<p>zm- there was a looog discussion about this a while ago, I could never get a straight answer, because I don’t think there is one. GPAs are reported inconsistently, and some schools recalculate, and others don’t appear to do so, what a mess. I definitely agree with scualum that a consistent scale would go a long way.</p>
<p>The reason I was digging into this was to see how D compared to stats you see from the college in their common data set and other reports, on their admitted student stats. There is no definition of how those numbers are composed. </p>
<p>What satisfied me, at least currently, was getting the naviance data from our school. I then used that to gauge her stats against the results of kids from our school. </p>
<p>Back to your question zm- One thing that schools tell you is that even if they normalize the GPA in some way, they also take as another factor the rigor of the courseload. So even if the GPA may be lower since it is unweighted, the rigor will be higher and that will be a plus.</p>
<p>zoose, I believe they have a factor in the process where they look to see your strength of schedule and if you took the most rigourous courses available.</p>
<p>cross posted with jackie :)</p>
<p>No call yet from my son. I don’t know if that’s good or bad!! His cell phone is on the fritz, so he’d have to borrow one anyway.</p>
<p>S2’s public inner-city HS reports only unweighted GPAs. About one half of the students take AP courses. No attempt is made to distinguish between courses except that two GPAs are reported, overall and core. The core is restricted to academic courses, no drivers ed, p.e., etc. Class rank does not involve any weighting either. All APs & honors, or none, one can still be ranked #1. In S1’s year, 44 students were tied for #1, a single B in an AP course dropped one out of the top 10%. None of this seems to matter to colleges, 190 out of 405 were admitted to top tier schools (90% went college overall). Last year, for example, of the 8 students (no athletes or URMs) who applied to Harvard, 5 were accepted (from what I understand, 3 chose to attend), for Yale, I believe it was 4 for 4, and Princeton 1 for 2.</p>
<p>idad mentions another thing which you need to be careful about when calculating GPA, is it all classes or just core classes. Many schools say they throw out grades for gym etc, but if you don’t see an explicit statement, what does that score on their web page include? And how does what is included with your transcript compare?</p>
<p>I think if this is important to anyone, they need to get the answers directly from the admissions at the various schools, and in many cases that means contacting them as the info isn’t readily available. Thank you to all the adcoms out there who blog and otherwise share the details of their processes.</p>
<p>For the most part, my DS found out by asking admissions - either on a campus tour or in the interview. I don’t think it was mentioned on too many websites or applications.</p>
<p>The UCs are pretty simple - they ask you to self report your grades on the application in the classes that they care about - then, if you are admitted, your grades better match what you provided on the application. I just like that it is all one piece of paper - less to get lost.</p>
<p>Thanks, scualum. According to D’s guidance counselor, most colleges will not include classes like art, music and PE when they recalculate - I was just wondering how you found out that different schools used different methods since I haven’t seen anything on the web sites about this.</p>
<p>Interesting about the UCs allowing kids to self report their grades. I guess you have to be careful to save all report cards in that case. Of course rememembering A,B,C or 4,3,2 grades are a lot easier than remembering number grades - 100,99,98,97… which is how my D’s high school reports grades.</p>
<p>idad - sounds a bit like our school, when my middle son was a senior, there were 27 tied for #1 out of 440, so one b and you eked out a top 10%, but 2 and you’re somewhere around 13%, which is CRITICAL in the state of Texas!!</p>
<p>My junior son now has 1 B and we’re praying he can make it the rest of the year without falling out of the top 10%.</p>
<p>Last year, there were 36 tied for #1 out of around 425 with 98% attending college. </p>
<p>Kids get into great colleges, but if your dream is to be a Longhorn, you better be in that top 10% just to be on the safe side!!</p>
<p>BTW, still waiting to hear from son about PSAT, I got a call from school, but it was from the athletic trainer telling me that my son fell and hyperextended his elbow during off season and I needed to keep an eye on it in case he fractured something - GREAT!!</p>
<p>Astromom, I know what you mean. We moved over the summer and in the course of interviewing/auditioning piano teachers, it seems anybody who still takes lessons at this level will put in 3-5 hours practice every day. HighlandDaughter can practice one hour. That’s it. </p>
