How do I explain my poor academic performance during some of my past semesters to people on a college admissions committee?

Applying to College
41

Nothing wrong with that. You can’t get in if you don’t apply.

It sounds like you have need. Some colleges provide need aid even to transfers. Most of them are selective but you never know. This is a who meets need for first years list but you can google the names and see if they meet need for all students, which would include transfers.

For example, Bowdoin says this - Bowdoin meets all admitted transfer students’ full demonstrated need.. On the other hand, Tufts says this - Although the financial aid budget at Tufts is substantial, it is a finite resource that is available on a limited basis to entering transfer students.

So you need to find, maybe a less competitive meets need that provides full coverage to transfers - such as Macalester which says:

Macalester is one of a small number of colleges that is committed to providing a financial aid package equal to one-hundred percent of demonstrated financial need for every admitted student and offers a robust program of merit-based scholarships.

Then you’ll need to have your guardian fill out their net price calculator to see if that meets need school will provide you a price to match what you or your grandma is willing to pay. But the NPC will be filled out by your parent/guardian, not grandma.

I put Mac’s NPC below.

Best of luck.

Here’s Every College That Offers 100% Financial Aid · PrepScholar

Getting Started | Net Price Calculator

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*live instead of “luce”

*centuries instead of “decades

44

I’m concerned that some people, including those on appeals committees, will believe in what one could call a “Just World Fallacy.” I’m concerned they’ll be like Job’s comforters and have a (perhaps religiously motivated and/or conservative) belief that those who struggle and suffer must have done something to deserve it and/or cause it

That’s a big part of why I dislike “focusing on the gloomy bits.” I know, through experience and literature and logic, that some people will use any negative disclosure against me. I don’t want that to negatively effect my academics

Am I being reasonable here?

If I am, then I must admit, that’s incredibly frustrating. Distressing experiences that would effect anyone could be used against and used to justify and compound hardship caused by social systems I have little control over.

I can’t say I have much sympathy for a system that functions like that. I like learning, but not elitism and compounding privilege.

I think education should teach people about the wonders of the world, teach them how perform complex tasks, and reduce inequality, not exacerbate inequality and make people feel bad for being marginalized and violated.

In truth, I don’t really believe in free will or meritocracy, and I have a hard time translating my experiences and beliefs into an institutional framework that assumes those things.

I also don’t like personal narratives very much. Life isn’t like a story, and something is lost and misrepresented in fitting one’s experiences into a narrative structure, especially one that involves a prelapsarian beginning, conflict, and a distinct, perhaps teleological end, which seems common in “hardship” essays.

What is lost my be unstructured representations of what people were like, the phenomenology of love and pain.

I don’t want to lose that.

When I was eighteen I started to photograph. I became social and started drinking and wanted to remember the details of what happened. For years, I thought I was obsessed with the record-keeping of my day-to-day life. But recently, I’ve realized my motivation has deeper roots: I don’t really remember my sister. In the process of leaving my family, in recreating myself, I lost the real memory of my sister. I remember my version of her, of the things she said, of the things she meant to me. But I don’t remember the tangible sense of who she was, her presence, what her eyes looked like, what her voice sounded like.

I don’t ever want to be susceptible to anyone else’s version of my history.

I don’t ever want to lose the real memory of anyone again.

Nan Goldin, The Ballad of Sexual Dependency

I’m more like a Harawayan cyborg than an atomized liberal self. I have no innocent orgin or telos.

The cyborg does not dream of community on the model of the organic family, this time with-out the oedipal project. The cyborg would not recognize the Garden of Eden; it is not made of mud and cannot dream of re-turning to dust.

Donna Haraway, A Cyborg Manifesto

How am I supposed to translate my experiences into a framework that may presuppose ideas I find alien and pernicious.

45

I think most will tell you not to. You need to sell admissions on what value you add to campus. A tragic upbringing may bring people to tears but it doesn’t say - here’s why I belong on campus and here’s the value I add. That’s what you need to show.

If you believe what you say, it’s great and you are reasonable. Unfortunately, short of a school with a we will admit you with a certain GPA, you don’t have a say. In other words, you want someone to buy in on your potential and it’s a nice thought. But in the end, they decide, not you. So you may not be unreasonable, but it’s their reasonableness that matters.

You’re going to struggle in life unless in certain roles. Most - whether it’s ability or personality - is based on a meritocracy. There are public roles, etc. that might not be but those are becoming less and less.

Yes be yourself - but you are trying to get into an affordable college so you need to work within the system.

OK - i’m not sure what you are trying to accomplish with these continued posts since it seems like you’ve gotten what you needed.

But you might one day write a book on the philosophies of Pearlyparrotfish.

OK - out.

46

I would focus your explanation on your situation stabilizing and stress the recent improvement in your grades.

You’ve been through so much but for colleges, you don’t want to give them the details you shared here. You don’t want to say anything to hint that you may not have the educational foundation to be prepared for more rigor.

I would keep that past super brief- “very unstable home life” or something like that, and then focus on what you have accomplished and your goals. Also the support system you have now to be successful.

Make sure you remediate any of the classes you failed.

Best of luck to you!!

