<p>To NKbaseballbum: Princeton doesn’t look at freshman grades which is probably why your friend’s two failed classes did not affect him.</p>
<p>thank you :I</p>
<p>I’ll try to add in other information by an edit of the main post in a while, but meanwhile worried students need to see this.</p>
<p>i have a question…</p>
<p>If I am doing terrible in math (possible D), should I just stick with the class and try to get an A next semester or should I drop it? The class is really killing me emotionally, mentally, and in every possible way.</p>
<p>I really want to go to Brown and I honestly believe I have a decent chance of getting in…but a D definitely will destroy my chance…</p>
<p>I’m sorry for my nonstop complaining, but I’m really frustrated esp since I’m a junior.</p>
<p>I wonder if these GPA’s are weighted or unweighted…hopefully the former</p>
<p>hey, i’m a junior too. i’m glad i’m not the only one on here who is haha. what level of math is it? if you are already well ahead of your grade level or something, i would drop it and take it next year. also, if you think the emotional stress of that class will affect any of your other classes, i would again advise dropping it.</p>
<p>What level of junior year math course are you talking about here?</p>
<p>im a junior, taking AP Calc BC</p>
<p>personally, i would drop it then. that’s a perfectly acceptable math class for a senior to take so they will not think you are behind or anything.</p>
<p>Nonetheless, the C must be offset by some amazing achievements for admissions to top colleges…</p>
<p>To think about it, a 3.75 pretty much means you averaged 1 B every semester (assuming 4x4 schedule). I would think HYPMS students would do at least a bit better.</p>
<p>I don’t think that one grade of “x” or two grades of “x” will keep you out, it would be other things.</p>
<p>I have to believe the colleges that say they really, truly don’t have a minimum G.P.A. requirement, because those colleges want to make sure to be able to admit exceptional examples of students whose high school grades don’t reflect what they can bring to a college.</p>
<p>brtibrat (post #5):</p>
<p>The top 4% (ELC) per high school class are guaranteed admission to a UC campus (excludes Cal, UCLA & UCSD), but that does not mean that only the to 4% are accepted to the UC. EVERYone in the State who meets the minimum admission requirement (3.0 uw + certain test scores, or ~700x 5 test scores alone) will also be admitted to at least one campus. Now, of course, that campus might be Merced or Riverside, but they WILL be accepted to a UC if they apply.</p>
<p>token: IMO, this thread is potentially misleading and gives false hopes to the masses. As the former insiders have made quite clear in their tomes sold on Amazon, those with the lower gpa’s and test scores are almost always hooked applicants, and/or attend nationally-ranked high schools (the big NE prep and schools like TJ). Kinda like looking at Harvard Law’s data and noting that, hey, they do have a few kids with a 3.5 gpa; but what is missing is that those few low gpa’s are former Olympic athletes, or scions of world leaders.</p>
<p>I do agree with your point that there is no “minimum” gpa, just bcos gpa’s are all over the lot. A kid who earns a 3.6 from Thomas Jefferson probably represents a Val at the majority of high schools. But, the premise of false hope. A 3.6 from Lake Wobegon’s high school just ain’t gonna cut it for a highly selective high school, absent a hook (which could be athletic, or eye-popping EC).</p>
<p>Agreed that any one applicant with a 3.75 GPA can’t count on getting in to any particularly selective college. </p>
<p>On the other hand, I think a lot of CC participants go awry in trying to preserve a 4.0 at the cost of not taking challenging courses. Colleges try, as best they can, to admit students who are READY for that college. (I guess the Olympic athlete shows he is able to discipline himself and stay on a steady training regimen, and thus can learn how to study college-level material.) Every year at this time of year, high school students are panicking as they get their first grades of A- or B+, and this thread is designed to remind such students that they should still APPLY and see what happens.</p>
<p>I always wondered whether those GPAs were weighted or not.</p>
<p>I mean, my UW is lowly 3.6. But weighted, it’s pushing a 4.0.</p>
<p>And sorry for the second post, but what?! at aigiqinf (post #31). Averaging a B, unweighted of course, is a solid 3.0. </p>
<p>What are you talking about? You mean weighted?</p>
<p>“I have to believe the colleges that say they really, truly don’t have a minimum G.P.A. requirement, because those colleges want to make sure to be able to admit exceptional examples of students whose high school grades don’t reflect what they can bring to a college.”</p>
<p>And thank them for that! Academics are a worthy pursuit, but without life experience and wonder it makes for a pretty awful excuse for a human being, especially a young one. Colleges really do sift through the numbers for personalities; some of those personalities may turn out to be just numbers–extremely proficient numbers–but some are something altogether different. And believe me, they are recognizable.</p>
<p>Just so that all of you realize, the college board website is quite delayed in posting the newest average GPAs, SATs and acceptance rates. For example, JW Muller posted that UChicago has an acceptance rate of 38%…actually, it is 27%.</p>
<p>It’s time for my FAQ: </p>
<p>CURRENCY OF COMMON DATA SET INFORMATION </p>
<p>Each school year the colleges officially count their new freshman class AFTER the school year begins. (One college admission officer told me near the beginning of the school year that his college counts on the tenth day of class in the new school year, which I think is industry-standard practice.) Sometime around the turn of the calendar year (that is, in January during the school year) a college’s figures for that freshman class begin to be posted on the College Board website, and possibly on the college’s own website in the form of a Common Data Set filing. So what you see today (early in the school year) on the College Board descriptions of colleges is mostly information about the entering freshman class that entered in fall 2007 (that is, new college students from high school class of 2007), and that is the MOST RECENT information you have to go on as you apply for colleges yourself in fall of 2008, as a member of high school class of 2009. It is always like this–there is always a built-in lag between the year you can look up and the year you are living in as a student. </p>
<p>In a few weeks, links to Common Data Set sources of information such as the College Board College QuickFinder pages for each college should be on an equal footing. As I post this reply on 21 January 2009, some colleges are showing current data (entering class from fall 2008) and some are showing data from a year ago (entering class from fall 2007).</p>
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<p>Interesting, with the exception of Texas residents (and their top 10% rule), I guess I have never seen that on cc since everyone has a gazillion AP’s and is an Intel/Math/International semi – must be looking in all the wrong places. :D</p>