<p>I was deferred EA with the following grades in the first marking period of senior year:</p>
<p>AP Physics - B+
Wind Ensemble - A
AP Calc AB - A
AP Spanish - A-
AP European History - A
Phys. Ed. - A+
AP English - A-
Honors Music theory - A+</p>
<p>for second marking period, my grades are as follows:</p>
<p>AP Physics - A-
Wind Ensemble - A
AP Calc AB - A
AP Spanish - B+
AP European History - A
Phys. Ed./Health - A+
AP English - B+
Honors Music theory - A+</p>
<p>As you can see, although I brought up my physics grade for the second marking period, both Spanish and english fell. Is it safe to assume that since they deferred me with one B+ first marking period, I have no shot now that i have two B+'s? What’s really bothering me is that i have an 89.0 in AP english and the cutoff for an A- is 89.5… grr…</p>
<p>Ah I SO know what you mean! I have 3 B+s in my sophomore final year grades because they were all 89 point somethings (it was like .4 .7 and .5 I think) and none of my teachers would round up! </p>
<p>I don’t know what to tell you though about your specific situation since I’m not an authority on it…but I can totally empathize with you if that helps any! haha</p>
<p>Obviously, it’s better not to have Bs. First semester senior year grades will be analyzed very closely because they should be the hardest classes you’ve taken and best reflect your current level of performance. If you have outstanding ECs that really set you apart, the Bs won’t kill you. If you fit into the well-rounded, smart, nice kid category, the Bs are likely more problematic.</p>
<p>yeah i don’t think PE counts for gpa. actually i’m not sure that wind ensemble does either. i just put up all of the grades that were on my report card, i’m sure the A+ in PE won’t exactly wow the admissions officers :-p</p>
<p>put simply, B+'s are very bad. with so many straight A students coming at them, its just one decent reason for adcoms with insane numbers of qualified applicants to reject someone. However, they are not as bad in fresh or soph. if u have more than one in junior or senior year, theres gotta be something spectacular to make up for it. in fresh or soph, you could get by if u shine above enough 4.0s in other ways</p>
<p>Getting B’s wont hurt you or move you “downwards” but no one here is looking to not be moved downwards. The real goal is to be moved upwards and I know that you know that getting B’s isnt doing that - hell getting A’s might not even be doing that.</p>
<p>what makes you think Spanish connotes easy (just wondering because if you think this then maybe adcoms do as well…)
Because where I go languages are easily the hardest classes to do well in.</p>
<p>Same. I’m in all AP’s, and the hardest ones offered, and right now I have A’s or A+'s in five and a B+ in Spanish. I don’t think anyone in my class is doing much better. AP Spanish is basically known as <em>the</em> AP to avoid. In most classes you can get by with intelligence or hard work or maybe both, but there’s not much you can do in Spanish.</p>
<p>Let’s not forget it depends on the school though. Pretty much everyone who gets straight A’s in my school is in easy classes. I’m sure almost everyone we’ve sent to Yale has had at least one B.</p>
<p>I’ve gotten all As and a smattering of A-s throughout high school but first trimester of senior year I got a B+ and a B in AP Calculus and AP English respectively. I have close to if not the highest grades of anyone, they are just extremely hard classes at my school.</p>
<p>Most adcoms will look at individuals from the same school and if everyone from your school with class X all have B’s but in every other class have been more successful, then they will more than likely assume that the class was difficult. On the other hand, if you have a B and all the other applicants have A’s, you could be screwed. Don’t forget that colleges love to see improvement from year to year, even though your classes, in theory, are getting harder and harder. The whole point is that they want to be assured that you can handle the level of work that college will require of you.</p>
<p>With that said, don’t worry about a single B or a few B’s. A friend and I both applied to Yale early, I was deferred and she was rejected. She had no B’s, I actually have a few (my UW is about a 3.75 btw). There are a number of possibilities as to why she was rejected while I was given hope for a happy April. More than likely it is my URM status, although I’d like to believe that my essays and extracurriculars are what saved me. Remember, objective qualities such as GPA, Rank, SAT scores, they’re really used to decide if you’re qualified or not. The next step is whether or not you can dazzle them. People have gotten rejected for mediocre essays, lack of passion in their extracurriculars, or whatever else hindered them from dazzling the adcoms.</p>
<p>Don’t let yourself get bent out of shape by a B or two. Let yourself continue to enjoy your senior year, work hard, play hard buddy. And continue with your extracurrics, and if possible become distinguished with them.</p>
<p>No no
I said challenging. THis is what you have to keep in mind</p>
<p>An AP is challenging, and we all know that
But if you are taking all easy classes, and are a B average student in them, then = ?
That is what I meant. You guys are fine. Do not worry. I was answering the question about the switch from A to B in different classes, pardon me.</p>
<p>i think the reason that i’m so freaked out about my grades this marking period is that I want to show a marked improvement from last. I quite frankly don’t see why they would accept me RD with one B+ in the second marking period when i was deferred SCEA with one B+ in the first marking period. although i brought up my physics grade to an A, my English grade fell to a B+ (although i really should have had an A-, but that’s a long story…) I feel like i really need to dazzle them with grades because the essay’s i submitted SCEA were written in a hurry at the last minute and in my opinion were mediocre at best. My extracurriculars, on the other hand, are impressive and i have a lot of leadership, so that helps.</p>
<p>That is a hard one. Leadership means that you should be able to speak to an connect with them using words. I hope that your essays said good things about you, and that you circled around good stuff about YOU and not someone else - like a relative or someone who is not you but you want to present (fake stats and info etc etc). </p>
<p>Extracurriculars are definitely a good thing. It is what everyone looks at. You could send me your essays and I will tell you what I think.</p>
<p>ha. how ironic, that’s exactly what one of my essays was about, which is why i’m so unhappy with it. i did the “write about a person who has influenced you” prompt for the common app because i had already written something similar for my english class and i was very short on time.</p>
<p>wow B+'s in ur school are lower than 89.5? In my school, a B+ is 90-93.5. If not, my grades would be A-, A, A, A-, B (in IB Chem), A-, A…yeah I have a lot of A-'s scattered throughout my transcript but idk how, but I’m still ranked 2 in my class. yeah…my school is not that competitive. does your school rank? if so, would your grades impact your rank dramatically?</p>