My daughter goes to a university (will not name it at this point) that only takes weighted grades into account if the school system where the kid comes from calculates them and posts them on the child’s transcripts. An administrator at the school went on to tell me that they will calculate regular GPA if the school does not post them but will not calculate weighted grades. This is regarding the academic scholarship awards not sure if they go across the board and do the same for admission. Am I wrong to think this is unethical and possibly illegal? Giving kids from some school systems a distinct advantage over others?
Schools set their own policies re: this. Nothing illegal or unethical about it.
It’s their policy and that is that.
How is the university supposed to know the difficulty level of courses at every high school in the country (or even in the state) in order to calculate a weighted GPA when the school in question has not done so? I can be pretty creative on the legal front, but I’m baffled as to what you could possibly think would be illegal in a university’s decision to rely on a student’s official high school transcript.
There is nothing illegal or unfair going on. The university said that they will take into consideration what your high school does.
Your issue is not with the university, it would be with the high school and how they report grades.
What does your high school they calculate a weighted or unweighted GPA?
If your high school post as GPAs as unweighted, that is what the college will take in to consideration.
Ask your D’s high school to put the weighted GPA on the transcript.
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Am I wrong to think this is unethical and possibly illegal?
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Why would this be illegal? why would it be the college’s fault how the school reports grades??
As @sybbie719 says…your issue is with the high school…not the college. The high school is hurting its students (not the college).
That’s just the way it is. My kids’ high school didn’t weight until this year, too late for us. @mommdc, some schools flat out don’t weight GPAs, so there’s no way they can put a weighted GPA on the transcript.
Parents at the high school started complaining about the policy a few years ago - that’s why it was finally changed.
Every college admission department (obviously not all but I have a jr in college and a HS senior
going ED) I’ve discussed this issue with have said the same. They look at the UW grade and then put their own weighting on it. Ie: usually a grade of A (4.0) in an advan place class becomes 4.5.
Edit above: fwiw…a 4.0 in a AP class becomes a weighted 5.0
high schools can change how they represent their transcripts
How do they compare different weighting systems?
@dartmouth…yes, a HS can represent a transcript any way they like. But my point is the college considering it is going to break it out and interprete it the way they want to.
To be honest…there are TONS of different ways for HSs to calculate weighted GPA’s.
@s3 in our experience…and we asked this same question at 28 colleges for two different kids…many colleges recalculate the GPA using the college’s formula…to even the playing field. And we were told 28 times…that when they recalculate, they do NOT weigh the grades…at all.
@thumper1…I agree, maybe I didn’t say it well.
What I was trying to say is that the colleges see the entire transcript and can see what level of class the letter grade was received in, so a HS calculation of weighted vs unweighted is irelavent.
An A grade is an AP class is stronger than an A in non-AP.
I think I understand what the OP was getting at. The school will use whatever stats the high school sends. If the school doesn’t weight courses or give extra points for honors or AP, that’s what the college will use for the scholarships. If Student A has a 4.97, she might get a better scholarship than Student B from a school that only has a 4.0 scale. The college will even calculate the gpa from a school that doesn’t calculate a gpa, but if the student is at a school that does, the college won’t recalculate.
My daughter ran into this with a scholarship. The scholarship considers gpa, scores, class rank, but if there is no class rank that is just thrown out. Well, if you go to a very competitive school, your class rank could be 20% even though your gpa is 4.5 and your scores are practically perfect. If you go to a so-so school, then you might be tops in your class even though you’d be much lower ranked at the more competitive school. If you go to a school that doesn’t rank, then you might be anywhere in the mix and it doesn’t count against you (it never really helps you as the gpa does that).
But in the end it is their scholarship money and they get to award it how they want.
I still think the MORE competitive colleges ( I know some schools have a minimum gpa/sat that will get you xyz, etc.) get way deeper into the course ciriculum that generated the gpa than just the “stats” the HS sends.
Every AO from the more selective schools that has visited our HS (public Fairfield Co., CT) over the years has preached the “there better be a high number AP courses” on the transcript mantra.
Another thought. If this isn’t the case, how would some of the better prep school grads be evaluated ? Many of those schools do not even assign an alpha/numeric grade to specific courses (or so I’m told).
This isn’t for admission, but for a scholarship. Take Alabama. They have a requirement for a 3.5 gpa. They do not question the gpa submitted by the high school, if it has honors on it, if it is from a home schooler, if it includes non-core classes. The gpa is the gpa and however the high school calculates it is fine. Send in your best one for the scholarship and they’ll take it. Other schools might make adjustments or only accept the unweighted gpa or only core classes. It’s up to the college.
It may not be fair. It is the school’s choice. Admissions is different.
The adcoms from selective schools are telling the kids at your school that there better be lots of “AP courses” because they want to see applicants with very challenging HS courseload…not because the colleges use those to recalculate GPA.
Remember…those very selective schools have very competitive applicants. If your student isn’t…that won’t bode well for acceptances.
But really…this has NOTHING to do,with the colleges recalculating GPA…at all.
That is absolutely not true. At very selective schools, students are evaluated on taking the most rigorous curriculum that their school offers. If the school does not offer a slew of AP courses, the student is not going to be penalized (I speak to this from both personal and professional experience- where I know and speak with a lot of AOs).
If your school offers a lot of AP courses, and a kid takes one or two, yes it will raise a red flag. If a school offers only 4 (my daughter’s school only offered AP English Junior/senior year and AP calc or AP stat) that it what they will be evaluated on. It did not hurt her as she was admitted to every single school she applied to (Ivies and top LACs)
Most highly selective schools don’t look at weighted gpas because there is already an expectation that the student is taking the most challenging courses the school offers and is doing well.
Feildston school did away with AP classes almost 13 years ago and it did not hurt their college admissions
https://www.ecfs.org/uploaded/ECFS_College_Destinations_2016.pdf
I still think you guys are missing my point (not that it is very important). A strong GPA without rigor is next to meaningless at more selective schools…however it is recalculated or not.
Merit scholarships at those schools generally go to the top 25% of admitted students. If you are not in that bracket as defined by GPA , with curriculum considered (if you don’t like the phrase recalculated) and SAT/ACT you aren’t in the game. Not to knock UA, but I wouldn’t put it in the selective category I’m referring to, solid school though.