Ok, I am a junior in high school, hence, I am starting to concern myself with college admissions and what not. I am looking back on my grades, and I am seeing that in my freshman year, I ended with all A’s and a B in biology. However, I’m looking at the second marking period of my freshman year (a marking period is pretty much a quarter) and my grades here are absolutely outrageous. I have an A in French and Math. In everything else I have a B in, and a C in biology. I asked my guidance counselor and she told me that all grades, not just the final grades, are included in the transcript. I’m just wondering how this will affect my college admissions, because I am sure that freshman grades are the first thing an admission officer sees. In sophomore year I ended with all A’s, and in junior year I am on track to end with all A’s and one B. I don’t have my sights set on Harvard or anything, but my dream school is Columbia. But other target schools are UCLA, UCB, and NYU.
Thank you!
The UC’s will only use 10-11th grades in their GPA calculation but will look at all grades 9-11th for the a-g course requirements.
You can use the UC GPA calculator to calculate your Unweighted UC GPA, Capped weighted UC GPA and Fully weighted UC GPA at the end of Junior year to see how you stand. An upward trend in your grades will definitely help.
https://rogerhub.com/gpa-calculator-uc/
If your counselor states that all grades including quarter grades are listed on your transcript, then you would need to submit these grades to the colleges in which you apply. Most colleges can be more lenient on lower than average grades received Freshman year but for selective colleges, they could have an impact.
So that’s basically the same thing.
An upward trend is much preferred to a flat or downward trend. 9th may be the “first” thing seen because it’s top left on the transcript, but you can be sure the grades to the right are more important to an admissions officer. I spoke to an admissions officer at Carnegie-Mellon and she said they don’t even look at 9th grade - discarded from the evaluation.
A 3.7 with a few Bs and a C in 9th grade and A’s in 11th will be better off than a 3.7 with a B or two each year, and certainly better off than all A’s in 9th/10th, then dropping off in 11th.
Having said that, any of those will fall behind a 3.95. Columbia isn’t much of a drop off from Harvard - 6.1% acceptance rate and a reported 11% acceptance with 1600/4.0.
But 9th grade is now in the past - nothing to be done about it. Get the best grades you can going forward.