<p>Well… I am a junior, and I do have many regrets,lol…I seriously underachieved througout the 3 years academically, like i was possessed in HS. Did not care about schoolwork, which is why i should probably supposed to be in at least the top 5% instead of top10% of my class rank. went socially awkward, kinda. I got fined by a police for doing something stupid like avoiding to pay the train fare since my card was broken. Joining the Wrestling team which wasted around 250 bucks…I still have 1 more year left to enjoy HS…</p>
<p>wow top 10% instead of top 5% go kill yourself. you are a failure.</p>
<p>I wish I’d stuck with fencing, and I wish I’d started HS more socially (i.e I wish i’d taken more people up on invites my freshman year). </p>
<p>Overall though, I think I did my best with what I had, and for the most part, everything’s turned out pretty good!</p>
<p>not putting enough effort to get into an ivy league school</p>
<p>Academically, I never tried…at all. Maybe it’s lucky that I went to two really terrible high schools.</p>
<p>Socially, I too was a victim to World of Warcraft. While it basically ruined my life for a few years, I did ironically make one friend who I consider to be my only real one. I would honestly do it again just for that. </p>
<p>Quite to the opposite of what I’m seeing here, though, I wish I was less social, at least during my junior year. My high school is full of idiots, and I when I started socializing with them, I began to conform to their stupidity, which is something I really regret having done.</p>
<p>75% of the white guys have a shaved head, wear a t shirt, board shorts and vans authentic/era. ****tards.</p>
<p>Not studying for the SAT [I got an 1820], not retaking the SAT, not doing any community service, not trying to get inducted into any honor societies, not doing many extracurriculars…and the list goes on.</p>
<p>I was addicted to Xbox freshman through my junior year. Definitely regretted that, because once I started looking into college applications and what my competitors had been up to for those years, I feel like I would come up short in the eyes of admission boards. Granted I was 2nd in my class and got a 2290 on my SAT, but I spent my time very unproductively to get those numbers, missing out on a lot of activties/extracurriculars edgewise.</p>
<p>To underclassman high schoolers, I beg you, don’t wait for opportunities to present themselves to you - go after them yourself. Go beyond what’s expected, but most importantly, make sure you love what you’re spending your time on. And just because you volunteer somewhere on weekends or start up some organization w/in your school doesn’t mean you can’t party or have some you-time. Personally, I like playing guitar, but I regrettably didn’t do anything amazing w/ that passion. However, I could have organized fund-raising concerts or started a guitar club in my school - something that transcends expectations of a high schooler.</p>
<p>I haven’t participated socially much until my senior year, but even hanging out w/ 18 y.o.'s this year, I’ve definitely had my fill of the superficial dynamics of the social scene, partying - I don’t think I missed much in regard to my freshman-junior years. Hoping for more mature relationships in college; I think the connections and cliques that survived from grade school and through high school tampered with real relationships that wouldn’t have been so caught up in appearances. But what do I know?</p>
<p>Primarily, I regret staying in the lines as I went through the daily motions of high school. I spent way too much time detailing my assignments in pursuit of A+s when I could have used the large margin of time that sets an A from an A+ in order to branch out to a more balanced life of community service, maybe even sports. I stand at the end of the road with my numbers and realize that saludatorian or SAT scores aren’t everything. Don’t work for the achievement, work for the process. Do your thing and the rest will come. (Case in point, I studied tremendously for the CR portion of the SAT, but still only ended up with a 710. If, on the other hand, I would have read regularly throughout high school, I would have been much better off. I worked for the score - not the skill - and came up short.)</p>
<p>If you have questions about how to seize the essence of high school, I’d be happy to answer a private message.</p>
<p>I don’t regret anything. I did what I wanted, said what I wanted, all when I wanted.</p>
<p>I don’t regret anything I did after about halfway through sophomore year. That was when I figured that my school was not exactly conducive to achievement. I just regret it took me so long to notice. Anyways…my advice is to take any opportunity that you know you have a chance of winning. If others think you’re crazy but you don’t, you’re not. :D</p>
<p>^Your life must have been perfect. :)</p>
<p>My only regret is not dropping out in 9th grade.</p>
<p>I honestly don’t know… probably not going to the school that I had to transfer from my sophomore year in the first place; </p>
<p>I would’ve done a lot more homework…</p>
<p>I regret not coming to America sooner (before freshman year). Because of that, I missed a lot of opportunities to achieve mastery of English and to pick courses leading me to top 5 or 3. I used to learn French for a long time back in my home country, but I stopped learning it due to multiple reasons. Hopefully, I would soon resume the education in college.</p>
<p>Also, I was too shy to get out of my outsider-restricted area to meet and make friend with new people. Now that I am leaving high school, I have only a hand of (close)friend. It’s not too bad but should have been better.</p>
<p>This is perhaps my biggest regret: I got accepted binding to the school that I don’t feel like going to. Afraid of getting rejected by top colleges, I expected for a higher chance of getting in a top but less prestigious school by ED to it. It turns out that I had a much higher chance that I thought I did for the higher one. Now that it’s too late, I’m thinking about transfer.</p>
<p>Not taking the ACT
Not trying as hard for a good GPA as I should have
Not coming out earlier
Talking to my principal about an issue</p>
