D24 and S28’s high school does not base class rank on weighted GPA. All GPAs are unweighted and there are 3 levels of classes offered (general, academic, advanced- these include honors/AP/Dual Enrollment). My advice to D24 was to take the most rigorous class even if it means a B in an AP over an A in an academic class. In fact, that is what has happened (one B+ last year) and she’s no longer in the top 10 based solely on her UW GPA. I have read class rank is important to certain selective colleges but how far do they read into the rank provided by the high schools? Just looking at rank, it’s impossible to know that student A had a mix of As and Bs but took mostly advanced/APs, while student B took academic classes and earned straight As. I’m assuming with holistic admissions the AOs know but maybe not?
I think you don’t need to worry about one B+ grade. If your student is applying to very selective colleges, it is very unlikely they won’t get accepted because of ONE grade of B+.
And if they do or don’t get accepted, you will never know why…but one B+ grade is very unlikely to be the reason.
Guessing ED didn’t work out. But really, not likely because of ONE grade of B+
D24 was deferred to RD for her top choice but has 4 acceptances already. Two of those she would be happy attending, but we still have 7 more to hear from. She’s in a good place and nothing can be changed now but it’s a question that’s been on my mind and I want to be sure I’m giving S28 the right guidance.
It’s my opinion that many colleges do look at course rigor when they are reviewing admissions. Plus you do want the school counselor to check the box for most rigorous courseload on their counselor recommendation.
That being said….your kids should be taking courses where the material is presented in a way that they will understand and do their best. This might not be AP courses or accelerated subject areas.
Just adding…that one B+ grade was not the reason for the deferral from the ED school.
@Mwfan1921 what didn’t miss?
My D’s HS didn’t differentiate between honors and AP classes so there was a lot of gaming for higher rank but in terms of college acceptances, it seemed that rigor trumped rank in terms of importance.
Two years ago, D’s school had 8 valedictorians…
Many high schools do not rank at all anymore. Period. And they don’t designate a class val or sal either. Our high school went to reporting class rank in deciles a long time ago.
Keep in mind that the way high schools compute weighted GPAs varies wildly. Very wildly. Colleges know this.
I think I can comment on this from first hand experience. My class rank is 4/19 (not a typo, 19 kids in my class!). We have unweighted class rank and my gpa was/is 3.94.
A lot of schools look for you to be in the top 10% of your class, and 4/19 is top 21% of the class. I was worried about this. I was also upset because the people higher than me had weighted gpas of 4.0 as well, while my weighted gpa is 4.5 or so. So I obviously challenged myself a lot more.
I have got into to almost all the schools I have applied to, including the ones that list class rank as important, or very important and admit 90% of their class from the top 10% of their high school class.
All this to say, colleges look for context when it comes to class rank, just like they do it most other parts of your application. Hope this helps!
PS: I think a strong test score (above your school average) can also help show that the class rank at your school is not a good representation. I feel this helped me, but I can’t know for sure.
A bit off topic, but my D’s high school doesn’t rank, but does select val and sal. The way they do that is they invite every senior with a 3.9 UW or above to apply. You send a resume and answer some questions about your activities and accomplishments and school involvement. Then a short list is made and each of those students writes a val/sal speech. Then they choose based on that process. In other words, it is not specifically class-rank based, but “top students” based on GPA and, in the spirit of California public schools, is also somewhat holistic as it takes into account ECs and other life experiences.
I found the MA Dept. of Higher Ed’s GPA calculator and plugged in D’s grades so I could get an understanding of how certain colleges would recalculate. D’s school also includes non-academic classes like PE in the GPA whereas I know many colleges do not consider these at all.
I can see where this might be helpful for instate MA colleges, but I wonder how helpful this actually is for OOS and private universities.
This is helpful–thank you!
If it really worries you, I also recommend asking your school counselor to explain the situation a bit in her counselor rec. I asked for mine to do that, and I think it really helped as well. Good luck!
I think it was more helpful than nothing at all but it’s impossible to know really how each school recalculates GPA (if they do even) and how it differs from in-state vs. OOS applicants. The calculator gives academic classes: A = 4.0, honors/advanced: A = 4.5, and AP: A=5.0. D’s HS does not/will not report weighted GPA to students.
