<p>Hello everyone!</p>
<p>I am considering taking one of three majors at UCB’s CED (I will have completed enough courses at community college by spring 2012 so that I meet the prerequisites courses for all three of CED’s undergraduate majors)</p>
<p>The only problem is, I got off to a rough start at CC, and got some W’s and non-passing grades. I have since retaken the non-passing classes and received A’s and B’s, though I have more than 12 units of non-passing grades from before.</p>
<p>Currently, if the bad grades are factored in, I would have a 3.0.</p>
<p>If not, I would have a 3.69, and two more semesters to raise it.</p>
<p>I spoke to counselors from UCB regarding my situation.</p>
<p>One said to use academic renewal to negate the impact of bad grades on my GPA for the purposes of the application process, since that counselor said that the CED will include the bad grades if I do not and the UC application will calculate the bad grades even though my CC transcript does not.</p>
<p>Another said that for the CED majors, the GPA will include bad grades, regardless of academic renewal, only if I repeated the course and passed. That means, if a course was not passed, not retaken, and relieved by academic renewal, it will not be included in the GPA, otherwise, it will be.</p>
<p>But then, I found this:</p>
<p>[<a href=“http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/admissions/counselors/q-and-a/calculating-gpa/index.html][/url”>http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/admissions/counselors/q-and-a/calculating-gpa/index.html][/url</a>]</p>
<p>“The university does accept academic renewal, a process which provides for the removal of previously recorded substandard grades that do not reflect the student’s abilities. If another college or university grants academic renewal and the corresponding grades are zeroed out, UC will calculate the GPA the same way as the institution sending the transcript. The information provided on the UC application must appear exactly as it does on the transcript.”</p>
<p>and</p>
<p>“For transfer applicants, only the most recent grade is counted when calculating the GPA; degree credit for the course is given only once. Repetition of a course with an original grade of C or better is disregarded; the original grade is counted when calculating the GPA.”</p>
<p>and</p>
<p>[<a href=“http://registrar.berkeley.edu/courserep.html][/url”>http://registrar.berkeley.edu/courserep.html][/url</a>]</p>
<p>“12-UNIT REPETITION LIMIT: If you repeat courses in which you received a D+, D, D-, or F, the units are counted only once and only the most recently earned grades and grade points are used for the first 12 units repeated. In case of further repetitions, the grade-point average is based on all grades assigned and total units attempted.” (I have a feeling that this applies after transfer, when one takes classes while at UCB or when UCB admissions is trying to apply classes listed on CC transcripts to a student’s UCB academic record.)</p>
<p>So who is correct on this? For the purposes of the application process, how will the GPA be calculated for CED undergrad majors? Will the bad grades (all or some) be removed from the GPA calculation for the application process?</p>
<p>By the way, academic renewal at my CC is course specific, and will not erase an entire semester.</p>
<p>Also, has anyone noticed that the Urban Studies admission rate dropped from around 30% in Fall 2009 to 16% in Fall 2010? [<a href=“http://students.berkeley.edu/files/Admissions/12626_5.Info_TransAdm.pdf][/url”>http://students.berkeley.edu/files/Admissions/12626_5.Info_TransAdm.pdf][/url</a>] What happened?!?! Not even the admissions rate for Architecture and Landscape Architecture change that much.</p>