<p>I have come to the US two years ago as a refugee and have been trying to get into grad school ever since. I took the GRE and received 1540/1600, I also took the TOEFL twice and got 117/120 and 119/120 (had to do it twice because it expired), at the time (2010), I did not know what GPA my overseas undegraduate degree of Computer Engineering (average:67%) would translate to, so I applied to UVa, VTech, GMU, VCU and Renssaeler. Naturally, I got rejected from all of them as my GPA turned out to be 2.25. The reason I did not so well was that I was under very difficult circumstances, as I have taken it in the middle of war (Iraq, 2006). </p>
<p>I went to the closest one, GMU, and described my situation. They suggested I apply for Non-Degree Graduate Studies and doing well in those. I applied to that and was rejected again. After having some discussions with admissions, they contacted me a few days later saying that I have been admitted after reconsidering my situation. This was in November 2011. </p>
<p>They recommended however that I take 2 Undegraduate classes before I re-apply, the CS GMu admissions includes a checklist which asks you if you’ve taken the equivalent of 8 particular classes (2 Calculus, 1 Discrete Math, and 5 CS classes). They only mentioned two but what I have been doing since 2011 was re-taking all of those checklist classes to give a stronger impression and also to provide myself with a stronger foundation. I have received As in the 5 I’ve taken so far, and I have three left. I am, however, considering taking one particularly difficult graduate class the advisor mentioned at one point as a good indicator of how well can a student do in grad school before re-applying to the masters as well. </p>
<p>My question is two-fold:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>How much of an impact would taking those classes would do in general? While I feel that they have been sympathetic to my case so far but 2.25 is still abysmally low. I should note that I have received As in every single class I have taken in USA (I took 3 other classes in 2011 in addition to the checklist classes), and my GRE and TOEFL scores are high enough that I believe it should demonstrate that my GPA does not reflect my true potential. But I’m still worried about that. </p></li>
<li><p>For Fall 2012, I am considering either taking the three remaining Undergraduate checklist classes (9 undegrad credits), or taking only two of these plus the hard graduate Algorithms class (6 undergrad, 3 graduate), the latter route seems more impressive to me, but I run the risk of not getting the As I want (I work for 30 hours a week), which course of action seems more reasonable?</p></li>
</ol>