I'm too scared to check my grades!! Afraid I ruined my chances...

Chance Me / Match Me
1

Grades have been up since Monday (it’s Thursday). I know not checking won’t make them better, but I’m so scared to do so.

Rundown: my school doesn’t weight GPAs, and it doesn’t offer APs. It’s a private, selective high school. I only had the option of two honors classes this year and my freshman year (just finished sophomore year) and I took them both years. So I took Honors Geo and Honors Spanish 2 freshman year, and this year I took Honors Algebra 2 and Honors Spanish 3.

I need above a 3.9 cumulative to be in the top percentiles of my class (we don’t do class rank but we’re divided in I think quintiles or something, so top 5%, top 15%, top 30%, top 60%, top 100% or something like that.) I had a perfect 4.0 my freshman year but first semester sophomore year I got a ton of A-'s, so my cumulative dropped to a 3.94.

Why am I scared? Well, my English teacher is crazy. He didn’t give us back 4 out of 5 papers, and the only paper he did give back, way back in January I got a B-. For Q3 which is Jan-March I got a B+. Since I didn’t get ANY papers back from Q4 I have no idea whatsoever how I did. The rumour about him is that he gives everyone an A- at the end of the year, but I’m not sure if that’s really true. He doesn’t grade papers, which is true, so nobody is sure what he bases his grades on.

Anyways, English I’m so scared I got a B+ in. My final didn’t go great for History, but I had a 94 before the final so hoping I’m still in the A range. Math the final went well (I think), I had a 93 going in, but you never really know with math. Chem I’m not scared for, I had a 95 going in and the final was fine. Spanish I had a 93 going in but our final was an essay and I always make grammar mistakes so I’m sure that affected my overall.

Basically, can you calm me down (lol) and give me confidence to check my grades? I really should know … and also, will one B+ affect my chances? I really want to go to Dartmouth

2

Check your grades! You are just going to make your anxiety worse thinking of all the different scenarios. One B+ will not be the end all for Dartmouth. Do your best, take a rigorous schedule, do well on the SAT’s and ACT’s and get leadership experience.

3

I completely agree. Also, it was only your sophomore year and one B+ will never “ruin” your chances anywhere. Just take a deep breath and check your grades! Then you can go from there!

4

You’re only a sophomore. You have plenty of time to bring your grades up. GPA is not the only thing taken into account when colleges review your application, as they also review your personal essays, the rigor of the courses you took, recommendation letters, extracurriculars, extenuating circumstances, your general background info, etc. Top tier colleges often ask for your unweighted grades anyway, so you’re not at a complete disadvantage for not having AP and weighted courses (but if you feel the need to explain the lack of AP classes in your schedule, they usually have extra space towards the bottom with which you can use to explain those parts of your application that seem confusing or ‘lackluster’). If you continue being a good student, one B+ in the first half of your high school career should not and will not ruin you.

5

@catchowder @radison405 @elena3142 Thank you guys so much for all the confidence! I ended up getting an A- in English and A’s in all my other classes!!! So I’m super happy and can now enjoy summer!! You guys are godsends