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47

You may not “believe in meritocracy” (not even sure what that means) but the entire premise of your admissions strategy is- in fact- based on some notion of a meritocracy. A college should take a chance on you based on your intellectual potential and curiosity, and not base it on your family of origin, your income level and socio-economic status, etc.

So I’d rethink your beliefs…

You’ve had challenges in life, no doubt, and kudos to you for coming out of your experiences strong and confident. You’ve got grit- which is probably the single best predictor of a person being able to achieve their goals. But I think you need to reckon with the fact that no “system” (college education, health care and medical, financial aid, criminal justice, public transportation, credit and banking, etc.) is going to align perfectly with any single individual. That’s not how systems are designed, that’s not the goal. These systems end up being a patchwork which hopefully accommodate as many people as possible without marginalizing (too much) large groups of people.

They are imperfect. We are all imperfect.

You might see a less complicated way forward for yourself if you stop trying to optimize for every single item on your wish list…. and just figure out “here are my top three, now I want to move ahead and achieve two of these”.

So compromise on geography/politics. Or compromise on the time it will take you to finish. Or figure out a workaround financially (yes, that will mean roommates. Living alone is a luxury item for most young people, even ones with solid professional jobs, a good paycheck and health insurance).

But tying yourself up in knots trying to bend a “system” to the way you want it to work for you is frustrating and timeconsuming.

Once you’ve simplified your needs the “explanation” of poor academic performance will write itself. You are an ambitious, hard-working and well read/self taught person who craves a college education and despite the challenges and sub-par performance you’ve had, you are ready to move forward.

“I’m concerned that some people, including those on appeals committees, will believe in what one could call a “Just World Fallacy.” I’m concerned they’ll be like Job’s comforters and have a (perhaps religiously motivated and/or conservative) belief that those who struggle and suffer must have done something to deserve it and/or cause it”.

This represents zero academics/folks in higher education that I know/have known. Admittedly, I don’t know any adcoms at Oral Roberts or Liberty. But even at BYU, other religiously affiliated universities, this is NOT their worldview vis-a-vis students who have struggled in life. Please don’t grind your gears worrying about this- it is a non-issue. And YOUR interpretation of Job is not universally held, btw. Their are entire belief systems that do not take this message away.

Good luck.

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48

@PearlyParrotfish

A way to bypass the necessity of a lengthy “personal life” explanation is to make it less relevant to understanding your record. Which would mean, more classes establishing your bona fide as a strong college student.

Is your sister ok w/moving with you out of state? Would she be okay working and taking only part time/community education remedial classes at first? Does she have a full HS diploma or would she need to take further HS classes to be college-ready?

A solution, which you alluded to, is for you to move to another state (with your sister if she’s okay with it) - a state with a solid public university system. Move there and work for a couple months. Do you feel you’d be able to do that? It’d mean finding an apartment - and yes, likely, roommates, and might even require you to share a room with your sister. Handling groceries&cooking etc. while holding down a job. Once you’ve managed all that, add community college classes, three max, probably just 2- some in Arts/Humanities and some related to your major. Make sure to get As. Build at least one year of record with straight As to decrease the weight of your earlier grades.
In addition, change your voter registration and your driver’s license to your new state’s as this is usually necessary to be considered a resident.
Under these conditions, a year of full time work (and no full time college) would qualify you as a resident in several states.
Note that in some states no matter how long YOU live there you’re still considered a resident of the state your parents live in.
I assume you’re 20+ at this point if your sister is 18, are you? Because you’d need to be 24 to be considered “independent for federal financial aid purpose” and in many states.

A Community College I know with strong Humanities offerings alongside solid transfer, technical, and career degrees is the public St Paul College, located in St Paul, MN. The State would be welcoming to you as a Trans/GNC person, has excellent public higher education, and you’d qualify for state financial aid after a year I think (= check) if you work full time and only take part time classes at first. The Twin Cities have several colleges where you could then transfer if you commute and which your sister also could attend: St Kate’s, Hamline, Augsburg, St Thomas, and the most well-known, Macalester and UMN-Twin Cities. Several state universities (St Cloud, Mankato, UMN Morris, I believe) don’t have OOS tuition.
The weather’s not for the faint hearted though :innocent:

This is just one example.
@Sweetgum might have better recommendations

As for how to frame it:
It’d be in “Additional Information”.
Something like : I was homeschooled/unschooled for 7 years in an unstable home situation, which left gaps I have tried to fill during my first two years of community college. As my subsequent record shows, once these gaps were filled I have been able to achieve academically.
AND
Have your current adviser write a letter of recommendation that details your initial struggles due to the homeschooling/unschooling situation, and how you rectified the gaps through grit, curiosity, and strong reading skills.

^This would be more potent if you have a string of As and Bs on your record, making you a borderline admit without the explanation. And the explanation just the little nudge in your favor (vs. the explanation doing the heavy lifting).

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49

One of my kids is trans and I get the reluctance to go to school in your state. It is about psychic and even physical safety.

You seem very intelligent and original.

There is essay help here on CC. You can put in a request. I know I would love to work with you!

The additional info section can be helpful to you, as someone suggested. An example: one of my kids chose not to write about having type 1 diabetes since age 4 in an essay. Instead they wrote just a few lines in the additional info section, describing how, in the hospital, they folded their clothes neatly hoping if they were good enough, the diabetes would go away.

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