Which colleges I should apply to in or close to my state/my chances at GMU or VCU?

College Search & Selection
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<p>Hey there, here goes my first post on this cool-looking forum,</p>

<p>I've just begun senior year and I should be graduating in 2011 from high school. I live in Virginia and I've been looking at colleges mostly in state. I'll give out the numbers right below, but I just wanted to say that I didn't do well in 10th grade in grades, which is why my weighted GPA is not a comfortable figure for some of the colleges I really like. I just want to say that I'm ready to recognize my chances and the realities and that I'm not trying to make excuses for my past shortfalls and make them seem like nothing; there were some issues and things going on in 10th grade that I won't go deep into in my college essay, I just want to show that I fell and got back up to move on (in grades, not literally). I took 1 SAT test, and I'm taking another one this October. I still don't know what I should major in, but I sort of like the sound of Business admin. But I have yet to see. Okay here are the figures:</p>

<p>Grade: Senior (graduating 2011)
Weighted GPA: 3.02
Unweighted (11th grade GPA): 3.28
SAT Score: 1610/2400
-SAT Critical Reading: 570
-SAT Writing: 520
-SAT Math: 520</p>

<p>9th grade GPA: 3.214
10th grade GPA: Somewhere between 2.7 and 2.8
11th grade GPA: 3.28</p>

<p>-From 10th to 11th grade I have completed 3 AP courses and 2 IB courses. This year I have 1 AP course and 2 IB classes (one of them is a double-bloc class which counts as two class grades at the end of the year).</p>

<p>Extracurricular Activities:</p>

<p>--School Sports--
-3 seasons of Indoor Track (2 Varsity letters, participated in county championship, +1 more season this winter)
-1 season of Tennis (started in 11th grade, 1 Varsity letter, +1 more season this spring)</p>

<p>--Volunteer/Work---
-Altar boy at my church (2+ hrs per week, have been doing so for 20+ months)</p>

<p>--Other stuff--
-My ethnicity is 'white'
-I'm a first gen in America and I speak 2 languages. But the language aside from English is my family's language, not a language I learned in school. Does this help or no? thanks!</p>

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<p>I reposted this same thread in the Chances forum, should I delete this? I don’t know how though</p>

3

<p>i’m not a fan of vcu, but that’s just me.</p>

<p>unlike the rest of my northern virginia peers, i actually like gmu.
nice area (better/safer than vcu’s) and “it’s close to d.c.” (my major is econ)
both are very similar in academics</p>

<p>my cousin goes to vcu and loves it. my other cousin goes to gmu and loves it.
they’re extremely similar, difference is vcu is bigger (although not too sure).</p>