Just switched from Reddit FYI

Until I went off to college in the city, I lived in a pretty dangerous hood in Baltimore with my single mom who had multiple jobs as a waitress, and a stripper at night (also provided escort services to some of her customers, and I slept in the bathtub when she did :/ ). When I was around 15, I cleaned windows & did yard work for a lot of my mom’s customers/clients to help with expenses. I could tell my mom hated her jobs, but she did what she had to, to keep food on the table and a roof over our heads. We stayed in a tiny one bedroom apartment, and my mom would come home at 3-4 am every night. Dad went to prison when I was young for assault, and I grew up around a lot of violence/drugs in general. Now I make okay money and I’ve brought my mom to the safer side of the city, but honestly I wouldn’t be where I am now without her hard work.

      • treyyy@lemmings.worldOP
        12·
        13 days ago

        I think schools are much more competitive now, but I would say being able to tell your story through your essays matter so much especially if you weren’t able to attain good grades bc of certain circumstances. And if I remember correctly, colleges take into account your stats in the context of your high school.

        If that doesn’t answer your question lmk

        • taiyang@lemmy.world
          3·
          13 days ago

          That sounds about right, and yeah, many schools (especially now…) will look at top performers in a given school, especially if it’s underserved as a way to diversity without being explicit. Like, if you only could take 2 AP courses, they won’t expect 10 and give you more credit got them.

          I mostly asked since I myself had to go through 2yr, but unlike you, I didn’t really do very well in high school (just, very angry teen due to abuse). It’s good to share in any case, I found on Lemmy there’s a lot of smart people with bad circumstances who read this stuff and the essay advice is spot on.

          Good work making the most of everything!

          • treyyy@lemmings.worldOP
            4·
            13 days ago

            Thank you! Honestly I think I just had no friends and too much time alone since my mom was usually working, so all I could do was study lol. But grades are definitely not indicative of anything tbh, some of the smartest people I knew were failing their classes.