Am I aiming too high?

ohiopop
Tue, 02 Jun 2015 03:01:53 +0000

I agree, while grades and test scores don’t define you or show how good you are as a candidate, it is the first thing they see, and your ticket to the “outer circle”, most especially the grades. With a 2.8 GPA (BTW, you don’t have do worry about “what GPA to submit” as your school will submit your weighted GPA based on your school’s formula, and colleges will compute your GPA based on their own formula) plus your SAT subject tests in the 500-600 range, you are probably out of the running for U Chicago, and perhaps to Vanderbilt, NYU, Barnard and other schools of the same caliber. You need a longer list of safety school and match schools. But there is no harm in applying to some top schools…you never know! Just don’t get your hopes up on them.

If you can repeat your subject tests, that will help. It might be easier to raise the SAT 2 scores substantially than your SAT 1 score, although you should try your best to improve on that too.

Good luck to you!