Admissions Success Stories

I graduated in 2007 from the University of South Florida with a 3.0 GPA in Computer Science. Through my academic career my lowest grade (D) was in Probability. Now I look back and I couldn't have chosen a worse class to get a bad grade in. What is everyone's opinion on retaking undergrad courses? Sure, I won't be able to eliminate it from my undergrad transcript, but I'm thinking a better score now, might help my application out. Also, this was engineering probability would it make a difference if I take some easier stats/probability class, perhaps in the college of business?

I like the idea... I'm doing it myself too... it was recommended by a couple different AdCom members at top schools - and my undergrad degree was in Economics, so I have the Quant classes.... I just have ot make sure that I do well in these post grad classes...

Are you taking graduate level classes? or just retaking some undergrad classes?

They are continuing education classes.

I was wondering, are these courses you are taking online? If so, can you please provide a link to where I can find them?

Nah they're in person... I live in NYC so I'm taking them at NYU

Hi Ashish,
I seem to be your pen pal in these forums.
I definitely think taking an in-person class would be beneficial. I went all the way back and took math courses over at the community college as prerequisites for university-level classes in statistics and finance. I ended up taking 7 college courses before applying and got A's in all of them, so not only did I feel like I was a new person, I felt I could compete when I went to business school. Getting good grades was helpful over these 7 terms because I had a terrible GPA (And I got into HBS and GSB.)

Best regards,
Betsy

I was told by an admissions consultant to take classes either through UCLA Extension or Harvard Extension. I was told not to go to Santa Monica College because the four year schools would have more weight to an Admissions Committee.

UCLA classes are about $550 per class, Harvard is about 1k, fyi.

If you retake undergrad classes, how do you utilize these new grades to help with your application? It doesnt affect your original GPA... so you just submit an additional transcript and hope they notice? Sorry for the confusion, im just wondering if there is some special way you can wave your hand at the adcom and say "hey look at my new and improved grades!"

Wouldn't they treat it just as another transcript to look at?

I went to more than one undergraduate institution (community college then a four year school) and they require all undergraduate transcripts even though my degree awarded is from the four year school.

WOW this is the kind of advice I was looking for. I have an English degree, so no quant classes.

Betsy, I cannot take an in person class right now as I have a daughter, would it be just as good if I took the UCLA extension and Harvard extension classes and got A's? I don't think I want to wait until I've had 7 under my belt...what about 4 (one math class per quarter for a year).