all marks good except one really bad: what to do?

TheOpusOne
Fri, 25 Jun 2010 01:29:51 +0000

Hi, I am a junior with an average mark of 97.5% (so a 3.9 - 4.0 for GPA? Sorry, I’m from Ontario, Canada) in all my humanities and music, but a 80% (2.9 - 3.0? Where can I find the definitive conversion chart? I’ve looked at so many, and they all disagree w/ each other) in one science course because I’ve been missing a lot of that class due to an assortment of music competitions. That substantially pulls my average down. How big of a deal is this going to be? Scholarship-wise? Admission-wise? Is the college/conservatory more likely to extrapolate that the 80% was an outlier, or is the school going to make a substantially big deal about it (as in lower my chances significantly)? Anyways, to what degree am I “screwed” by this mark? BTW, I’m applying for piano performance to Eastman, Oberlin, Mannes, and reach for Curtis and Julliard, but at am pretty good with academics. I have nearly no money, so I’m counting on financial aid and scholarship.

Really stressed about this issue. What should I do?