o my nephew is a high school senior, here are his stats and at the end I will be listing the schools he wants to apply to.
GPA= 3.2 unweighted, 3.9 weighted (goes to top magnet school in his state and has been on an upward trend ever since the start of his junior year, ranks 35 out of a class of 82 students). He started out slow his first 2 years at a magnet school.
Test Scores: 800 math, 790 reading and 780 writing. He scored that on his second attempt.
34 on the ACT and he made the following on the subject tests for the SAT
US History: 710
Biology: 740
Volunteer Hours: About 40, 12 of them spent on cleaning up a lake and the rest spent in a hospital working with doctors.
Extra Curricular activities: Soccer Team member, a fitness program captain at his school, HOSA member, Tennis Player, Ecology Club member, started his own SAT Club to help students raise their scores, Academic Decathlon team captain, and he won governor’s honors in Social Studies (US History), Economics and Math.
Other special things: Won an essay competition for the Bantam Classic company in his local area and as a result he was recognized by a congressman from his state. Also he won an essay competition in his school, as a result he had to read the essay out loud in front of everyone in the gym.
State of residence: GA
Colleges on his list (he already applied to his safeties and matches, now he has made his reach school list):
University of Virginia at Charlottesville
Harvard University
Yale University
Princeton University
Columbia University
Brown University
Northwestern University
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Georgetown
Boston College
and Johns Hopkins
Does he have a chance at ANY of those universities or does his GPA basically eliminate his chances at the top schools?
asked this on college confidential and I did not get any good replies, all were insults hurled at my nephew and it was a waste of time
The problem is that all of these schools are very competitive for everyone. Boston College is the easiest for admission of those listed, but it admits only about a quarter of its qualified applicants and many qualified applicants will have higher GPAs. Of the listed Ivies, Harvard and Brown are probably the least rigid in their admissions policies–the admissions officers seem to have more discretion, rather than just going by the numbers. If I were in this student’s shoes, I would apply to the three colleges I have mentioned. They are all "reaches". I would apply to Georgia and Georgia Tech as "matches" and to an easier state university campus in Georgia as a "safety". For additional private colleges, I would suggest American University in DC and Drew University in NJ.
Best wishes.
December 6th, 2009 at 7:40 am
The problem is that all of these schools are very competitive for everyone. Boston College is the easiest for admission of those listed, but it admits only about a quarter of its qualified applicants and many qualified applicants will have higher GPAs. Of the listed Ivies, Harvard and Brown are probably the least rigid in their admissions policies–the admissions officers seem to have more discretion, rather than just going by the numbers. If I were in this student’s shoes, I would apply to the three colleges I have mentioned. They are all "reaches". I would apply to Georgia and Georgia Tech as "matches" and to an easier state university campus in Georgia as a "safety". For additional private colleges, I would suggest American University in DC and Drew University in NJ.
Best wishes.
References :
US News 2009 college edition.
December 6th, 2009 at 7:45 am
Not seeing anything that makes this particular student a stand out. There is nothing here to differentiate this students from the sea of barely above average students he will be competing with for admissions. All of these schools turn down PERFECT students with stellar transcripts. He’s going to need to lower his standards a bit and get realistic.
My cousin is a child prodigy who composed music at age eight, taught music at age 14, had perfect scores, stats and impressive credentials and barely got into Princeton.
Nearly everyone of these schools is out of your nephew’s reach, I’m afraid. With the exception of U of VA
References :