Options for a Highschool splitter that wants to go into high finance
Title, was a high school slacker now zeroing in on college applications. I didnt try hard enough in school and some personal circumstances with my family resulted in my gpa dropping a significant amount in sophmore year and early junior year. Now as a senior i have a 3.3 unweighted gpa and am looking for some suggestions on options and also if anyone has reccomendations for edits to my college list. If it helps, I have a 1600 perfect sat right now and am maintaining a 4.0 as a senior while taking ap econ, calculus statistics as well as some pretty good ecs (economic research internship, founded a small buisness consulting firm in my town)
I'll attach my current college list below, please tell me what you guys think and if you have any advice or suggestions for me. I'd prefer to stay on the east coast and go on to Wall St but am applying to all sorts of different schools. I didnt wanna ask on college confedential cause the all the moms would give me BS about how the college you go to for undergrad doesnt matter and go for the cheapest option etc
BC, BU, CMU, Cornell, Emory, Fordham, Georgetown, IU, Loyola MD, Northeastern, UT Austin, Tufts, UMBC, UMD, UMich, USC, Vanderbilt, Villanova, WashU, Wesleyan
If you can’t get into a school with a strong name, prioritize a school with a strong, enthusiastic alumni base as those alumni are much more likely to want to help you out.
Definitely add Wisconsin, Indiana, Penn State to your list
Indiana is there, ive been debating against penn state because of its huge frat culture and social scene which im not a crazy fan of but maybe ill just send in an application anyway. Would you say a strong alum network public uni would trump a smaller private like villanova or fordham in recruiting?
Perfect SAT should make you very competitive at more top targets than you have listed. Easy to point to your perfect GPA and make up a story about how you didn't really have a passion for academics until you discovered your passion later/were focused on entrepreneurial projects till you got serious senior year. Race? Sadly that's still a significant factor in admissions despite that big lawsuit that was ruled against Harvard in 2023.
I am black but I'm not certain if it actually helps that much since affirmative action ended
You'll come to find that settled case law on most issues, even when SCOTUS gets involved, usually takes a decade or more before it stops seeing challenges and uniformly effects institutional behavior. There are ~30 active DOJ investigations/cases right now based more or less the same underlying triggers as Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard (UC Berkeley, Stanford, Yale, Dartmouth, UCSD & UCLA to name a few of the accused/defendants). A quick glance at the admissions data some schools freely share (my alma mater included) show that largely nothing has changed regarding this topic.
The formalized policy of AA might be "over" but admissions departments are still run by largely the same people who were there 10 years ago. I say this as someone who worked part-time in admissions during my undergrad in the pre-COVID era (well after the SFA v. H case began in 2014). People saw the writing on the wall long before the case even got to SCOTUS (the first district court ruling was in 2019) and were already putting policies in place to continue the practice under a different name. Just because there isn't an official rubric and grading scale for the practice anymore doesn't mean it's not still happening frequently albeit informally.
All this is to say - If you are black, with a 4.0 your senior year, and have a perfect SAT every Ivy League school and top academic target (Stanford, UChicago, etc.) that you're interested in should realistically be on your list. You can feel pretty confident you've got a ~50/50 shot at most of them as you're what admissions depts. call a "golden candidate" because your scores represent a massive mean derivation that raises the admissions curve for other black students. That's even more important to them now BECAUSE of the SFA v. H case as the rate of admissions relative to test scores between demographic groups is actually being scrutinized and carries real legal repercussions for the schools.
Sincerely, congratulations. You turned things around your senior year and clearly worked for those scores, it's not an easy thing to do for anyone. Even the most anti-AA person can see and will respect that. The gripe with the practice was never about kids like you who actually put up the #s and deserve a fair shake, it was about the subpar admits who when they get on campus clearly don't belong and can't keep up with their peers.
You'll be fine. You're smart, entrepreneurial, and seem (at least from this limited, digitally mediated interaction) to have a good head on your shoulders. Any school would be lucky to have you and I'm sure you'll succeed wherever you end up. Good luck!
try to take as many classes as you can to boost unweighted, 1600 is super impressive, come up with a creative story as to why your GPA was so low and maybe not putting in all that you could, then turning it around especially with the 1600. I think you have a great list; IU is def most likely going to accept you, if you get direct admit to the b school even better. UT Austin is super strict about in state, and very competitive if your out of state
Really? I heard the opposite, and that they are extremely strict with in state applicants, but are more holistic towards out of state applicants due to the top 6% auto admit they have as well as the competition in texas. Im takin 3 aps rn which isnt alot but im still maintaining a 4.0 so I think it should be good
In your additonal info section when applying in the common app you can mention your personal issues that affected your gpa btw
Yeah im going to
Go Michigan then Wisconsin / Indiana. They’re the big10 schools who do the best with Wall Street placements by a long shot. All others are substantially worse. I went to the Wisconsin / Indiana tier. Michigan def does better and is on par with UC Berkeley for placements I’d say. Wisconsin and Indiana benefit from very large and enthusiastic alumni bases - lots of placements into top shops
Interesting, Ill look into it, I really wanna get into umich but Ill probably just get auto filtered out due to gpa
You're maintaining a 4.0 3 weeks into the school year...?
Lol
Honestly thats fair but I had substantially more on my plate during that time than I do now
Similar situation, turned my life around after senior year and broke into top BB from a state school. I would be looking for state schools that have a pipeline club (or clubs) that places well into nyc roles - mentorship and historical alumni placements are actually more important than overall school prestige when you drop off the very top. At higher end (in terms of selectivity of admissions) this looks like Michigan, UT, IU Kelley (for IBW), UF, UGA. At the higher acceptance rate end (also more likely to get full ride / very good scholarships here) is Penn State, UW Madison, ASU, Alabama, maybe a few others. Apply to those private schools on your list if you do genuinely want to go there, but worth exploring these as well. Feel free to dm / ask any follow ups
B10/SEC schools should be on the radar (Michigan, Indiana/Florida [Go Gators], Texas, Vandy). The big alumni bases can make differences, as someone mentioned above. You are bright and will figure it out- don't put too much stress on yourself now. Congrats and keep crushing it man.
As other commenters said, schools with active alumni bases or decent IB clubs would be smart. Midwest schools like Wisconsin and Indiana are good. UMN, Marquette, and UIUC are slightly easier to get into and have pretty active alumni bases.
Texas A&M, Florida, Indiana, some of those bigger state schools are actually decent and have a big alumni base. Utilize the finance clubs. The 1600 will really help bridge the GPA gap. Not sure if Ivy schools will filter out because of GPA or not, but even if they do there are plenty of semi-targets you could get into with a 1600.
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