My GPA is at risk

Pre-College Issues High School Life
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<p>I need some advice on what to do to help secure myself for the rest of this year... I'm a junior now, here is my schedule:</p>

<p>Band (100%)
AP EnviroSci (88.2%)
AP Gov (89%)
Honors English 3 (81%)
Honors Chem (80%)
French 4 (93%)
Alg 2/Trig (91%)</p>

<p>I've been butchering tests left in right in my two best classes (AP Enviro and Gov). I really want to keep my GPA above 3.75 so I can apply for NHS at the end of the year. On the weighted scale... my gpa is 3.71 for this sem.... Right now my cumulative is a 3.69.</p>

<p>I've never gotten a C before, and I hate having non-solid grades when finals come around. I like having a "safe" B or A (85% or 95%) so I have room to screw up on the final. I'm certain I can secure A in French and Alg 2 hopefully, but Chem and English I'm worried about. I don't know how to study for those classes, to me English is that you better understand it from reading the book or you're screwed. AP Gov and Enviro is just a lot of reading and terms, so if I can study enough I can bring those back up to As. If I get A's in both of those classes it will give me a 4.0 on the weighted scale. </p>

<p>I am feeling really stupid lately because I hate seeing all the kids around me in my AP classes getting perfect scores on tests. Until this year, I've been able to retain information incredibly well, and I almost never studied for tests. Now, I have to because I'm being completely overloaded with all of these info-heavy tests in Gov and Enviro. I took no honors classes Freshman year, took one honors class sophomore year, now I have a lot. I probably should have challenged myself much earlier on, so I'd be more prepared for something like this. Given the general rigor of junior year and piling all this on without much preparation was probably a bad move on my part.</p>

<p>Any advice as to how I can try to bring my grades up and maintain them? I'm not very good at studying, I think. I can't tell when I'm studying effectively or not because I never had to do so in the past.</p>

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<p>bumppp…</p>

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<p>Hmmm. Certainly ask your teachers ahead of time on what is going to be on the finals especially in the classes you have the lowest grades in. There’s so many ways to go about studying and I think you should try to figure out what way is best for you. I also think you shouldn’t have over loaded yourself with as many rigorous classes. But that’s not the point. I guess you may truly need to review notes even for like 15min daily, ask your teacher(s) if there is any extra practice sheets or ask if there are any retakes on tests quizzes etc etc to get your grade up, maybe not in ap classes but you get the jest. Because you obviously are fairly smart and seem completely able to get good grades you just need to create a habit at going past the average and becoming a better smarter student. I mean I find it hard to understand you have such low grades in Chem and English. I think it’s more a matter of you investing more time rather then just doing what is expected or what is getting you by.
Anyways I’m sure you can get up to that 3.75.</p>

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