Very low GPA

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>Hey guys,</p>

<p>So I've struggled to stay motivated about school for my first two years of high school (now a rising senior) and I realize I probably screwed myself in regards to getting into any top school. I'm reasonably intelligent (or so I'd like to think), but never really bothered to try to keep my gpa up. I was wondering what chances I'd have at these schools with a low gpa.</p>

<p>Male, Asian
MA
Junior, Class of 2017</p>

<p>SATs: 2320
750 Critical Reading
770 Math
800 Writing</p>

<p>Sat Subject Tests:
770 Chemistry
760 World History
750 Biology
Taking Math 2 in October, probably should get 770-800</p>

<p>Unweighted GPA: 3.4
Weighted GPA: 3.9
Class rank: School doesn't rank</p>

<p>AP Classes Taken:</p>

<p>World History
US History
Chemistry
Biology
My school doesn't offer AP math until senior year, or AP english at all</p>

<p>Senior year AP Classes:</p>

<p>AP Econ
AP C Physics
AP BC Calculus</p>

<p>EC:</p>

<p>4 years of baseball (varsity letter)
AAU/legion baseball during summers
4 years of indoor track (varsity letter)
Volunteer T.A at my local chinese school (about 200 hours)
Helping my dad run his online restaurant ordering business (I help him run the site, design restaurant pages, make sales calls etc.) <- Not sure if this counts?</p>

<p>But yeah, my ECs are pretty limited, so I'm planning on pouring my heart and soul into my essay.</p>

<p>Don't know if this matters but I go to a public school that is pretty well represented among top schools. Usually around the top 10% (out of a graduating class of 500) end up going to an Ivy or equivalent. Unfortunately I'm not one of them so this doesn't apply to me but I just thought I'd throw it out there.</p>

<p>I've accepted the fact that I'm bound for mediocrity college-wise, but I was just wondering what my chances of salvation were.</p>

<p>(originally posted this in Uchicago board but I'd like to get a better read on all my schools)</p>

<p>Other reach schools I'm considering:
Swarthmore (Not sure if realistic, guidance counselor said I had a chance if I ED?)
UChicago (Not sure if realistic either)
Brandeis
William & Mary
Carleton
Colgate
NYU Stern
Michigan Ross</p>

<p>Thanks if you made it this far</p>

2

<p>Everything is good except for your GPA. If you explained what your situation was and how you’ve improved so immensely, I’m sure they’ll understand. The low GPA will affect your chances but it doesn’t mean you have absolutely no chance at all.</p>

3

<p>Your GPA isn’t low. This is sad.</p>

4

<p>@gomdorri That’s encouraging to hear. Only problem is that I don’t really have a valid excuse other than immaturity lol.</p>

<p>@cathyandrade Are you sure you’re looking at my unweighted gpa?</p>

5

<p>If anything I would EA to U Chicago. They are playing the numbers game to get to the coveted Top 5 spot in USNWR, so they will love your high SAT score. Additionally they weight essays quite heavily so if you do well on those you may have a solid shot.</p>

6

<p>the fact that you have scored 770 in Chem SAT clearly shows that you are a very smart person. All other SAT scores are also excellent. Once you are in college, nobody will ever ask you what your HS GPA is. What matters is college GPA.</p>

7

<p>Is swarthmore or bowdoin realistic provided I ED?</p>

8

<p>GPA is low, but mine is lower. :stuck_out_tongue: Apply you have a good shot, especially with those SATs. One friend of mine got into Princeton with a 3.5 GPA but really good ECs. Try, you never know. Try to improve your senior year, make straight A’s. Don’t worry about ECs much,you have good ECs, try to do more volunteering if you can.
And yes, make a kick-ass essay. Essay can really determine college admin. if they want you or not. Along with others, like awards or recommendations. :slight_smile:
Also what are you majoring in?</p>

9

<p>your gpa is better than average, not low(like 2.8)</p>

10

<p>

</p>

<p>This is why your GPA will be problematic for the colleges and universities you’ve mentioned.</p>

