Would anyone mind chancing me?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Boston College
1

Demographics:

White male, currently living in VA. I am homeschooled, so I don’t know if that will play favorably or not to either of these schools.

Test scores/grades:

SAT: 1460 (690R/W, 770M) with a 16 on the essay
ACT: 30 composite (probably won’t submit since the SAT correlates to a high ACT score) with an 8 on the essay.
GPA: currently have a 3.97 unweighted gpa and a 4.23 weighted gpa (unfortunately haven’t been able to have lots of AP classes due to being homeschooled).

I also have a total of 14 college credits atm due to being dual enrolled and will have 21 by the end of this upcoming semester.

Dual enrollment courses taken: General psychology, General chemistry 1 with lab, Precalc, World Civ 1

I received As in all four of those courses, and I am taking Applied calculus 1 and General College Physics 1 this upcoming semester.

ECs:

Varsity debate/speech (10,11,12) 6hr/week 40week/year (Placed 8th in the state of NC and missed qualifying for nationals by one round).

Church youth group (9,10,11,12) 2hr/week 52week/year

Math tutor for high school/middle school kids (10,11,12) 3hr/week 36week/year

Geography camp helper (9,10,11,12) 30hr/week 1 week/yr

AWANA (basically just a church-related group that meets outside church) (10,11,12) 2hr/week 30week/year

Library internship (10) Haven’t calculated the hours/weeks but basically I helped lead a bookclub for 3rd-5th grades during the summer

Youth medical mentor ship: (9,10,11) (had to stop due to moving) 2hr/week 9week/year

Taking care of my dog? lol they have a family responsibility section on the common app and it’s something that i am responsible for at my home. It also takes a good amount of time, too. (10,11,12) 4hrs/week 52 weeks/year

Red Cross volunteer at naval hospital (9) 8hr/week 7week/year

I’m looking to apply as an econ/finance major (haven’t decided on one yet.

Thanks!!

2

Bump

3

Your EC’s are amazing, high SAT and my guess is colleges accept a number of home school students. Best of luck!

4

You look like a solid applicant. But in order to chance you, we need to know which colleges you’re looking at.

5

You stand an incredibly good chance. If you’re really worried, I would use this site called Naviance. It shows the GPA and SAT scores of the students admitted to a school. Based on what I’ve seen on the site, students have been admitted to BC with GPAs and SAT scores far lower. I wouldn’t stress over BC.

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Based on what I’ve seen on the site, students have been
admitted to BC with GPAs and SAT scores far lower.

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As well as applicants with a higher academic profile who did not get accepted.

@jsh323:
You have a respectable profile. Academics is only part of an application at schools like BC. Academics are often used to determine if you can handle the workload. Once it’s established you can, they then move on to the other more important parts of your application.

Give BC your all, but keep your “Plan B” school apps in good shape.

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Hey! Tons of my friends are homeschooled and some of them really benefited from the flexibility of their programs. Now, as far as chancing you, the truth is that I don’t think very many of us know how homeschooled applicants are evaluated. It is probably highly variable. If I were to guess (and this is only a guess), I think you have an slightly below average shot, unfortunately. This is partly because your SAT is only 2 points above the accepted student average of 1448. I wonder if, fair or unfair, homeschooled applicants tend to have more rigorous testing standards in the absence of objective grades (and because of the assumption that they have more time to study). Some schools require them to submit subject tests for this reason. You’ve got great grades (good job!). But dual enrollment courses tend to be viewed as relatively easier than AP courses taken at high schools (in fact, many high schools weigh them lower than AP courses when calculating wGPA). You’ll be competing with traditional students who have almost as many DE credits in addition to a full slate of AP and honors courses (I had 18 DE credits, for example, in addition to 12 AP classes). This is not to sneeze at your considerable accomplishments. I definitely think you have a reasonable shot, but I disagree with those suggesting you’re a lock (or close to it). .

The other potential bias working against you is that admissions might assume that with relatively more free time (or more flexibility in scheduling your time) that your ECs should be exceptional. It seems that your Speech and Debate work might be just that, though I don’t know enough about the field to know if it is. Be sure to highlight this in your essays. Speaking of which, the best thing you can do at this point is pull together some amazing essays that show a heart for service and for enriching the communities of which you are a part. I would also recommend retaking he SAT once more, focusing your preparation only on ELA (awesome math score btw!).

Good luck!

8

Whoops. Just noticed you have a 1460 SAT — I thought it was a 1450. Doubt it moves the needle too much, but it’ll probably upgrade your chances a smidge.

Again, I think you’re a solid applicant with an average shot. Boosting your Verbal SAT score if possible and writing killer essays will def help your case. Good luck.