<p>My opinion is the OP should apply to UofM. No one can predict how they will interpret his/her application, what the high school counselor will say, what the recommendation will say. The OP should make the short trek to UoM and meet face to face with an admissions counselor if possible. We have no way to assess anything about the alternative high school the OP mentions. If the OP is interested in starting college in the fall of 2010, then the OP can also apply other places. If the OP is interested only in UofM then the accept or the rejection will determine what the OP does in the fall of 2010. UofM can make some surprising decisions sometimes.</p>
<p>But for heaven’s sake, have a back up plan! One of my D’s classmates reminds me of OP. The only NMSF I know of who didn’t make it to the Finalist designation because of his grades. He applied to Berkeley (flagship state school, like UMich). Wasn’t accepted–I don’t know what ever happened to him…</p>
<p>^^^</p>
<p>Good advice!! Have some back up plans!! :)</p>
<p>You’re making 120K/year? (Is that profit, or just total sales?)
Why bother going to college?</p>
<p>^Because he wants to help our pathetic society.</p>
<p>I was thinking about the educational lives of other people who certainly had trouble fitting the traditional college education mode. Maybe you can become the next Stephen Wolfram…</p>
<p>I cannot believe how appropriate that comparison is, given that our Integrator mastermind is a self-styled “mysterious genius.”</p>
<p>I suggest you get a reality check, OP. No one’s going to give you a chance if you condescend to them for providing one in the first place.</p>
<p>atomom@ It is total gross sales. However, our net profit margin is about 60%. I have no need to work, or attend university. I suppose this is reflected in my grades. However, I would like to be a researcher in science. My passion for discovery is not reflected in my grades.</p>
<p>^^Scientific research, especially biomedical or genomic research, is not something you can successfully tinker with alone in your bedroom or in your garage or . You will need a large and expensive infrastructure around you: buildings, labs, scientific equipment, fancy computers, chemicals, safety systems and licenses, etc. To get access to that you will need to be a part of some organization to provide them - a university, a biotech company, something.</p>
<p>So you need to ask yourself what you will need to have to offer a university or company that will make them choose you over all the other candidates. Unfortunately, what you will need will almost certainly include academic degrees and credentials.</p>
<p>OK, here is a thought. Sigh up for Stanford’s EPGY online HS, <a href=“http://epgy.stanford.edu/which[/url]”>http://epgy.stanford.edu/which</a> is fully accredited program, and was originally designed to provide rigorous fast paced academic courses for gifted students. You will be held accountable to a tutor [ from Stanford] for getting the work done by the deadlines, but since it is all online you can do it when you want to. EPGY is especially suitable for homeschooled gifted kids who are bored out of their minds in a regular HS.</p>
<p>OP, you remind me of another highly gifted student I personally knew well from my son’s school. He hated the HS he was accepted at, after 2 years homeschooled for HS, went to work at a high tech co for 4 years, and is now at Reed finally getting a degree. he could also probably have done without a college education, but needed to have that degree to get where he wanted to go, despite his IQ.</p>
<p>I interpreted the OP differently than many of you. My take is that he is rejecting the usual “do well in HS so that you can get into a good college so that you can get a good job and make a good living” path. He is financially secure and this makes no sense for him. He has easily mastered the material for 5 AP science and math courses, and he spends up to 4 hours a day studying on his own. He has a consuming desire to do research and to contribute to society. What some of you saw as arrogance - e.g., the “pathetic society” statement - I see as a tongue-in-cheek way of expressing himself. (I’m not sure why I am assuming that this is a male.)</p>
<p>He is not the first extremely bright student to get mediocre grades in HS, despite mastering the material. In my view, the failure of most HS to serve this population is a serious problem in our society; we can ill-afford to lose the potential of these students. I think it is likely that, if he is able to gain acceptance to a good college, he will do well there. Gaining acceptance is the problem. There have been some good suggestions about colleges that may accept him. I have another suggestion to make. I have no idea whether it’s a good idea or not, and I hope that others will chime in on the likelihood of success.</p>
<p>What about a “back door” path into a good college? If the OP were able to get a job as an assistant in a lab doing research he is interested in, there might be a chance to learn a great deal and make some contributions. As a university employee, wouldn’t he be able to take a few courses? If he did well in these courses and in the lab, he could apply to be a regular student at that university (or another one) with good grades in their courses and a glowing recommendation or two from their faculty. It seems to me that this would be a better way to spend a year or two than going to a junior college.</p>
<p>I like ClassicRockerDad’s suggestions way back in post #7. Find some rigorous but high acceptance rate U’s with good engineering programs to apply to. Michigan Tech, Purdue, a bunch of state flagships, etc. </p>
<p>I would imagine that the OP would be bored with community college. I would guess that with your grades/stats you could get into some decent 4-yr University with engineering. If you do well your first year or two, you could consider transferring to a more selective school.</p>
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<p>Those of you who have worked in university labs can probably address whether a person out of high school could snag one of these jobs or would a BS be required?</p>