<p>Most of the colleges you’ve named don’t have to take a chance on anyone. They can fill their freshman class and their wait list and never take a student who’s been an underachiever in the past. And while your GPA, as others have noted, is not bad, it is both low for the colleges you’ve targeted and out of line with your top-flight standardized test scores.</p>

<p>If any of the colleges or universities you’ve named is going to accept you, they’ll need to be persuaded that you’re not going to lose motivation and underperform while you’re in college. How will you convince them that this is the case? What can you offer them that’s better than the assurance, “I really, really won’t?”</p>

11

<p>Uh, some boys take longer to mature? :slight_smile: Yeah, I really have no idea. Brandeis does seem to be more forgiving gpa wise, and traditionally favors higher test scores (at least according to my schools naviance chart). </p>

<p>At this point I’m strongly leaning towards a finance route, probably going IB after college and hopefully ending up in hedge funds. However, none of these are really target schools (besides Chicago), so I’m considering joining Brandeis’ 3-2 program which gets me into Columbia. This does tack on an extra year though, so I was wondering (provided I do well of course) would I be able to/would it be worth it to transfer to a target school such as Cornell or UPenn after freshman year? My motivation won’t be a problem in college. If I’ve learned anything from high school, it’s that I really need to step up my game.</p>

12

<p>Your test scores are great so that should help you make up for your gpa even though it isn’t very low. If you have a strong essay and good recommendations you should be fine. Try to stand out</p>

13

<p>Is this regarding applying out of high school or transferring?</p>

14

<p>Wow your GPA is really not that bad >>. What’d you do, get a couple of B’s.</p>

15

<p>More than a couple Xp</p>

16

<p>Can someone please tell me what my chances are of getting into a good UC? My designated goal is UCLA, for their psychology program; they have the best CLINICAL psychology program in the entire us, and are ranked the 4th best for psychology in the country. </p>

<p>So the problem is my gpa is not very high at all. I hear that UC’s only look at your soph/jr year, and i have just completed my soph year and going onto jr year next fall.Can someone tell me if colleges look at your cumulative gpa for soph/jr year (as in your overall gpa for that one year) or your semester grades for both of those years? (as in the two gpa’s you’ve received for each of those years. </p>

<p>Soph year first semester i had all A’s and 2 C’s, (maybe one B) and second semester i had 3 A’s and 3 B’s with a gpa of 3.5
My cumulative gpa for soph year is 3.29. Notice how if they were to look at semester gpa rather than cumlative gpa my grades would look a lot better seeing that I improved second semester with a higher gpa. </p>

<p>soph year sched:
Alg 2
Vietnamese 1
Chemistry
PE 2
Eng 2A
World history</p>

<p>I did not take many ap classes soph year, but am taking ap eng and ap psychology (since i want to major in psych) to try to make up for soph year. Junior year i plan (or really hope) on getting at least a 4.0 as my gpa. </p>

<p>EC so far:

  • badminton (soph year and planning on joining jr year again)
  • volunteer at innvision homeless shelter (summer of 2012 and 2013)
  • volunteer for summer adventures camp counselor at innvision (summer of 2012 and 2013)
  • volunteer to teach/ta vietnamese catholic students vietnamese language and amatuer biblical studies every saturday (junior year)
  • i am currently looking for a highschool internship to a psychology-major based place (as in a counseling center, therapist office, psychiatric department at hospital) etc. , or at least a place i can volunteer so it could stand out on my college app for my psycholgy path
    -key club (jr and senior year planning on joining)
    -interact (jr and senior year planning on joining)</p>

<p>This is all i have so far, and i hope that junior year i will bring up my gpa A LOT so i can compete with all these great applications that are being submitted into ucla or any other uc. </p>

<p>Can someone please give me an HONEST opinion on what my chances are of getting into ucla or a uc? I was hoping that i can make up for my low soph gpa by getting a high one junior year, and that my ec could make up for lots of it. I plan on take stats and physio senior year to also continue showing my psych major path, and i plan on getting reccomdation letters from the places i am volunteering at and from my badminton coach. I don’t want to get my hopes up for ucla and then get crushed. someone please give me a vague idea please? don’t stack it too hard on me if it’s a no though, i know i still have two more years of highschool left to do better. thank you!!! & please help!!</p>