Calculating the GPA (again!)

newmassdad
Fri, 06 Jul 2007 09:17:38 +0000

This is an exercise in futility. The fact is that few people actually KNOW how colleges make their admissions decisions. And the fact is that many colleges play games with the numbers they report.

Take admissions. Over the past 6-7 years, solid academic research has shown that the things adcoms talk about are often not reflective of their practices, especially at elite universities. And the list of half-truths (at best) is a long one.

Take reported data. A number of colleges over the years have reported numbers such as SAT scores that excluded groups of students such as foreign students.