Freshmen GPA and the long term effects

I go to a non-target school and maintained a GPA of 3.2 throughout my first year. I was off-campus for both semesters and dealt with a handful of problems related to COVID-19. I, not one to make excuses or allow any inconvenience to ruin my academic goals. But I have had some battles over the past year that at times deeply affected my ability to progress in school. My question is, will I be able to justify my first-year GPA with the challenges of online school and some of the personal issues that were caused by COVID-19. I know I have 3 more years to bump up my GPA but was curious as to what I can do about my low GPA during my first year of college. Also related to this was my question on behalf of only reporting Major GPA on my resume and whether it is common to do.  

3 Comments
 

Don't worry about it too much but just don't fuck up again. I was in a pretty similar place early in college, I think I had a 3.1 the first semester. I actually ended up retaking a class I got a D- in my first semester to replace the grade (probably your school has this option if you have one specific class you bombed) and honestly apart from that I just kind of wised up and I don't think I ever got less than an A- again. Easier said than done but you'll have to aim for this, just use Ratemyprofessor to find easy classes tbh. By the time I got to SA recruiting I had a mid 3.7 which was good enough. Unless you are really shooting for the moon with your sophomore summer internship you should be able to get something finance related and relevant for IB where they won't care if you only have like a 3.5 or something by that time.

 

I had a 3.08 going into sophomore year. Ended up with a 3.5 which allowed me to recruit/land interviews for top BB AM positions. 


I barely made the cutoff, and had to average north of a 3.6 for the rest of college. You can do it too. At the end of the day, recruiters don't give a shit and neither does HR. The only way you get around that stuff is if you go to a target and can end up at JEF/RBC with a 3.0, otherwise you are going to have to work quite hard. 

 
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