How to choose the universities to apply to and get admitted

For all of us that are in the process of applying for college, we know that applications have a fee. The fee can vary from 30 up to 100 dollars so we cannot just apply to 30 universities we like. Also we cannot apply to Harvard if you have a GPA of 2.5 just for the fun of it. However, there is a good method for you to choose 8-10 universities you like and be sure that at least one will accept you.

NOTE: if you are thinking of applying for only 1 or 2 universities, I recommend you apply to others just to make sure. I call it shooting with a shotgun, you have to hit something.

If you follow this method and have an ok or decent GPA I can assure you, you will be admitted to a couple of universities.

Before you apply this method there are some things you need to have, you have to be sure of your major and you have to have a basic knowledge of the universities available for your major. You must do your some investigation before applying. Depending on your major some of my other blogs can help you with this so be sure to check them out.

The Method

Ok as an example for this blog we will be applying for 9 universities but you can do 8 or 10 or something close to that. So since we have 9 universities we will be dividing them into 3 equal groups, so there are 3 groups of 3 universities. We are going to call the universities in the first groupIvy, the second Top, and the third Safeties.

Ivy

The first group of 3 universities are called Ivy because these 3 universities are going to be the best of the best, your dream schools. They do not have to be Ivy league universities, they can be if you want to. But basically the idea for these 3 universities are choosing 3 that are the best of the best for your major and ones that you could dream of getting into but there might be few possibilities, few but still some. You never know one of these universities might like you and you could go into your dream college. Nevertheless, we have to maintain ourselves in reality, these have to be really good universities but you also have to keep in mind your GPA, SAT scores, etc. What I mean is that if you have a 2.5 GPA and got 1600 in your SAT combined score do not apply for Harvard, the possibility of you being admitted with that scores is decimal. Basically you have to balance it out, pick universities that are amazing for your GPA.

So, we are going to use me as an example. I have a 3.3 GPA and I want to study economics so I am going to pick: Cornell University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Princeton University. (Yes, I am hoping to score high on my SAT)

Top

The second group might be the most important one and here you might have the biggest trouble deciding which 3 universities to pick. You want to pick 3 universities that are really good and that with your GPA you have a fairly decent chance of getting admitted in. You want to find a balance, universities that are not impossible to get in to but not universities that you are almost completely sure you will get admitted. Go for something that you like, universities that if you get accepted you are going to be really happy about.

Ok, I am going to pick for my Top universities: Ohio State University, University of California – Berkley, University of Washington. (These are just some of my picks, I have not really decided yet on which to select. Normally in the Top universities people add one or two more depending on how much money you have for applications)

Safeties

These universities are the ones that you are very sure you will get admitted, but still give you a good education. Universities you will enjoy going to even though you might prefer other better one. These universities are the ones that will get you admitted in a worst case scenario. If nobody else accepts you (which is not very likely to happen) at least one of these ones will accept you and you have the option to go there. Do not go ever the line, you don’t want to go to a horrible university, just somewhere where they are not so selective.

In my case I will be picking: Oregon State University, SUNY at Brighamton, University of Texas at Austin. (As I said, I am not completely sure about these yet just some examples)

Alright that is the method and if you do everything right you will get admitted to a great university. Good luck. Check out some of my other blogs for some more help.

Alberto