If you do far better from now until you end school, universities such as Harvard will see that (and you’ll explain your change in the essays), and will thus give more weight to your later grades, than to those you got in your earlier years. So focus now on your goals, and do as well as you can.

With that, schools such as Oxford, Cambridge and Harvard are so competitive re: admissions that they reject perfectly suitable candidates. Even if you do everything right from now on, you may not get into these universities (through no fault of your own.) So be sure to have some backup schools that are perhaps a bit less competitive to get into, but which are also extremely good universities with great reputations. So, if you like Oxbridge, also look at Imperial College, London, and University College, London. If you like Harvard, also look at Cornell, or Boston University, or New York University. All of these are elite universities, but just slightly less difficult to get admitted to than Harvard.

I love that line, and I believe that it is true. I will be applying for law school next year and I have every intention on applying at Harvard. My background was interesting as I never graduated from HS, in fact, I got a GED so that I could raise my children who came into our lives just a little bit earlier than we would have planned for… and I married my HS sweetheart. Now I will graduate with a BS in sociology and I have a 3.8 GPA!

It is never too late to have a happy childhood, and it is never too late to pursue to your dreams. If you want to go to an Ivy League school like Harvard, you need to believe both of these statements and you need to live by them. Only the very best is good enough for you from this moment on. This goal is only realistic or achievable when you KNOW it is!