Question on extenuating circumstances - what qualifies, and to what extent do colleges consider it?
Hi!
I’m a junior currently, and I’ve had a stellar academic performance for the majority of my high school year. (4.0 uw, 4.8 weighted sophomore year + 4.5 weighted freshman year, 1590 SAT) and I’ve had some EC’s that I consider pretty decent (started my own band which got gigs and opening performances, started a library program to teach kids science, research award etc.) However, this year I had to suddenly transfer to a new school about a week before orientation due to my family’s worsening financial issues, so along with helping my family make money I grappled with adjusting to the completely new environment - on top of that, I joined a varsity sports team which added another huge commitment. I started living with my grandma this year, so I’ve had to help take care of her when I’m home which leaves not much time to focus on school. As if it couldn’t get any worse, I was faced with a threatening heart condition in the middle of the fall semester and had to miss a good amount of classes going to the hospital. The semester has just ended, and I unfortunately could not salvage my grades even with the best final grades I could manage, and ended up with my first 3 C’s and a 3.0 unweighted (two were in AP Calc BC and AP Chem, which I missed a lot of classes for due to my doctor’s visits.)
Is there anything I can do to salvage my application? How deeply will colleges consider extenuating circumstances, and does this count? I’m really saddened by this, as I feel I was a perfectly fine contestant before this year, and I’m not sure what to do.
Thanks so much for reading^