When I got to high school, I was not the best student. I got fairly bad/mediocre grades my freshman year, and stayed almost entirely out of extracurricular activities. I think I have improved quite a lot since then, but I think that my lack of 3- or 4-year extra-curriculars and my cumulative gpa will significantly damage my chances at selective schools (I have about a 3.5 unweighted gpa, which goes up to about 3.7 when freshman year is discounted. My sats are pretty good - 2230 (790cr/660m/780w)). I am not an underrepresented minority or anything like that, I haven’t started my own multinational corporation, and I don’t have any of Harvard’s athletic centres named after me. In addition, while my family is not poor, we certainly can’t afford full-pay at any private school. Accordingly, at any selective private school that I managed to get into by going early-decision, I would probably have to go significantly into debt (was considering going ED at Colby, Bates, William & Mary, or Oberlin; I could probably get into St. John’s College Annapolis without ED).
My plan is this: try for my in-state flagship (UMASS Amherst), get into the honors college if I can, “engage with my community” this time around, and then try for a top-tier law school. I’ve quite liked what I’ve seen of the school, I could probably (with a job/aid) graduate without a lot of debt, and I like the mascot. In addition, I don’t think that I would enjoy the atmosphere at a private liberal arts school. The problems that I see with this are:
- UMASS isn’t the best of the best, and I’m worried that I would have to do much better than I might otherwise to have a shot at good law schools.
- I’m not sure about the quality of the programs at UMASS - I was considering majoring in philosophy/anthropology/poly sci or something similar, and the rankings of those programs don’t seem too stellar at UMASS. How indicative are those rankings of reality, and
- how much would being in the honors college really affect the quality of the education?
Are my concerns legitimate? Is this plan totally asinine? Opinions would be much appreciated :D!
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I have about a 3.5 unweighted gpa, which goes up to about 3.7 when freshman year is discounted. My sats are pretty good - 2230 (790cr/660m/780w)). I am not an underrepresented minority or anything like that, I haven’t started my own multinational corporation, and I don’t have any of Harvard’s athletic centres named after me. In addition, while my family is not poor, we certainly can’t afford full-pay at any private school. Accordingly, at any selective private school that I managed to get into by going early-decision, I would probably have to go significantly into debt (was considering going ED at Colby, Bates, William & Mary, or Oberlin; I could probably get into St. John’s College Annapolis without ED).
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You can only borrow $5,500 for frosh year. To borrow more (which is terrible idea for a pre-law student), your parents would have to agree, qualify, and cosign every year. But, it’s a bad idea to borrow more than the $5500.
How much will your family contribute each year?
Your GPA, as you know, will be an issue for many school.
What is your home state? If W&M will be OOS, will your parents pay all costs??
W&M would be out-of state. My home state is Massachusetts. I’m not sure about my parents’ contribution.
Like I say, I would only consider the more exclusive schools if UMASS turned out to be impractical for good law schools or if the education turned out to be generally much lower quality.
Ask your parents to run the calculators before you make assumptions on financing school. Forget W&M. Look at Colgate and Hamilton as well.
If you go down market just a bit, like Dickinson, Gettysburg or St. Lawrence good merit aid could come into the picture.
Law school entry depends on GPA and LSAT score. Go where you can get an education that will teach you to think critically. Keep costs low because law school is expensive.
Widen your search a bit.
UMass Commonwealth Honors College is very good and it does affect the experience - better dorms, priority registration, interactive classes, dedicated classmates, etc. Apply early in the application cycle and you should be good.
Add some more colleges: Hamilton and Kenyon would be “within reach” (reaches but not out of reach), and I agree with BatesParent2019 on Dickinson, Gettysburg, St Lawrence, plus Muhlenberg, Hobart&William Smith, Goucher, Lafayette, Franlin&Marshall, Denison.
Add UAlabama for variety and choice, if you want a full tuition scholarship (it’s automatic for your stats) as well as an excellent honors college, as well as Pitt (competitive honors).
Very helpful posts!
So applying early in the “season” does actually give you a better shot at a state honors college?
And is the financial aid at those liberal arts colleges really at all likely to make it more economical than a public school? It’s always kind of hard to know based on the US News financial stats (e.g. you don’t know how many of the students attending without financial aid are not getting it because they’re rich or because the school is tight with its cash).
How were your PSAT scores?
PSATs? I took them twice - got 216 sophomore year and 203 earlier this year. I have no idea if that’s good or bad, I didn’t prepare for them at all. I didn’t know that they counted for anything except for some spam e-mail.
They are a giant scholarship search. If you’d only scored at sophomore-level your junior year you’d have qualified, but 203 is unlikely to have made the cutoff. :s
Rolling admission universities fill their classes with whoever applies first (if your application’s strong, you may get an offer as early as October… or if it’s weak, you’ll hear as early - only if it’s average will it be pushed down the calendar); once the class is 50% full, they start looking more closely, so that the earlier you apply, the better.
Are there any scholarships that use SATs as opposed to PSATs?
I do get e-mails saying that “public/private colleges want to recruit you” but it seemed like some sort of scam and I couldn’t find out much about that online. Is that legit?
Go to the Financial Aid Forum and look at the pinned threads for assured merit aid. Most are based on SAT.