DS just found out his grade dropped from a B+ to B for orchestra. He has been in orchestra through all three years of high school. He will likely end up with a B for the semester. Music is one of his major ECs, and he is interested in pursuing a music minor in college. Will it look odd that he has this one B, while his prior grades in orchestra were A’s? I won’t get into why the grade dropped, but trust me, it is for a very petty reason. Orchestra grades are not calculated as part of his high school GPA, but it will still appear on his transcript.
One (still good) grade is not going to be the make or break of any application.
please don’t dump your college savings on the minor grade drop.
it will be fine. breathe.
A decision won’t be based on a grade in orchestra. Of course, getting Cs never looks good in any class, so he should try to maintain his orchestra grade, as music is important to him. A B isn’t a cause for alarm, especially in a non-core class.
Even as a possible music minor, he’s ok. Maybe he can bring it back up this fall. We don’t know the target colleges or possible major, but I wouldn’t be anxious on this one point, today.
Might depend on the school. My D visited Allegheny College last month, and I asked the admissions rep we met with how GPA is computed and the reply was that all classes are included, unweighted, because the electives showcase interests and provide the whole picture of who the student is. Rigor is then reviewed separately. At my D’s school, electives carry less credit weight and so they don’t count as much as the core classes, and so have less impact on GPA, even on an unweighted basis. But if my D does end up applying to Allegheny, it looks like they will be looking at all classes.
Every college will recalculate its own gpa- usually unweighted and likely “academic” only courses (have never figured out how state flagship determined this).
Also- a mere +/- change is nothing. Some districts do not even use the qualifying +/-, who knows if any colleges drop them as well. Perhaps a warning to child to not slack off, a hint.