How to know what schools to apply for based on academic performance?

[financeiscooll]

Hi everyone!

I'm currently in my third year at university studying economics and possibly adding a computational data science minor! Although right now I'm torn between working straight out of school or going into a graduate program, I'm definitely looking to apply next year. My main question is with my GPA and academic performance, what tier schools should I be looking at? When researching programs, the only real statistic I see is a minimum 3.0/4 to apply, but not a lot of programs give insights as to the scores of their incoming class. Additionally, I'm not really sure what constitutes a "good GPA" in an undergrad economics program.

I currently have a 3.43 cumulative (3.33 within my major) HOWEVER, I started out as a nursing major and basically failed out my first semester of college and ended up transferring schools 3 times because of financial issues resulting in my 1.6 GPA my first semester (long story short I found out I lost my scholarship 2 weeks before school started my sophomore year, couldn't afford out of state tuition, transferred last minute to a safety school I was accepted to in HS that allowed me to apply last minute, then transferred AGAIN into my junior year into an actually solid economics department at another school because I was unhappy with the academics of the school I had to transfer into last minute).

Basically, my applications are gonna make me look like a crazy person for transferring, and that 1.6 my first semester drops my cum GPA down to a 3.01 (not counting that first sem I have a 3.43 as an econ major ever since).

My major GPA is a 3.4 which I ~think~ is OK for econ, I've gotten all As in math and nothing lower than  B in my ECON classes. Based on that though, I'm not sure what would be a target school for my GPA. I have yet to take the GRE but my professional experiences I think highlight my strengths well as I have had great internships in the finance and tech world which I am hoping can offset the fact I "failed out almost" my first semester freshman year (lol).

Is there a range of schools that anyone suggests I should look into? Specifically masters programs in applied economics?

Ex. I would LOVE to get into George Washington but I doubt my grades are good enough, should I be targeting schools like George Mason, U of MD, etc?

I  know this post is super long so I apologize!!

[slouching]

Applied economics isn't my field, but in many fields, graduate admissions work differently than undergrad in that there's a lot more to your application than GPA and test scores. If I were you, I would try to focus on things like letters of recommendation and statement of purpose, rather than dwell on things that can't be changed. Lots of people have problems early on in their college careers, and/or are transfer students, and plenty of those people go on to attend grad school. It helps that there's an upward trend to your GPA, and if you do feel like you want to address your earlier grades, you could use your SOP as a place to do so, or have one or more of your LOR writers address it for you. 

[unipathfinder]

4 hours ago, financeiscooll said:

My major GPA is a 3.4 which I ~think~ is OK for econ, I've gotten all As in math and nothing lower than  B in my ECON classes. Based on that though, I'm not sure what would be a target school for my GPA. I have yet to take the GRE but my professional experiences I think highlight my strengths well as I have had great internships in the finance and tech world which I am hoping can offset the fact I "failed out almost" my first semester freshman year (lol).

It's great that you're starting to look at schools to target at this stage, but without the GRE, you'll be casting a wide net.  The 3.4 GPA, combined with a strong GRE and personal essays, can be a very strong application package.  However, a low GRE score will change your target schools.

You can certainly craft an essay that will explain your freshman year, and demonstrate success in the new direction that you're taking.