Hello everyone,
I am a rising senior, and so I have a question that I have been dying to ask. How does AFA and the other service academies for that matter factor in senior year when it will only be half completed when the application is due? Thanks!
Everything counts, not only for the military academies, but for colleges in general.
Your Junior year and 1st half of senior year are important to your admissions - grades, activities, leadership roles, those all tie in to whether or not a college finds you as meeting their standards. In general, February-April is the confirmation period, in which you tell anyone interested whether or not you're actually attending. At this point, it seems like the second half of your senior year, up until graduation, is moot. You're already accepted into a college, so who cares if you just bomb your remaining classes, as long as you do enough to finish the grade? Well, the colleges do - just because you're accepted doesn't mean they can't still pull back their offer.
One of the first graduates from my (relatively new) school found this out the hard way. They were accepted into an Ivy League school on a very lucrative scholarship, and they proceeded to just coast through the remainder of their senior year with the assurance that "It doesn't matter, I'm accepted already." Come May, a letter comes - "We were watching, and you're not a great student. This kid who did worse than you last year is now more qualified because of his final grades. You're out." Bam, community college.
Your second semester is even more important if you're
not accepted - your continued performance through the year will affect your ranking on the standby list, if there is one. What happens when somebody who was accepted gets DQ'd at the last moment, or turns down the offer? Bring in a replacement from standby - your second semester performance can have a huge role in that.
In short, while the second half of senior year may not seem important in terms of college applications, it is
huge in terms of maintaining your standings,
especially after being accepted.