@Thumper is very kind, but my guesses are just guesses. There’s actually someone who has kept very well updated on the Florida publics @k something, but I can’t find any of the posts right now. (ETA: It’s @kevi2900 who has already posted on this thread.) The Florida publics have become quite competitive, significantly moreso even in just the last couple of years.
Be that as it may, below are my guesses as to what your chances for acceptance may be. Additionally, please do not interpret low probability as impossibility. These schools are extremely popular with extremely strong candidates. They get far more amazing candidates than they can accept, which leads to low odds of acceptance. But every year there will be kids accepted, and one of them could be you.
Extremely Likely (80-99+%)
Likely (60-79%)
Florida State
Toss-Up (40-59%)
U. of Florida
Wake Forest (on the low end of this category)
Lower Probability (20-39%)
Low Probability (less than 20%)
Columbia
Cornell
Duke
Georgetown
Harvard
MIT
Princeton
Stanford
UC Berkeley
UCLA
UNC
UPenn
UT
Most colleges prefer a recommendation from a teacher you had in 11th or 12th grade. Will there be a teacher that you’ve had before that you’ll have again in 11th or 12th?
$65k is what Stanford would expect your family to pay. That does not necessarily mean that is what your family is willing and able to pay. Additionally, Stanford is one of the most financially generous schools in the country in determining need. Not all schools will define need the same way, so you will need to make sure you run the Net Price Calculator at each school on the list. Additionally, apart from UNC and UVA, public schools generally do not give any need-based aid to out-of-state students (outside of Pell grants and federal loans).
What you need to do, as @tsbna44 mentioned, is have a discussion with your family about how much they are willing and able to pay per year for you to go to college. That amount will then be your budget.
If you only feel “eh” about a school, it shouldn’t be on your list. Any school you apply to you should be happy to enroll in and attend for at least four years.
For people who are interested in public policy, I am partial to capitals (state and federal) as there tend to be a lot of opportunities available. Since we don’t know the budget yet, I focused mostly (though not exclusively) on schools where merit aid is available, even if only to a select few.
Extremely Likely (80-99+%)
Catholic U. (D.C.): About 3k undergrads. This Catholic university tends to be more conservative than Jesuit colleges.
Louisiana State: About 31k undergrads
Providence (RI): About 4300 undergrads
U. of South Carolina: About 27k undergrads and a very well-reputed honors college
U. of South Florida: About 38k undergrads and if you like it better than FSU, then this could be a possibility where Bright Futures would still come into play
Likely (60-79%)
American (D.C.): About 7900 undergrads
George Washington (D.C.): About 11k undergrads
Trinity College (CT): About 2200 undergrads
Toss-Up (40-59%)
Lower Probability (20-39%)
U. of Richmond (VA): About 3100 undergrads
Low Probability (less than 20%)
Brown (RI): About 7600 undergrads (no merit aid available)
Emory (GA): About 7100 undergrads
Vanderbilt (TN): About 7200 undergrads
For both American and GW you will need to show a lot of demonstrated interest, as they do not want to feel like they’re a backup for Georgetown. If they don’t think they’re a serious contender, you’re unlikely to receive an admission.
This is what I was wondering about, and hoping I would hear. I was hoping that by being significantly lower in terms of rank than my peers (and also the 2 Bs…), it could be subsidized by being Student Body President (though I know everyone at any top university is) would help in justifying that. My interests lie in politics (for now) so I thought that by participating in SGA, I would certainly be more well off. In terms of rigor, other than Student Government, I am taking the highest classes possible.
I will rerun the NPC calculator at a bunch of schools, I honestly was confused by the entire system to begin with and I think I have a better understanding of the calculator, etc.
Yes, I was planning on applying to the Robertson at both UNC and Duke.
Thank you everyone for your comments, I’m going to read through everything in the next few hours. I feel like I’m obvious to the entire process so thank you guys!
Being student body president alone won’t provide a huge bump because at many high schools the position is a popularity contest without a lot of responsibility. But, if you are able to show significant impact/results in that position, then that can help. The impact/results could be many different kinds of things: Having an active role on the school board, leading an effort to make a curriculum change, working to ensure that students with housing insecurity have resources available to them…it could mean so many different things depending on what is relevant to you and your school. There are also some schools where the role does have a lot of fiscal and organizational responsibility, too. Make sure that the important part of what you are doing isn’t the title but all of the time and effort you are investing after the election.
Looking at your OP again is this from Bright Futures? If so it is basically the recalculated GPA all Florida Publics will use and will be what you should use when you compare your stats to OOS and Privates that use a weighted GPA ( Check each school website for final determination on how they weight but this will be close)
As a Poly Sci major look at FSU again being located in the State Capital is a plus
UF I feel will look at your essay more than the other Florida Public and the supplemental essays are very important. I cannot stress this enough for you. You should start working on it over the summer (now)
Realistically your stats are good for UF unfortunately just at your school 99 students have better GPA’s and they all have similar or higher rigor ( I know this based on weighted GPA class rank it would be virtually impossible to have a higher weighted GPA rank without more rigor than you with your 3.93 unweighted GPA.)