<p>Her current teacher is fabulous but he will push her as hard as she lets her. I too enjoy hearing her practice and would hate to see it go - really I would probably have her stop dance first, but she’s within a year of the highest level of Highland dance, which has been her dream since she started at 11.</p>
<p>I will say I’m glad she can still sleep in when she needs to - though she generally never sleeps past 8am even on the weekends. She has high academic goals and is willing to do what she must to achieve them. It just seems this year we are “schooling toward the test” while it’s always been a plus of homeschooling to be able to do our own thing to a certain extent, going off on rabbit trails as desired, etc.</p>
<p>Why did your dd (or you) decide to switch from homeschool? Congratulations on making the switch - it’s never the easiest, smoothest thing in the world.</p>
<p>ag54, hope you get some news soon! HighlandDaughter’s scores arrived last Saturday just as we were walking out the door for her piano recital. We had both been pacing the floor all week, circling the mailbox (heaven help us next year!!) but on Saturday we were focused on the recital. We’re pleased with her score as she’s definitely within range for TX even if the number moves up a bit. As a homeschooler we love getting verification of our “mommy grades” :)</p>
<p>Hope your ds’s elbow isn’t fractured. Be sure to update here :)</p>
<p>And that 10% thing is just nuts. I’ve never seen such an un-holistic approach in all my life.</p>
<p>Our school has online grading - which allows you to pull an unofficial transcript at home. So that is how he populated the UC application. The application expects A,B,C grades - not sure how your grading system would fit into the form. </p>
<p>In terms of what courses were included, that was all over the map… Some used all core classes (raising the question of what is core), some weighted AP with a extra grade point, some weighted Honors and AP with an extra grade point, etc. </p>
<p>One trend I noticed was as the school got smaller, the more the package was read as a whole and the less the GPA formulation was an issue.</p>
<p>Congrats on your daughter!! I’ll be sure to let y’all know. I should hear from him in an hour or so. I hope it’s not a call about swelling and needing a visit to the ER!</p>
<p>ag54 - hope your DS is ok - I’m sure that wasn’t a call you were excited about receiving - especially when you were on pins and needles waiting for another call! Good luck with the score.</p>
<p>Thanks for going into more detail scualum. I feel like the number grades make things so much more competitive here! At least with ABC grades, there’s some latitude given. Of course it makes it easier to have only one val when you use number grades, though the difference can be a small fraction of a point.</p>
<p>Dang It!! 198!! He is bummed, he did great on math - 74. but bombed the critical reading - 60. He was surprised that it was so low.</p>
<p>Oh well, at least he can now focus on the ACT this weekend!! I’m telling him if he kicks booty on that, he doesn’t even have to take the SAT! Looking for silver linings!</p>
<p>ag54, only on cc would 198 be a bummer, huh? But I know how you feel – my ds would be bummed to not be commended. He estimates he got a 208; maybe he’s overconfident? I wish we could find out!</p>
<p>LOL, no joke!! CC is a bit skewed from the regular population! </p>
<p>DS said that he did better than ALL of his friends (of course they’re the football guys so, what does that tell you - haha, just kidding!!!)</p>
<p>I’m going to print out where I saw the 2008 listings, a 198 is in the 96th percentile this year, so he’ll feel good about that.</p>
<p>The arm is really sore, he says he can’t straighten it out without wincing. I told him to take advil and start on ACT stuff, that you don’t have to straighten the arm to work on the computer!! Luckily, he and I get along great and he laughed at that, if not, he might have hit me!!</p>
<p>So the kids share their scores? I don’t think kids do at my S’s school. The parents don’t. Last year, I knew of only one kid’s score from his mom, but we’re pretty good friends, and he’s a year ahead of my son so it’s not like they are in direct “competition.”</p>
<p>OK, I’m doing some volunteer work at the school in the morning, and I’m just gonna bust out and ask to get the score!!!</p>
<p>They handed them out at lunch, so I’m sure it was the major topic of conversation! I can just see them sitting around the lunch table giving each other various levels of crud about it. That is the relationship this particular group has with each other, there is nothing sacred ;)</p>
<p>Parents don’t talk about it though. They don’t have to, they hear it from their kids haha! I live in Peyton Place.</p>