Did you not read my first post on top?
I did say students with 4.0, 3.9, and 3.8 all have chance to be admitted. Depends on rest of everything else.
Not to go into too much detail, but I go to a well-known private school in my area. However, I donât think this by itself would lend our students to being perceived as more competitive than local public school students. While it is true that the entry for our school is pretty tough, our actual course material & rigor do not seem to be very different.
The only way that our school may be more competitive is that, while the local schools evaluate any A as 4.0, we differentiate A-, A, and A+. Thus, someone with a 3.9 GPA at our school could have 4.0 at the local public school (which is part of the reason Iâm making this thread, I suppose).
1 Like
Right, so a CS major applicant who got a 3.9 due to an English class may not be âpenalizedâ as much as a Pre-med applicant who got a 3.9 from a biology class, right?
This assumes that colleges take high-school-calculated GPAs at face value, rather than recalculating or taking a closer look at the courses and grades behind them.
1 Like
I was so surprised when I learned that at some high schools a 90 or 92 average is a 4.0. One of the root causes of grade inflation - no wonder there are SO many 4.0s! The difference between kids at our school graduating with cum laude honors and missing that cut is a matter of A- grades. School does not weight.
I think you have to watch out for a lot of variables. Was that a lower-level English class? Advanced Bio class? What sort of college and program? Some donât admit by major, some have tough core curriculums regardless of major, and so on. What sort of test scores? An intended STEM major with a low for that school SAT ERW score but high Math score might actually benefit more from a straight A in an advanced humanities class to counterbalance that narrative. And on and on.
What difference would a low-level English class vs high-level English class have?
True, but the public schoolsâ way of calculating GPA allows for a level of ambiguity since - to my knowledge - the actual grades arenât shown. Even if they were recalculated, the likely wouldnât have enough information to determine if they got a 3.7 (all A-) or 4.0 (All A and A+).
Not true. Letter grades are shown for each course.
Most schools have a school profile that provides AOs information about grading policies, courses offered and course weighting (if any). That would show schools what number grade is equivalent to âAâ etc.
Not sure if this is true for my school district; I very well may be wrong though and will check.
Right, but because a 90-100 is a 4.0 in my school district. The AOs wonât know specifically what grade a student got on the standard 90-93, 94-96, 97-100 scale.
A lower grade in a lower level English class, all else equal, would imply a lower level of proficiency for English classes.
This could concern colleges that will require even their STEM majors to take college level reading and writing-intensive courses.
At least usually, each course has a grade. But not necessarily a letter grade.
1 Like
I struggled to comprehend this with D22. At her public high school, sometimes an A or a B might depend on the teacher you got. She took a ton of AP classes and got As or A-s most of the time. Did well on the tests.
But how can an AO really get down to the minutiae that goes into semester grades? I have to believe they are looking for an overall profile of strength and then looking for validation of that through things like⊠what else are they juggling and still pulling great grades? What else do they care about? Do they write well? Do they teachers actually know and like them? Do kids from this school often choose their school? All this other âholisticâ stuff that canât be pinned down.
All this fixation on grades is understandable given that itâs the only thing that can be controlled for, but the variety even here makes this job seem nearly impossible and bordering on ridiculous
1 Like
My thoughts exactly. I know classmates at my school who earned a B+ in a class when those paired with another teacher easily achieved an A+. These classmates who earn a B+ are no less motivated, intelligent, or hard-working but were set to a higher standard. Grade inflation only exaggerates the negative impact that this B+ has.
Grades are important to evaluate a studentâs intelligence - but only to a certain extent. Once youâre comparing students between 3.9-4.0, I believe there really isnât any difference other than luck and the amount of actual time you put into the class that could be used doing something else.
2 Likes
I think this is where your school profile and advisor letter comes into play. Like someone said earlier, many schools will recalculate your GPA based on straight letter and ignore the plus or minus. However, if your school report indicates many students have A+, and you have an A-, then you may be setback from your own school pool.
This topic was automatically closed 180 days after the last reply. If youâd like to reply, please flag the thread for moderator attention.