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Hi! I am going to be a
junior at a highly competitive high school in New Jersey and am commencing my college search, and I
was wondering if you could help me decide if I should consider UVA. My unweighted gpa is a 3.7 and my
weighted gpa around a 4.0. I am taking all honors this year (4.5) except
for math, and am enrolled in the most demanding english and history program
(seminar) in the school (you have to apply for it, and we write 16 10+ page
papers a year). My senior year schedule is all AP courses (5.0), and by senior year (best case scenario) my weighted gpa would be a 4.44. My
highest SAT's so far are 790 verbal (I'm working to bring this up to an
800), 800 writing, and 690 math (I'm taking a class to bring this up). I am
student representative to the Board of Ed in my district, student
representative to the districtwide school improvement initiative committee,
member of the New Jersey All- State Chorus, first- chair soprano II in last
year's Region I Chorus, first- chair soprano II in Bergen County Chorus, in
my school's Vocal Jazz ensemble, Maroon and White (selective recital program
at my high school) performer, Walter Engel (recital) performer, attended
JHU- CTY for 3 consecutive summers, have played harp for 2 years, member of
the German Honor Society (selection for NHS is next year), peer tutor at my
high school, attended NSLC on International Diplomacy, and will be co-
President of Model UN and Model Congress next year. I also hope to apply
for NJ- Governor's School and/ or study abroad with AFS my senior year/
summer before my senior year. I love to read, write and discuss; I tend to
do better in seminar- style classes in which there is a great deal of
discussion and writing. I'm definitely more of a humanities person; I love
history and international studies, as well as the social sciences and
English/ foreign languages. I would major or minor in any of these topics,
as well as Arabic, Italian, Chinese, Music, journalism, and Asian or Middle
Eastern studies. I am very much a city person and would prefer a school in
or in close proximity to a city. I would like a more intellectual than
preprofessional atmosphere, and I tend to be shy, so I wouldn't want to go
to an overly large university; I am looking for a small- to mid- sized
college. I live in New Jersey but am comfortable going anywhere in the
country; a plane ride away from home wouldn't bother me at all. I want a strong focus on
undergrads; I don't want a big research university- type of experience. I am left- leaning politically. Do I stand a chance at UVA and would it be worth looking into?

By Nyclyzz (Nyclyzz) on Wednesday, September 08, 2004 - 07:13 pm: Edit

Please help! Anyone?

By Dadx (Dadx) on Thursday, September 09, 2004 - 11:18 pm: Edit

Look into it. You have a decent chance.

It has an added advantage that it is substantially less expensive than Berkeley or Michigan, assuming you are paying full tuition. FOr that reason alone, it should be on every good students list in the east.

Uva is a little bigger than small to mid sized, though.

Give Princeton and Yale a look too. Some people think those are nice places. Tough to get in, but very nice to attend.

By Uvaparentfrommd (Uvaparentfrommd) on Monday, September 13, 2004 - 03:09 pm: Edit

You have an excellent chance, based on my son's experience. He went to a top public hs in MD, had a 4.44 weighted GPA, took all honors courses except for 6 APs, had 730/710 math/verbal, and scored extremely highly on the AP exams and SATII's. He had nowhere near your breadth of extracurricular experience, and still he was admitted. Please note as someone else said: UVA is not small or medium sized. It is not huge, but keep in mind that there are about 3,300 per undergrad class. But it's a great school -- the campus is unbelievably beautiful and the academics are great. And even out of state, the cost is a good $9,000 (or more) less per year than an equivalent private university. Good luck.