Different choices for college

chloebrun
Tue, 11 May 2021 09:33:20 +0000

Hello everyone,

So here is my problem. It’s going to be a little long and maybe complicated to understand but I really need a quick answer to this question. (In advance, I’m very grateful for any advice you can give me )

I am a 16 years-old French student in Première (the equivalent of junior year in USA). I never was interested in studying in France and my dream always was to go in an American College, and in particular…NYU. I know this pretty ambitious but I think I’m someone really dertemined and I have many qualities that might interest them. I have a pretty good level in English and of course I’m fluent in French (it’s my native language). I also practice a few other languages like Spanish (that I study in my highschool), Russian and a little Polish. I have a quite high level in literary subjects so I think I could make a good essay for when I apply in college. I have several extracurrical activities but none of them at a really high level (I can play piano, I’m always reading, I love to draw and I take ballet and contemporary dance lessons) ← I don’t know if it’s important I’m just putting it to expound the whole situation.

My problem is: I had some family problems my last 2 years in high school. I know it’s easy to say that but for this reason, I wasn’t particularly involved in my studies. When I say that, I mean that my grades were not incredibly good.

The grade system is different in France, we don’t have letter grades but number grades, the most often out of 20. So last year and in the year before, my overall average in the year was aproximatively 14/20. It’s definitely not catastrophic,it’s actually pretty good, it might be the equivalent of an A- (but correct me if I’m wrong). The thing is, I know I can have way better grades. My last trimester (it’s not semester in France) was pretty good (16/20) and I think I could keep those grades in my last year in highschool.

But… If I want to apply in colleges, even if I apply in regular decision, universities won’t really see my results in Terminale (it’s the equivalent of senior year in France) because we have to apply very early. I’m concerned about the fact that 14/20 may be not enough for a university like NYU.

So, the first solution I thought about was taking a gap year and THEN apply to universities. It will allow me to have the entirety of my gradebook (I’m not sure about this word ) Besides, it could be an opportunity to do many things interesting in my gap year, like travelling, volunteering, improving my english, working to save money for college costs, taking the time to complete my registration files and take the tests (SAT, TOEFL)…
Except that I heard that universities prefer that students apply first and then ask to be deferred for a year. But that solution isn’t what I need because it still means that universities won’t see the results of my senior year.

So I am completely lost. Should I take the risk to take a gap year and then apply to universities?

There might be another option but I don’t know if it makes sense. I could only apply to NYU next year ( because it’s my first choice).

1rst possible situation: I’m rejected, I take my gap year anyway. At the end of this year I re-apply to NYU (so they can see all my results and maybe the volunteering I would have done in my gap year) and others universities. If NYU reject me again, I’ll make sure I have a less elitist university that would have accepted me.
2nd possible situation: By the merest chance, NYU accept me despite my average grades and the fact that I didn’t do volunteering. If that happens, I ask to be deferred for one year.

Phew… So it’s finally the end of this thread. If you have any questions, I’d be happy to answer anything. I’m aware this is hard to understand but I wanna thank anyone who has read to this point even if you don’t have a solution to suggest. Maybe some questions gonna sound stupid for an American but, since I’m not completely familiar with the university system in USA, many sentences must be clumsy for you. Finally, I’m sorry if there are some grammar/spelling/syntax/vocabulary mistakes, I’m clearly not completely fluent in this language.

Have a nice day everyone