Hi my name is Alex and I would like to go to a US college next year. (after the summer of 2016) I just graduated from a quite difficult austrian school and would like to know my chances to get into a good college. I have a GPA of 3.5 but I have not taken the SAT yet. I learned 3 languages at my school: English (8 years), Latin (6 years) and Ancient Greek (4 years). I am very interested in history and would really like to get into a college with good history courses.
Another important point is that I was born in the US and that I am an american citizen. Is that helpful in any way to get into a college? Thank you in advance for your answers
Unable to chance you until you have an SAT score. You also need to do some research on what type of US college you want to attend and how much your parents can pay. Since you are a US citizen, you are eligible for Federal aid which is not available to International applicants. Unless your parents maintain a residence in the US, you will be considered an out of state applicant and for any state public school, you will paying OOS tuition rates.
Do you have any preference to a state or region for attending college? How much financial/merit aid do you need? There are over 4000 colleges in the US, so you need to give posters some guidelines before asking about chances and need some test scores.
The majority of the colleges on the first list are very selective, but it is a starting point.
http://college.usatoday.com/2014/10/06/the-top-10-colleges-for-a-major-in-history/
http://www.usnewsuniversitydirectory.com/graduate-schools/social-sciences-humanities/history.aspx
My parents could pay a little bit but not very much. I don’t have any preferences where I want to go to college as long as its a good one. On the internet some people recommended to go to a community college first and then change to a 4 year one. Is that a good idea? I am sorry that I can’t be more specific, but I just don’t know where to start to find the right college for me. (of course I am dreaming of going to a really good one like the ones you listed but I think the chances of that are not very high for a international student)
There are many “really good” schools besides the top 50 or so listed and each school is very different, so you need to have some sort of criteria to start your search. A CC would be a good option which would allow you to acclimate to the US college system and give you more time to focus on that " perfect" fit. You will need to file a FASFA form for federal financial aid, but you still need a ballpark number of how much money your parents can contribute. You will be paying Out of state rates at any CC you attend. Since I am a California resident, I am familar with the California CC’s. It will cost you around $6-7,000 a year for Community college tuition since you are considered OOS. This does not include room/board/personal expenses and the majority of CC’s do not have dorms, so you would need to find a room for rent/apartment. If you qualify for Federal aid, your costs will be offset by the FA amounts. Assume around $16-20K/year to attend a CC in California.
The California CC’s are an excellent system and have articulation agreements with the California State and University of California system, which allows you to transfer into one of 23 Cal States/9 UC’s after 2 years if you have met the transfer requirements.
http://admission.universityofcalifornia.edu/transfer/guarantee/
http://www.calstate.edu/transfer/degrees/AAAS-TDegreeRequirements.shtml
If you plan to pursue this route, after your transfer to a Cal State/UC, your costs would be significantly higher.
Cal States would cost you around $35K/year or UC’s around $55K/year for your last 2 years of undergraduate instruction. Again, if you qualify for FA, your costs would be offset by your aid, but by no means would you get full costs covered.
You need to do more research and see if coming to the US is even a viable option, financially and academically.
http://www.expatarrivals.com/the-usa/applying-to-college-in-the-usa
I hope some of this information helps and Good luck with your search.
Perhaps it is preferrable to wait until graduate school (especially PhD, if so you wanted or needed) to go to the US…
First of all thank you for your helpful responses! I just got the message that i will not have to go to the military here in austria, so I can basically do whatever I want next year. I will take the Sat 3 times this fall and write the texts for my applications. But I think I will still have more than enough time to do something else like go to our local university. Is there anything you guys would recommend that would look good on my college application? Like studying english or history. (I really want to study history in the US) Could it also be a problem if I start to study here in austria because of certain rules that some colleges have regarding transfer students.