<p>Probably my biggest regret was giving up all my electives to take all science courses. I almost didn’t graduate because I didn’t fulfill my computer and art credits. Now is my last semester of my senior year and I realized the medical field is not for me. Freshman year I was so set on taking all science classes because I thought that was where I belonged. I didn’t want to be one of those students who didn’t know what they wanted to do. But now that high school is almost over, I am one of those students who doesn’t know what they want to do. Science doesn’t interest me, it actually discourages me. If I could go back I would have taken more art, humanities, business, and computer classes so I could be exposed to all different areas and see what I’m really passionate about.</p>
<p>mhh…
-not being as nice to my parents as i could have been or helping around the house
-wish i was more friendly to some people
-Taking the ACT because the SAT sucks for me… thats the only thing holding me back from going to Clemson bc i didnt get in state tution now im going to Chapel Hill which dont get me wrong is a great school but i wanted to go to Clemson soo bad
-working way to hard in school and doing so much extra when i could have been enjoying more highschool life… and i wasted all that hardwork for nothing since i got into where i wanted to but my parents cant pay for it
-anddd not runnning cross country my freshmen and sophmore year i loved it!</p>
<p>Probably not studying enough. I got through classes with an A average hardly studying and didn’t study for the SAT’s. I got a 2100, but I feel I could have done better. I think of what could have been if I studied hard all those years. I could have probably gotten into an Ivy League school. Then again if I was obsessed over school I wouldn’t have had time for fashion design, cello and sports. I guess it was a trade off.</p>
<p>Considering that academically and EC-wise, I am a typical CCer, and I am satisfied with my social life and most other aspects of my life, I don’t really have much to complain about. There are a lot of little things I regret (e.g. not bringing my lab notebook to the science fair), but nothing huge, except one thing: Not getting involved in research earlier. It’s so incredibly fun, and plus I could’ve been one of those amazing Siemens/Intel/ISEF winner types. Instead I’m stuck with semifinalist :P.</p>
<p>Here are the things I regret, in no particular order:</p>
<p>1) Only playing one Varsity sport (dropped lacrosse and basketball)</p>
<p>2) Not trying freshman year. My GPA would look a lot better if it didn’t include freshman year. Even getting near 4.0 wasn’t enough to make it as good as it should’ve been.</p>
<p>3) I paid too much attention to all the “find some crazy EC for your application”. Luckily for me, I found something in social entrepreneurship which ended up being a focus in every interview and a neat aspect of my application.</p>
<p>4) I didn’t take Computer Science classes in H.S. My school offered the classes, but I didn’t bother to make my schedule work around it.</p>
<p>5) Not going to more Diversity Weekends fall of senior year. A lot of small LAC’s, including Bowdoin, Swarthmore, and Amherst, host diversity weekends in the fall for seniors. No worries, this isn’t a URM weekend, Asians (like me) are included! These weekends also serve as a fantastic opportunity to show that you are more than numbers. If I hadn’t attended Swarthmore’s open house, I doubt I would’ve gotten the early write I got a week ago.</p>
<p>6) I wish I took the ACT. My SAT score was CC competitive, so it’s good enough. But, I know a lot of people at my school who got ~2000 on their SAT’s and yet got 33-35 on their ACT’s. If you don’t do well on the SAT, you have nothing to lose by taking the ACT. </p>
<p>7) Started gradually preparing for the SAT. I took the SAT essentially without preperation March of my junior year. Big mistake. I wasn’t familiar with the format of the test, and the writing section really threw me off. You can study the writing section and its grammar rules much more effectively than math or critical reading, as there are a finite number of rules you can memorize that will guide you through 90% of the problems in the section.</p>
<p>Things I do not regret:</p>
<p>MOST IMPORTANT ONE OF ALL: Don’t apply ED if you don’t feel completely convinced you want to go there. Even though the acceptance rate is higher, it’s more important you end up somewhere you really want to go. That being said, applying to every single EA school on your list (assuming it’s not some SCEA thing). I applied to UChicago EA and it was the best decision I ever made in my college process. Being able to spend winter break and the first two months of second semester not really worried about March 31st was fantastic.</p>
<p>1) Keeping my art class beyond the requirement. I love to sing, so there was no way I was about to give up 4 hours of chorus a week. </p>
<p>2) Talking to my college counselor. Even though mine wasn’t the best and told me schools I got into were not realistic, just getting to know your college counselor will help you a lot and their letter will be more personal. I visited my college counselor even when I didn’t have a ton of college related things to talk about just because she was an interesting person.</p>
<p>3) Joining the CC community. CC is undoubtedly a double-edged sword, but it made me feel less weird for being intense about where I got into college and people who were as crazed about their scores as I was. It also helped de-mystify a lot of the college process for me.</p>
<p>4) Finding and sticking with an extra curricular that I loved. I could’ve done all this crazy stuff like my peers regarding community service or other EC’s, but sticking to something I loved was way more important. I put way more time into it than I otherwise would have, and it ended up changing my perspective on life.</p>
<p>This post is long enough…feel free to PM me if you have questions. I would love to help anyone, high school is tough enough as it. With CC, you are never truly alone in your experience.</p>
<p>I procrastinated everything…</p>
<p>I’ve still done great…but it’ll be hard to not procrastinate in college. </p>
<p>Otherwise, high school was great! =) I was a cheerleader for 3 years, honor roll…and had some fun!</p>