International student-australia

oli886 · 10-12-2009, 07:56 AM

hey everyone

um i am actually applying for columbia college in 2015
i am wondering would the australian schooling and course system impact my chances of being accepted into the college as i am very passionate and serious about this

first of all there is no such thing as AP or honour (honor) courses in australian schools, so this can be a problem in showing my academic abilities and achievements

secondly, each student takes a different selection of subjects but it has to be a minimum of 10 units (higher units mean a more challenging course, max 4 units and only for particular subjects), therefore we do not have overall rankings

i currently do
1. economics (2u)
2.maths (4u, equivalent 1st yr american university)
3.business studies (3u)
4.english adv (2u)
5.visual arts (2u)

this means that i do not study any science related subjects, would that be a problem?

also our GPA system is completely different, out of 15, so i am not sure how the college board would view this as 13/15 would be in the top 5-10 percent, but without this knowledge, 13/15 does not look appealing

for my SAT i will most likely achieve around 2200 or 2300
i am hoping to make a difference in my personal essays, i have a very serious attitude and manner but i deliver in a down to earth and passionate way

i would appreciate any suggestions and pointers
particularly from international students, especially from australia (which is virtually non-existent in columbia)

thanks heaps

yescolumbia · 11-03-2009, 10:34 PM

Well i personally think you should get yourself a set of strong extra curricular activities focusing on community service and leadership. Everyone applying has strong academics so it isn't even a big of deal. =) but good luck! you have time to build up your resume =)

Aininor · 11-03-2009, 10:56 PM

Hello there! I'm a fellow aussie here

Judging from your gpa out of 15, I guess you're not in NSW eh? Because if you're, Yale/UPenn/Columbia/Princeton/Georgetown have international AO coming down to sydney each year to give an information seminar thing. I've been to quite a few of them and they do stress that they do as much as possibl to understand the australian curriculum to put applicants into context. They do understand about HSC curriculums, ATAR/ENTER etc. I think the ENTER will give them th ebest indicator of your academic ability since it's a national rank. Check out the aussie thread in the international student forum for more info - there are quite a few aussies around here, and someone from ACT was accepted to Columbia last year so good luck

Ruby_x3 · 11-04-2009, 06:59 AM

What Aininor said!

"Yale/UPenn/Columbia/Princeton/Georgetown have international AO coming down to sydney each year to give an information seminar thing."
Didn't know that. Gah why does everything have to be in sydney and only sydney! I hope they understand the OP system too. I was on Northwestern university website and they had a section for aussie students where they listed the names of the diploma's they accept and had every state's diploma except Queensland's. Discrimination much??