u/azucario

i’m a rising junior in high school, and quite literally, i have NOTHING. i need junior year to be my year.

i’m more centered around academics, so im not worried abt that, but im reaching for NYU (and some other colleges in mind), so I know ecs and stuff matter a lot.

Literally the only things i have going for myself is:
- good grades (all A’s, 4.246 gpa, rank 9/263)
- will have taken 4 AP classes by end of jr year (AP Bio, AP Psych, AP CSP, + AP Gov)
- became this Member-at-Large HOSA position for the upcoming school year

Member at large is the lowest ranking leadership/executive position in my school’s HOSA chapter, so i fear it won’t help me get anywhere since it’s not like president or anything ;(

i’m sick of like google and chatgpt and other resources saying like “oh start a passion project, start a coding project, make a blog!” like what does that even mean!!! i need something REAL

LMK anything i can do to improve my overall leadership, ecs, and more!! I also don’t wanna waste my summer, so it’s full of SAT/AP prep and summer work, but i probably also have room for more.

i’m a rising junior in high school, and quite literally, i have NOTHING. i need junior year to be my year.

i’m more centered around academics, so im not worried abt that, but im reaching for NYU (and some other colleges in mind), so I know ecs and stuff matter a lot.

Literally the only things i have going for myself is:
- good grades (all A’s, 4.246 gpa, rank 9/263)
- will have taken 4 AP classes by end of jr year (AP Bio, AP Psych, AP CSP, + AP Gov)
- became this Member-at-Large HOSA position for the upcoming school year

Member at large is the lowest ranking leadership/executive position in my school’s HOSA chapter, so i fear it won’t help me get anywhere since it’s not like president or anything ;(

i’m sick of like google and chatgpt and other resources saying like “oh start a passion project, start a coding project, make a blog!” like what does that even mean!!! i need something REAL

LMK anything i can do to improve my overall leadership, ecs, and more!! I also don’t wanna waste my summer, so it’s full of SAT/AP prep and summer work, but i probably also have room for more.

this is more of a reflection post, but sophomore year was the best thing (academically) that’s ever happened to me. i go to a school that has a lot of the “gifted” and super smart kids, so literally 90% of the students in freshman year were in all places into honors and advanced classes(since we can’t choose classes freshman yr). on the other hand, i was not the same way. i always felt overlooked by so many people and teachers because i was never a gifted kid. freshman yr, i was placed in all general classes and a singular honors class (biology), which didn’t even count really because my counselor told me it was more of a “intermediate honors course” or a bridge to honors courses for kids who were “there, but not quite there yet.” (*lowkey destroyed my confidence..imagine being told u weren’t good enough for honors but not bad enough for regular classes??*🤨*, really added to my feelings of being overlooked…*). Anyways, like most students,(hopefully) i really care about balancing things like academics, extracurriculars, sports, etc., but u can imagine how these general classes limited my GPA because i didn’t have that weighted honors advantage as much as other students.

What im trying to get at is that despite being so limited, i tried my hardest in the classes that i had and excelled beautifully. I ended up finishing nearly every class with an A+, class rank of 24/263, and a GPA of 4.16. The 4.16 may not seem impressive, but in my school we run on a 4.2 scale for general classes, so i nearly maxed out the scale i was limited to.

During my freshman year, i became friends with all the kids that were in all honors classes, and they may have been good as friends, but these kids are brutally competitive + petty when it comes to academics. the amount of times i’ve been told by my own (fake) friends that i’d never make it to the top 10, make it into honors classes, or raise my gpa higher than a 4.1 is probably a billion.

now comes scheduling and nearing the end of freshman year, i was able to select ALL honors and even up to 3 AP classes (tho i only chose 2), again, despite being limited by my general classes. i told NOBODY my plans because i really wanted sophomore year to be my comeback (*and avoid the “sophomore slump”)* to prove everybody wrong. seeing my report cards, these courses gave me such boosts in my gpa, especially since i still maintained the grades i had last year. now that sophomore year is over, i ended up finishing every class with A/A+, ranked 9/263, and a GPA of 4.344.

