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Joshua Sims
Joshua is currently finishing up his last year at Cornell University and intends to apply for Law School to pursue his career as a Lawyer. P.A.C.E has invested their time and money to help Joshua further his education. As a way to give back to his community, Joshua has volunteered his time to help the P.A.C.E program carry its mission. He now works as P.A.C.E's funding director.
His Story
Since his start in P.A.C.E, as a freshman, Joshua knew that he wanted to attend an Ivy League institution. What he didn’t know was that there hadn’t been a single person in his school district accepted into an Ivy League institution in over 20 years! He also didn’t know that he was on track to follow that same trend.
Although Joshua always got good grades, his PSAT score was less than 1100, while most Ivy League students score at least in the 1300 range.
“It was at that moment I realized that I wasn’t doing enough, but I didn’t really know what else to do. I didn’t get why I was so behind nationally if I was doing so good in school”.
The P.A.C.E College Counseling Team mentored Joshua and guided him in his studies so that by the time he was a senior, he was top 5 in his class. By his Junior year, P.A.C.E organized meetings with Joshua and college admission advisors from schools such as Cornell, John Hopkins, and Duke University so that he had a better understanding of what elite schools were looking for from prospective student applicants. Finally, the P.A.C.E College Counseling Team instituted a rigorous tutoring schedule with Joshua for the SAT. The team sat with him for about 10 hours a week for 6 months.
“Not gonna lie, at first it seemed like a lot and I didn’t want to always do what they were asking of me. Although, I could tell they believed in me. I just kept doing and it was a good thing.”
Josh increased his SAT score by over 200 points and scored 1320, the highest score his school had ever seen. With that score, he then applied to Cornell University and became the first person from his school district, in 20 years, to attend an Ivy League institution. He is currently applying to law school and sits as one of the advisors on the PACE College Counseling Team.