Does living in a rural area screw me over when it comes to college

>>17451449
No I don't think so. But honestly going to an elite school right out of high school is an incredible waste. The general education courses you take in your first two years are largely the same wherever you go. If you're smart enough to get into an elite school I think you should go instead to the best state school in your state, get in the honors program, get a high GPA, then after your first two years transfer out.

Realistically though where you did your undergrad hardly matters at all. It might help you get your first job, but it won't get you promoted. People pay much more attention to where you went to grad school.

>>17451459
I get where you're coming from, but if I were to be accepted in UPenn, the business program there would automatically place me as a priority to some businesses.

I fear that due to my lack of strong business extracurriculers, I'll be pushed aside

>>17451473
That's the wrong attitude, you should be looking to start your own business not work for others.

>>17451473
You won't even be doing anything business-related til your 3rd year. Prior to junior year, you would take, at best, 2 100/200 level intro to business, intro to marketing, intro to finance concepts- type of classes.

That's two whole years to join business honor societies, clubs, etc. As far as the business honor societies go, by the way, you have to have x amount of required classes completed for consideration of membership. Credits you won't have til that 3rd year.

Go to a cheaper school, get your bullshit classes out of the way, then transfer junior year to the best school for your major.

Source: MBA from Gonzaga U, went to CC for first 2 years, transferred on full academic scholarship my junior year into the business program, graduated then went into their MBA program.

>>17451479
I realized that sounded bad. I meant it as I need some work experience before I start up a business and go off to business school

>>17451489
Money isn't an issue though, man. I appreciate your advice a lot though. If I weren't so lucky in life, I would certainly take that route.

All I'm asking is if my rural area (lower Delaware) will screw me over. I'm placing Berk and UPenn as my top reach schools.

I know 4chan is an inappropriate place for such a question, but I figured a non biased, real answer would be better than someone trying to comfort that fear

>>17451509
The rural thing won't screw you as long as you have good credentials going in. Here's the thing when it comes to competitive schools: they'll take something like 3% of applicants (not exact numbers, just illustrating this for you). Now, those 3% came from the best 3% of their respective states, which came from their top 3% of respective cities, and school districts, etc. So if you're one of the top performers in your graduating class, with plenty of extra stuff like work and volunteer and leadership experience, you've got a great shot at getting in. Whether you're in bum fuck egypt or Los Angeles. A solid applicant is a solid applicant.

If you're showing up with nothing on your application but a 2.9 GPA, yeah no way, you're not getting in. And all of it has nothing to do with where you live, and everything to do with being a poor applicant.

what part of the country you come from doesn't make too much of a difference in admissions. how is it supposed to make an admissions person decide which of 2 mostly equal applicants is better? it doesn't tell someone anything about an applicant's personality. maybe if one of the decision makers is super biased against the specific area you live in. but that seems unusual.

what's more important is your actual accomplishments and experiences. the issue with location is if your school or town had very little opportunities for you to stand out, like AP courses, volunteering, internships, extracirrucular stuff. just my opinion.

>>17451564
because my extracurriculars are now strained due to my area. If I were in new york, I could do 40x what I can do right now.

That's exactly what I'm worried about.

>>17451449
Professor writing here:

There's another element that hasn't been mentioned. Really elite schools try not to get all students who look and act the same, so while it is likely that the top candidates will come from the same sorts of schools with the same sorts of grades and the same sorts of extracurriculars, they will frequently skip over some of these to find a kid from outside their usual geographical area or not fitting the usual profile, jut to keep the mix of students that will contribute to the general experience.

Put another way, not everyone accepted by Columbia comes from New York - they actively look for interesting applicants from Bumfuck Oklahoma.

Don't mean to hijack your thread but I have a similar question.
I live on the east coast...
As you know everyone I talk to these days wants to know where i'm applying so I started floating the idea of UC Berkeley as kind of a pipe dream.
All of a sudden my ma wants to shell out $700 for plane tickets to tour the place. Which makes me feel like shit because part of me thinks I cant get in and i've been talking out my ass

3.5 GPA
30ACT
1300 (new) SAT
2 leadership positions

Am I wasting my family's time and money?