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Hey.. I will be starting ninth grade at Northside College Prep HS, which is the #1 public school in the state of Illinois. We barely have any kids that go to HYP, so far Northside has sent only 1 student to the Ivy, specifically Harvard. This is only Northside's first graduating class, and I don't know what to expect in the future because I will be the Class of 2007 at Northside. Classes have graduated from Northside, but this is the first class that spent their entire HS career here. Most of our graduates attend the University of Illinois - Urbana, University of Illinois - Chicago, DePaul University, Loyola University - Chicago, and the elite attend Northwestern. The problem is - 8th grade.. that was the year that schools came to SCOUT me to come to them. Choate sent me several invitations to apply to their Icahn Scholars program, which my parents made me decline. I was asked by the school with the most kids going to HYP from Illinois, the Latin School of Chicago, to come, as well as NUMEROUS private schools wanting me to come. Only recently did I realize what I did.. I had the chance to go to one of TOP TIER schools in America on a FULL scholarship and I declined.. Yesterday I met a lot of people that went to Andover, Exeter, and Choate who told me I was serious prep-school material.. NOW I have NO clue what to do. I want to go to Stanford pre-med after HS.. Eighth grade year I attended the city's 2nd most top-scoring school in standardized testing, Taft. There I did HORRIBLY academically, where I graduated with 5 high school credits and a 3.8 GPA on a 5.0 scale. Is it too late for me to apply to a top-notch boarding school? I've made so many individual achievements, my resume is TWO pages. Will that cover for my horrible academic record? I've had straight A's my whole life.. til Taft. Also, is it advisable for me to go to a boarding prep where I would have less opportunites to shine? I'm so confused... HELP!

By Gianscolere (Gianscolere) on Sunday, July 27, 2003 - 06:53 pm: Edit

Congratulations on getting into Northside...that's quite an accomplishment!

Would you mind sharing with us some of the things on your resume? I can't really evaluate your chances without them.

Many might tell you admission to the elite prep schools are extremely hard. Often, they ask for grades and rigor of classes, an interview, 2 or 3 teacher recommendations, extracurricular involvement, and essays. More often that not, admitted students usually have A averages and excellent test scores.

Your test scores can make up for your grades I guess, but these schools want smart people who are also hard-workers...because the workload is very demanding and requires a high level of motivation on the student's part. But Choate recruited you for the scholars program, which means you are obviously qualified...but did they evaluate you based on your 7th grade record since you applied in the beginning or middle of 8th grade? If you apply to Choate during 9th grade for 10th grade entrance, they will base their evaluation mainly on your 8th grade performance.

I myself applied to boarding schools in 9th grade for admission to 10th...so I think they mainly looked at my 8th grade transcript. But I also submitted my 7th grade grades as part of the requirement.

By Asknot11 (Asknot11) on Sunday, July 27, 2003 - 07:16 pm: Edit

Sorry, Northside may be ranked no. 1, but ask any college admcom and they won't think it is. Instead of going to a private school out east convince your parents to move to certain suburbs. If you get into the honors classes at schools like New Trier, Lake Forest, Stevenson, Hinsdale Central, Lyons Township, Glenbrook North, and Glenbrook South you should be fine wherever you want to apply. ALL these schools send tons of kids to the Ivy League and are well known throughout the country. These schools don't beat Northside prep in standardized testing because they have special education programs and have to accept everyone who lives in the district. At my school, one of the schools mentioned above, the honors department's average ACT(according to the ACT test all IL juniors take in april) was a 31. We had 8 36s. If you do well at any of the schools I mentioned the Ivy League is a reality.

By Gladiator0489 (Gladiator0489) on Sunday, July 27, 2003 - 11:08 pm: Edit

But the problem is - my dad works for the City so I can't exactly move to a suburb until he retires. So I'm out of luck over there.. And secondly, truthfully, I KNOW I won't be able to get into a top-notch school like Andover, not because of my inferiority, but because of my tarnished high school grades.. and the problem with Chicago Public Schools (CPS) is that they will not allow you to retake a course and receive credit in that repeated course, like other schools in Illinois. In seventh grade, my performance was EXCELLENT. On my HS-Application, I received a score of 976, which is rounded to the top 98th percentile of all CPS students. My resume achievements will not fit into this box.. I'll email them to you Gian. I really hope testing and my past achievements will help me get in, that is if my parents permit me to. Thanks.

By Asknot11 (Asknot11) on Tuesday, July 29, 2003 - 01:14 pm: Edit

Even if you can't move to the suburbs, I'm sure Northside Prep is a decent school. I know northside has terrible athletic teams so you should be able to get a captain position on one of them. Your EC's will benefit from going to Northside. Really though, you can get into ANY Ivy school from ANY public school. Just make sure you do really well in school and do well on standardized tests.

By Way2goidho (Way2goidho) on Monday, September 01, 2003 - 03:42 pm: Edit

Northside is an excellent school. The graduating validictorian of the school had a gpa of 5.2 out of 4. Thats not bad at all. Also it was the second class last year that speant all four years at northside but that is besides the point. Another thing is that unless you do have talent at sports you will not be able to be captain. All the teams are easy to make but to be a captain you actually have to have some skills. And so you know many reasons why people didn't go off to east coast schools and west coast schools was because many didn't apply and many do not have enough financial aid to go to those schools. If you apply yourself and take advantage of all the many programs there you will do fine. Take Mr. Devine's classes they are good.

By Pens16 (Pens16) on Tuesday, September 09, 2003 - 10:15 pm: Edit

I am looking at Deerfield, Berkshire, Hotchkiss, Taft and St. Pauls both for education and sports.....particularly ice hockey and baseball. Any opinions or suggestions?