<p>amazing - what little info the op has said compared to the incredible assumptions which some here have made in extending the benefit of the doubt. admissions departments in top schools are much harder to convince. in our hs district kids choosing the “alternative” school are not on track to procede to a research position (nb: not as a mere salary mule in the tech industry, but somehow associated with higher levels of academe) in genetic engineering! what a joke - get a grip, folks. such subjects are not easy, do not in fact lend themselves to home study, and the days of garage tinkering a la thomas edison are over. to the op check out the thread “Under 3.6 (GPA) and Applying Top 20 Parents Thread” which has lots of suggestions for aspiring underachievers like yourself. btw, realize that successful internet businesses have no lifetime guarantees for longterm continuity.</p>
<p>ellemeope, I do know a crazy bright young guy (friend of son) who did OK in high school, well enough to get into Big 10, and is doing tons of research as an undergrad. A prof invited him to work with him. He’s one of those kids that zigged when everyone else zagged. Not too great for public K-12 but well appreciated by college profs.</p>
<p>*If the OP were able to get a job as an assistant in a lab doing research he is interested in, there might be a chance to learn a great deal and make some contributions. *</p>
<p>Without a degree, the only job as a lab assistant he could get is basically doing “clean up” duty, not any real research. When that Yale pharmacy student was recently murdered by the lab assistant, he essentially did custodial work.</p>
<p>I really don’t think that the OP is willing to be the clean up lab guy for anyone.</p>
<p>So being accepted into a university that would have a good research program in an area of interest is going to be key. Then OP can get a research job as an undergraduate student and if the college part doesn’t work out, he could probably stay on as a researcher in the lab if he is good enough…and a professor takes a shine to him.</p>
<p>“Those of you who have worked in university labs can probably address whether a person out of high school could snag one of these jobs or would a BS be required?”</p>
<p>undergrad research opportunities are highly sought after by upper level students, and aren’t awarded just because “a professor takes a shine to him”. so the only work in a research lab for an undergrad “if the college part doesn’t work out” will probably involve a mop and bucket. more complicated work in sci/tech/eng is done by GRAD students who, most likely, can not rely on successful internet businesses to support their studies.</p>
<p>Heh.
Because his family makes a pre-tax profit of about $72k/year selling stuff on eBay, he thinks he’s never going to need to work for a living.
Heh.
He wants to be a high-flying research professor, in large part because he seeks to avoid the tedium and drudgery of obtaining a degree, marketing himself, and working at an actual job.
Heh.
Out of some sense of altruism, he wants to enable all the rest of us in this pathetic society to “advance and transcend,” just as soon as he figures out what we should be instead of what we are.
Heh.</p>
<p>Hypothermic, I’ve known people who think like that, including the self-anointed “smartest person in the entire world” – a fellow with a fairly extensive juvenile prison record who, at 21, impregnated his 16-year-old girlfriend and lived on her welfare checks because he considered himself to be above any job he actually qualified for. You probably wouldn’t like his lifestyle. Stories like that abound on the street – people who are genuinely intelligent, but make no contribution and don’t support themselves because they’re unwilling to work. What people know is all but worthless; what they do is what counts.</p>
<p>You say that you’re extremely patient and very disciplined. I would say that the things you’ve shared about yourself on this thread do not demonstrate those qualities. It’s easy to spend hours on end engaged in something you find intriguing. That’s not patience or discipline; it’s self-indulgence. Patience and discipline are what we draw on to take care of the things we don’t really want to do, because we know that doing those things will help us do what we really want to do.</p>
<p>Many folks here have taken your opening post at face value and given you a range of interesting suggestions. Some of those suggestions might work for you, if you are willing to work at things you don’t really enjoy doing in order to achieve your goals. That’s what the rest of us do, and I think you’ll find that you need to do the same. In order to be the kind of person you think you want to be… you will have to put considerable work into becoming that person. And then being that person will require considerable work that you are likely to find – how did you put it? – pathetic or simply not worth your time. Academia (the world of research and teaching) is no escape from tedium, drudgery, and pettiness.</p>
<p>What I’ve said to this point may strike you as harsh, so my suggestion may surprise you. My advice to you is to go right ahead and apply to the colleges you deem worthy. Cast a wide net and be honest about what you’re looking for; this should increase your chances of finding a good fit and weeding out the (many) places that would make you miserable with busywork and “general studies” requirements. Make your best case for why they should ignore your GPA: If you felt that your high school classes were pathetic and not worth your time, say so and say why. That will help your target colleges determine whether their program requirements might also be a waste of your time, and/or whether the obstacles you faced in your high school classes will be absent from their degree offerings. The outcomes might surprise you, and/or they might surprise me. Either way, I think the experience will do you good, and I sincerely wish you the best.</p>
<p>Oh, and if you are indeed male, you might put Deep Springs on your college list. It’s a two-year residential college that transfers students into highly competitive programs across the country. The student body determines the curriculum, house rules, and admissions. I don’t think you’d be studying genomics right away, but you might find the place intellectually stimulating and they might be more open-minded about your application than larger colleges. And given the extracurricular activities there, graduating from Deep Springs would certainly put an end to any top college’s doubts about your work ethic.</p>