Demographics 24, white male, north carolina resident
US domestic (US citizen or permanent resident) or international student Domestic
State/Location of residency: (state is important if you apply to any state universities) North Carolina
Type of high school (current college for transfers): Dropped out of App State in 2021
Gender/Race/Ethnicity (optional): see above
Other special factors (first generation to college, legacy, athlete, etc.): N/A
Intended Major(s) Undecided. I don’t care that much at this point tbh. I just want a degree from a respected school. What will make me most likely to get in? Lol
GPA, Rank, and Test Scores
Unweighted HS GPA: 4.0
Weighted HS GPA (incl. weighting system): 4.0
College GPA (for transfers): 3.93, however I had trouble during my summer community college classes and only got a 3.46 there.
Class Rank: n/a, covid, would have gotten chancellor’s list
ACT/SAT Scores: 33 ACT composite
Coursework (AP/IB/Dual Enrollment classes, AP/IB scores for high school; also include level of math and foreign language reached and any unusual academic electives; for transfers, describe your college courses and preparation for your intended major(s)) I didn’t do anything particularly rigorous at App during my two semesters there. I had some covid withdrawals during the second semester unfortunately. But I did take some harder classes like business law and got a 100/100 in it with no extra credit. No math taken.
Awards
Extracurriculars (Include leadership, summer activities, competitions, volunteering, and work experience) Extremely good work experience in technology for age, senior software developer and high level manager at local tech businesses.
Essays/LORs/Other (Optionally, guess how strong these are and include any other relevant information or circumstances.) Very strong and competent essays, but nothing mind blowing.
Cost Constraints / Budget (High school students: please get a budget from your parents and use the Net Price Calculators on the web sites of colleges of interest.)
Schools (List of colleges by your initial chance estimate; designate if applying ED/EA/RD; if a scholarship is necessary for affordability, indicate that you are aiming for a scholarship and use the scholarship chance to estimate it into the appropriate group below)
Safety (certain admission and affordability) UNC Wilmington
Likely (would be possible, but very unlikely or surprising, for it not to admit or be affordable) NC State
Wanted to say I’m mainly wondering how much my low community college GPA and COVID withdrawals will hurt me. 3.93 is otherwise very strong but these seem like big blemishes. Thank you!
Since you don’t seem to know what you want to study, I recommend you take a variety of classes at your community college and figure out what you like. Get an associate’s degree there and then perhaps go to a 4 year school.
As a 24-year old, I think your reach schools like Duke and Brown are extreme reaches. Those are primarily residential schools, and many colleges might be wary of having a 25-year old staying with a bunch of 19-year olds. Additionally, there’s a lot of maturing (and brain development) that happens in that time frame, so you might not be bonding with your peers the way you might have if you were closer in age.
As you already completed one year of college, but with several drops on your record, and with below a 3.5 at the community college, I’d probably put NC State as a match and Chapel Hill as a reach. I don’t think either of them are out-of-reach, but I don’t think the odds are as good as they would have been without your college record.
Right now I would worry less about the name and more about a place that’s the right fit. Have you thought about looking at schools that have more non-traditional students (i.e. age 25+)? Also, you may want to look at schools with larger grad programs, as you will probably be closer in age with the grad students than your fellow undergrads. Look for colleges that might have a dorm for nontraditional students if you still want the dorm experience.
Lastly, you’re going to need to figure out what you want to study. Complete more of your prereqs and distribution requirements at your community college. Since you’ve been doing software development, is something CS/tech related an interest? Or management? Or…?
I realize I didn’t suggest any likely schools for you.
UNC-Charlotte: Had more tech/CS-related college graduates in 2022 than any other college in North Carolina. 11% of students are age 25+.
UNC-Greensboro: 19% of students are age 25+
UNC-Wilmington: 18% of students are age 25+
In comparison, these are the percentages of students age 25+ at the universities on your list:
UNC-Chapel Hill: 3%
NC State: 6%
Brown: 1%
Duke: 0%
My guess is that students who are 25+ are either coming in from community college with an associate’s degree (or equivalent) and a dissimilar background from most students on the campus or have military service, or some other “unique” factor for a “top” college that is largely filled with 18-22 year olds.
As you have only one year of college under your belt (from App State & community college), your own experience shows that you can be successful from anywhere. It’s what you do that will make a difference, not the name on your diploma.
Mathematics is quite important for a software engineer, or at least for some software engineering jobs. Perhaps it might be more accurate to say that the rational / quantitative thinking that is needed for math is also very important for nearly any software job, but actual mathematics (such as calculus, linear algebra, probability theory and/or statistics) is needed for only some software jobs. I have definitely used all of these multiple times as a software engineer in the past, although I was a math major so the software engineering jobs that I got were likely to be relatively math oriented.
If you like working in software development, then this is a very good area in which to get a degree. There are lots of software engineering jobs. However, I am wondering if doing well with one or two math classes at a local community college might make your application stronger. This might depend upon how much math your already have from high school.
Otherwise to me it looks like your reaches are very high reaches, but it also seems likely that you will get into some good universities.
Also, some “COVID withdrawals” does not seem to me to be anything to worry about. On the one hand on-line classes were lousy for everyone. Also, if you actually got COVID at some point, depending upon the severity dropping all or most classes may have been precisely the right thing to do. Physical health matters, and the COVID pandemic was lousy for most of us one way or another.
Also, if you like software engineering, then getting a degree in software engineering (or alternately in math with software engineering as a minor) is most likely going to be more important than the name of the university that you get your degree from.
Why did you leave App State? What have you been doing for 3 years since then?
You didn’t answer the budget question. Do you have unlimited resources for returning to college?
Do you have as little direction, career-wise, as you have major-wise? Or is your indifference to major because you already have career options in mind that simply require a bachelor’s?
Do you want to stay in NC? (At age 24, you could go to literally any state, pay relatively-low OOS tuition at a community college there for one year, and then transfer to a public university there as a resident and pay in-state tuition at the four-year school.)
I don’t see a path to super-elite schools like Duke or Brown. Transfer acceptance rates are very low, and you’re not mentioning achievements that set you apart to an extent that you would be selected. This is fine; there are many respected schools that don’t have single-digit acceptance rates.
But the vagueness about your interests, goals, and finances makes it hard to recommend one attainable school over another.
What is your overall college GPA over all college courses taken, and how much college credit do you have now and when you expect to enter the new college? Also, intended major becomes more important for transfers, particularly if you more credits and higher standing.
In NC, I think your best shot is to get your associate’s and then apply as a junior transfer. Transfer acceptance rates for graduates of NC community colleges are boosted. I would talk to a counselor at the community college (or your potential 4 year schools) to see if you being a non-traditional student affects that.