Will 5B's destroy chances to top colleges?

gardenstategal
Fri, 24 Jan 2020 11:28:14 +0000

If you write about any part of it, it should be about what drove you to change what you were doing. But this should also be something that is really central to who you are. It’s possible that a teacher could cover this in the LOR, leaving you with more options for your essay besides this.

FWIW, @MWolf has given you great advice. If the slippage of grades was a maturity issue, fix it and move on. If you can knock it out of the park from here on out, there will be AOs who will like that story. There are students, especially boys, who are late to the game in terms of applying themselves when the work gets harder and the raw talent that got them As up to that point is no longer enough. But know that these are generally not the students who get into Brown, for example.

And there are students who prefer to put their energy into things outside the classroom. Whichever it is, there are plenty of colleges for you.

If you can get As, you can apply to those schools. You may get in. You will need great essays and LORs. But you probably won’t (because they are so selective) so you really should focus your efforts on finding schools that are less of a reach.