<p>Only on CC is a 3.8 a bad GPA. In the real world your 3.8 is fantastic, especially coupled with your SAT score. While I agree that it makes great financial sense to apply to schools that give full rides for NMF, don’t discount applying to the Ivy’s or other top schools if you want to go to those schools. We have a student from our high school that is finishing up his freshman year at Harvard, having turned down Cornell, Princeton, Yale, Dartmouth, Notre Dame and Stanford to attend Harvard–too bad his 3.8 and his 32 on his ACT held him back…</p>