However I am betting there is not a lot of difference in rigor or GPA for those the say rank 50 to 100
So again I stress start working on your Essays’s
Looking at your Rigor will you graduate with an IB diploma? I see you are taking IB courses but the follow trough to the Diploma will enhance your rigor. compared to students that took College level classes but did not complete an IB curriculum.
Also, UF does not look at letters of recommendation.
UF common Data Sheet only classifies 3 areas as very important GPA, Rigor and Essay
Test scores are listed a step down as important
Non Academic very important are Extra curricular, Talent/ability and Character/personal qualities. this from from page 8 of the CDS
This is 2 years old class of 26. you will be in the class of 29 and admission standards are going up every year
Your EC’s look great make sure you highlight and explain your leadership roles and contributions on your application
This is another opportunity to shine compared to someone that may not be as well rounded
Finally UF Early Action deadline is November 1st make sure you apply before then
No idea if it is correct but it seems to be what you said the calculations should be. I took three HS honors classes in MS, should I add those in? Without them, and with only up to the end of junior year, the WGPA with only core classes (no electives, even ones that are dual enrolled because its only supposed to be core classes, right?) is 4.7/5. (70.5 total/15 credits)
check out the School of Public and International Affairs at UGA (SPIA), which houses the political science and the International Affairs majors. It’s really great for political interests, with some great certificates offered as well (like Applied Politics or Data Analytics in Public Policy). UGA has a top 10 (top 5 maybe) public policy graduate program, and you can get a masters in 5 years. SPIA has great people and is a tight know communtiy of engaged and politically active students (my daughter is one). I think you would have a shot at the Honors college and a decent merit award.
UF does not exactly define what “core” means here, though it presumably includes the listed requirements of English, math, natural science, social science, and foreign language. Whether art or music or other subjects like computer science, business, or PLTW engineering, etc. count is something you may need to ask directly.
I will defer to you HS counselor for categorization, and if your school uses Scoir or Naviance I would look at those scattergrams. You are in the top 25% of students in GPA and test score, but only 12% of admits for Class of 2028 were outside the top 10%. And this year’s acceptance rate was 21.8%. I wouldn’t call that a safety.
I think if you want to take advantage of BF (and I really think you should), please apply to the Big 4 (UF, FSU, UCF, and USF). I think you’ll be surprised what you like about each school when you visit and talk to some advisers. It could be the poli sci dept but it might be student government, a history program, the study abroad program. It may be the campus location (I think USF wins with the gulf being right there). With all the money you can save, you will have options for grad school.
Basically, apply as soon as the app opens to USF Honors. Use that to iron out the wrinkles. Then apply to UF&FSU honors.
Then choose 3-4 private universities that are good matches and offer merit scholarships. Keep in mind that being around the top25% for stats isn’t enough, the acceptance rate must be above 30-40% -ish). I would include AU and Dickinson, demonstrate a lot of consistent interest. Definitely add a couple suggested on this thread.
Once this is done, run the NPC on each&add your reaches.
Most of what I would say has already been said, but OP, have you considered the remote possibility of pursuing a post-graduate degree? I see you’re intending to major in Poli Sci or Public Policy, and depending on the field you’re intending to go into, having a post-grad degree may help you secure a job or more.
Grad Schools can be very expensive, depending on the institution you attend, and if you’re already taking out a lot of private loans to pay for undergrad, post-grad may be a boatload of debt on top of it.
You’re a very strong applicant to a lot of the institutions you listed and those suggested by others, but the cost of undergrad relating to potential graduate school is something you may want to keep in the corner of your mind.
Why MIT? Even though you say you’re “anti-CS,” I suspect you must be open to a quant-heavy public policy program, if MIT is on the list. As such, you might consider both Georgia Tech and Emory:
Lots going on politically in Atlanta, and both of these programs are rigorous and well-respected. OOS full-pay for GT would be within budget, and Emory would hopefully give enough aid (run NPC). It’s slightly less reachy than the Ivy+ schools
Also seconding (thirding/fourthing?) William & Mary.
Absolutely do not bother with the UC app, which is onerous and which, best-case, will lead to acceptances you cannot afford and don’t even like as well as UF. If you want more California options besides Stanford, run the NPC’s for USC (B.S. in Public Policy Curriculum | USC Price School) and Claremont McKenna (which is smaller than the schools you’re considering, but it part of the Claremont Consortium, with around 7K undergrad total, and is particularly known for its Government and PPE programs).