My daughter was admitted to USC Engineering and just started her freshman year. Her ACT wasn’t great - 28 - but her diverse activities, leadership, GPA (3.93) and APs (11) made up for it. USC looks for well-rounded applicants and denies a lot of straight-A students with better grades and test scores than my daughter had. Do something spectacular your Junior year - challenge yourself. In my daughter’s case she completed a major award and served in a high leadership position at school, in addition to everything else she had going on (outside activities and work). She also did a college summer program before starting her senior year. You really have to go above and beyond to get into USC. I also strongly recommend visiting USC, learning everything there is to know about them and the department you want to study in, and doing an interview in person, either in your town or on campus. Also write spectacular essays - get help with this and complete your common app next summer so that you can focus on the USC essay questions once they come out. Good luck!