College recommendations? Majors?

Applying to College
1

<p>Hi, this is gonna be long.
Goal
I want to go to somewhere in the UC system, preferably UCSD, Boston University, or Boston College. Essentially either northeast or Pacific coast. I want to study natural biology at the moment and pursue pre med qualifications and then move on to med school.
Facts
I am a junior in a very tough(ranked tough, not opinion) public high school. I was born in Argentina to a Brazilian-American-Italian father and a Panamanian mother. I have gone to school in Florida, Venezuela, Puerto Rico, Texas, and Brazil. I speak English, Spanish, and Portuguese. I have played soccer my entire high school career up until now. I will be the an editor of my school newspaper(which is nationally recognized) my senior year. I have logged a bunch of community service hours and have worked in Brazilian favelas. I have taken rigorous courses thus far…and still do.
8th Grade Average Grades
Honors Algebra 1: 92
Spanish 1:93
Freshman Average Grades(Only Including core/essential classes)
Gifted/Talented English:86
Honors Geometry: 86
Honors Biology: 87
Honors World History: 90
Honors Spanish 2: 89
Newspaper: 99
Un weighted: 89.5
Weighted(Including all classes that year): 95.6</p>

<p>I really wasn’t mature enough and focused that year. </p>

<p>Sophomore Year(Including core/essential classes)
Gifted/Talented English:90
Honors Algebra 2: 91
Chem:92
Honors World History: 88 (class was haaaaaaaaaaaaard)
Honors Spanish 3: 89
Newpaper: 98
Unweighted of grades above :91.333
Weighted of all classes: 96.8
Made national honors society as well as honor roll. </p>

<p>Junior year thus far(First semester at a brazilian american school that grades on the 4.0 scale)
Honors Pre calc - A
Honors Physics- B
English Normal-A
Switched at quarter to AP english-B
US History- A-
AP Euro-B+ or A minus, this is projected as she has not graded the final yet
Photography- A
Portuguese-B
Finals haven’t been graded yet so I don’t know the actual GPAs, all grades above are projected.</p>

<p>I’m in Brazil as a foreign exchange type thing. I go back to my other high school second semester.</p>

<p>I got an 1820 on my PSAT…i screwed it up
I got a 29 on my Practice ACT</p>

<p>I have yet to take the SAT or ACT, but I think I’ll do better on the ACT.</p>

<p>Question: Can I get into the UC schools, preferably UCSD, and/or some Northeast schools? What are some schools you guys recommend?</p>

2

<p>I don’t know much about the UCs (I’m from the east coast), but if you’re looking to do pre-med, I would rethink Boston University. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a great school and has a great pre-med program, but they deflate grades using a bell curve (meaning only the top ~5% of students receive an A, and most receive C’s). Though you might be performing just as well as students at other top universities, grad schools will be focused on your GPA, which will be considerably lower at BU. That being said, it’s just my opinion and you should definitely go with the school that fits you best, regardless of what I said about the curve. With a lot of hard work, you could be one of the select few students that receives all A’s there.
All I know about the UCs is that they’re difficult to get into OOS, but I’m sure that varies from school to school. From the looks of it, your ACT will be higher than your SAT, though that could change. Right now, your scores are a little low for schools such as Boston College, but you seem to have great international/unique experiences as well as leadership that could offset that. If you write killer essays that would give you an edge too (easier said than done, I know). I’m not exactly sure how far ‘Northeast’ extends for you, so I’ll continue with the Boston area. University of Massachusetts is somewhat similar to BU, though it is a public school, and would probably not give great financial aid to an out-of-stater, if that is an issue for you.
Sorry for the huge response, hopefully this helps!</p>