So having read a lot of what AOs tend to say on this subject, here is my two cents:
Some colleges more or less have a mandate to consider rank in a relatively mechanical way. These are usually public colleges.
Other than that, when relatively selective colleges say they consider rank, mostly what they really mean is they evaluate your grades/transcript in context. They understand grading systems are very different, course offerings are very different, and so on. And so while they might be looking for relatively outstanding students, they understand what they need to look for in detail depends on the school.
And then again unless they are operating under some sort of mandate, exactly how the school itself ranks students (if at all), how the school itself weights grade (if at all), and so on is not determinative of how the college will evaluate transcripts. Again at a high level, the more selective colleges want to see people who have challenged themselves, and some specifically want to see people who have challenged themselves in all the core areas. But they also like to see kids who enthusiastically follow their interests.
And they understand that there can be tradeoffs involved, and generally they are going to be OK with different kids doing different things. But in detail, they might see some kids as being more the type of student they are looking for than others, and in fact that can explain how a kid might have more success with some colleges rather than others despite them having similar generic rankings–in detail, those colleges are not necessarily all looking for the exact same type of student.
OK, so what to do with all this? Well, I think it is a good general idea to try to challenge yourself across all the core areas, preferably for all four years but sometimes that fourth year might put you into a tradeoff issue. But if you are better at some things than others, maybe what that means is an objectively more challenging set of courses in one or more areas, and less so in one or more other areas. And sometimes you may not get a perfect grade challenging yourself.
And all that is OK. As you then approach college applications, you can assess where you are as a student, what are your relative strengths, what are you most passionate about, what is your current vision for what your college academic experience will look like. And then you can identify the colleges that are closest to your vision, and for which you might be a good fit. And usually if you do this with an open mind, you can find colleges like that across the full spectrum of what would be likelies, targets, and reaches for you. And your list will not be the same as some other kids’ lists, and that is actually great.
So on the one hand, I think it is a mistake for college prep kids to specialize too early in HS. But on the other, I think different kids can chart different paths and apply to different colleges, and that is the way it should be.
College admission officers review the actual transcript and will understand exactly the level of coursework your D has completed.
I would not give the ranking another thought (unless applying for an auto-admit in TX).
- AOs understand that different high schools calculate GPA and rank in different ways (ex. some high schools don’t do a weighted GPA, others don’t rank).
- Many colleges recalculate GPA based on their own criteria (ex. academic subjects only, no weighting, etc.)
- In general try not to worry about things you can’t change.
Wishing you D the best. And congrats on the acceptances in hand!
Thank you so much! I won’t give the rank another thought. It is just something that has been on mind. I appreciate the information!
True, I actually suggested D drop down from AP Calculus to Calculus at the beginning of the year. She adamantly refused and is earning a respectable B which she has had to work for. She didn’t the easier A, and I’m really proud of her for challenging herself with this one even if the GPA suffers a bit.
My son’s school only publicly shared the top 25. The Princeton admit - no clue what hook there may have been - wasn’t in the top 25.
They will know your kids schedule. There are factors beyond grades also looked at and deferral means they’ve yet to make a decision (as opposed to a WL where they’ve already made a decision). The reality is they can see rigor but for so many they cannot see rank. So in general rigor will trump.
The only time, I think, rigor could penalize in this situation is a school that awards merit based on unweighted gpa. At U of Arizona, for example, the B+, if it were an A even in a standard class, would have led to a larger award.
Congrats on the two admissions that excite - assuming they are affordable.
I think your advice was wise and spot on. Let’s say the student lacked rigor. Even if it impacted an admission in a positive way, they’d then be less prepared for the rigors of college. As long as the student could handle the rigor of their ha schedule, of course, which your student clearly could.
And best of luck going forward to this student.
It’s hard for kids to realize but even the most accomplished are faced with rejection. I see it as the school’s loss - but with a deferral there’s certainly still a chance.
Best of luck.
This is so important–the primary purpose of a strong college prep curriculum is to be prepared for college! Colleges in turn tend to like to see that, but that is because they think the same thing and want their students to be well prepared.