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3 years ago
Admissions Advice

Classes for next year?

Hi, I'm a junior who goes to a very competitive school. Today, three students got into Ivies on regular decision. How scheduling works is I have 8 full-year slots to fill up with full-year or semester (half-year) courses. For example, I can take 6 full-year and 4 semester courses. My intended major is entrepreneurship. These are the courses I have requested for next year, but want to change:

AP LIT (I don't plan on taking the exam)

AP CALCULUS BC

AP STATISTICS

PHYS ED 12-SEMESTER

HEALTH 12-SEMESTER

AP ECONOMICS (covers both the macro and micro exams)

AP COMP SCI PRINCIPLES (might not take the exam)

AP FRENCH LANG/CULT

ENTREPRENEURSHIP-SEMESTER (business course)

FINANCIAL LITERACY-SEMESTER

I can take any combination of PE, Health, and/or Financial Lit for $200 each over the summer. All are graduation requirements. The reason I want to take AP Lit is I want to boost the strength of my coursework, but there is no Honors option for English, which is another requirement. I see no reason to take the exam. I think my best option is to take both PE and Health over the summer for $400, and replace them with a full-year course. I would like to know if I should replace them with a free period/study hall, or another course relevant to my major, such as a course in business law, public speaking, student leadership, or international business.

For further context, I am striving to get into a school like U of Michigan, U of North Carolina, Georgia Tech, or Babson College. Other schools on my list include UT Austin, Carnegie Mellon, and Northeastern, but I think I would most like to attend one of the first four. My UW GPA was a 3.88 during freshman/sophomore year, but plummeted to a 3.25 due to mental health problems by the middle of junior year. I'm aiming for a minimum 1500 on the SAT. Would taking another course in place of PE and health help me be a stronger candidate for these schools?

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2 answers

1
3 years ago[edited]

6 APs during senior year is a very very heavy load. I would not recommend to anyone to take 6 APs. At most 4 or 5 but then again you are a special case because you said your GPA is on the low side and you are trying to end your HS career on an upward trend. I think if you take 5 or 6 APs and get all As in them, that is enough of an upward trend for any AO to recognize. Nevertheless it does not and will not fully compensate for your 3.25 UWGPA.

I wouldn't recommend delaying your HS diploma by taking PE/Health over the summer. I think it would be better to draw a line in the sand next year and say you are going to try your best but graduate on time with all your HS requirements.

Right now it's a good time to do a realistic inventory of your common app narrative and kind of plug in all the data and see if you have some serious gaps or not.

Have you taken the SAT yet? and if so what did you get so far. If you are 100-200 pts away from a 1500+ score, it's going to take most of the summer to grind on the SAT prep to get there by the August testing date.

One immediate thing that comes to mind are your school choices. You should know that large state schools especially stem related one like the ones you picked are very fussy about high GPAs, course rigor and and if you plan on submitting a test scores it needs to be high because STEM publics are pushing 1500 these days. I would seriously consider adding some private colleges because the admissions office will spend more time on your application and evaluate it more holistically. I don't really understand the GPA scale at some of these schools but Gtech is 4.09 and UNC is like 4.39 and UMich is like a 3.9.

Since you are interested in entrepreneurship or business, I'd consider these schools as well because they have lower GPA averages than your list.

-Fordham University (3.68)

-Santa Clara University (3.69)

-University of Richmond (3.71)

-Indiana University-Bloomington (3.89)

-Syracuse University (3.74)

-Boston University (3.79)

-Bucknell University (3.64)

-Tulane University (3.58)

-University of Miami (3.65)

-American University (3.58)

Good luck!

1
0
3 years ago

I would recommend that if you do want to take PE and Health over the summer you replace them with classes that are close to your major because you can write about that in your college app about your interest in those fields. However at the same time, your schedule already looks really packed and taking PE and Health during the year can act as a sort of "free-period." It really comes down to if you think you can handle more classes, if you think you can then opt to take PE and Health over the summer. Another way that you can boost your coursework is by taking dual enrollment (if your school offers it but most schools do). These are basically classes offered by your local community college and give you college credit without having to take a test at the end. Plus, most schools add them as a weighted grade so it can help boost your GPA as well. If I were in your shoes, I would look into dual enrollment and if it is available take PE and Health over the summer so I could take dual enrollment during the school year. However at the end of the day it really comes down to if you think you can handle it and based off your other classes, which are all really rigorous, I think you could! Hope this helped, good luck!

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Unweighted GPA: 3.7
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SAT: 720 math
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| 800 verbal
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