I ended up higher than EVERY. SINGLE. PERSON that doubted me, talked shit abt me, and overlooked me during freshman year.

im cutting the story short, but this entire rant/reflection is about how i persevered and built myself up from a place where i was limited, disadvantaged, and overlooked. i’m sharing this story because i want people to realize that it truly is possible to turn yourself into a better person/the person you desire to be, even if it takes you an unusual route to get there. it may not be impressive to others because im sure there’s people that have like 4.7 GPAs here and whatnot, but IM proud of myself, and i hope there’s people that can relate + have gone through the same thing as me and are proud of themselves.

next year i’ll be taking Algebra 2/ Trig Honors which is supposedly the hardest class in my entire school. we even offer Multivariable Calculus/Calculus 3 Honors at my school and they say somehow Algebra 2 Trig Honors gave a harder time.
people say the homework is whatever, it’s the exams. they’re almost like riddles, and you have to apply the knowledge learned in class to solve the questions rather than just being handed a problem and asked to solve it. i’ve also heard the exams sometimes DO feature things we’ve learned, but more extreme versions as if we’re doing like “challenge problems” for our entire exam.

does anyone know any ways to combat this kinda thing that teachers do? Any study methods, tips, tricks, or whatever? something i plan on doing this summer is i asked some friends who already took the class and got their unit 1 notes/resources/homeworks, and i plan to self study the unit so i can ensure that i have a background in what we’re learning.

lmk!!!

this is more of a reflection post, but sophomore year was the best thing (academically) that’s ever happened to me. i go to a school that has a lot of the “gifted” and super smart kids, so literally 90% of the students in freshman year were in all places into honors and advanced classes(since we can’t choose classes freshman yr). on the other hand, i was not the same way. i always felt overlooked by so many people and teachers because i was never a gifted kid. freshman yr, i was placed in all general classes and a singular honors class (biology), which didn’t even count really because my counselor told me it was more of a “intermediate honors course” or a bridge to honors courses for kids who were “there, but not quite there yet.” (lowkey destroyed my confidence..imagine being told u weren’t good enough for honors but not bad enough for regular classes??🤨*, really added to my feelings of being overlooked…*). Anyways, like most students,(hopefully) i really care about balancing things like academics, extracurriculars, sports, etc., but u can imagine how these general classes limited my GPA because i didn’t have that weighted honors advantage as much as other students.

What im trying to get at is that despite being so limited, i tried my hardest in the classes that i had and excelled beautifully. I ended up finishing nearly every class with an A+, class rank of 24/263, and a GPA of 4.16. The 4.16 may not seem impressive, but in my school we run on a 4.2 scale for general classes, so i nearly maxed out the scale i was limited to.

During my freshman year, i became friends with all the kids that were in all honors classes, and they may have been good as friends, but these kids are brutally competitive + petty when it comes to academics. the amount of times i’ve been told by my own (fake) friends that i’d never make it to the top 10, make it into honors classes, or raise my gpa higher than a 4.1 is probably a billion.

now comes scheduling and nearing the end of freshman year, i was able to select ALL honors and even up to 3 AP classes (tho i only chose 2), again, despite being limited by my general classes. i told NOBODY my plans because i really wanted sophomore year to be my comeback (and avoid the “sophomore slump”) to prove everybody wrong. seeing my report cards, these courses gave me such boosts in my gpa, especially since i still maintained the grades i had last year. now that sophomore year is over, i ended up finishing every class with A/A+, ranked 9/263, and a GPA of 4.344.

I ended up higher than EVERY. SINGLE. PERSON that doubted me, talked shit abt me, and overlooked me during freshman year.

im cutting the story short, but this entire rant/reflection is about how i persevered and built myself up from a place where i was limited, disadvantaged, and overlooked. i’m sharing this story because i want people to realize that it truly is possible to turn yourself into a better person/the person you desire to be, even if it takes you an unusual route to get there. it may not be impressive to others because im sure there’s people that have like 4.7 GPAs here and whatnot, but IM proud of myself, and i hope there’s people that can relate + have gone through the same thing as me and are proud of themselves.