Michigan is one of the few schools that discloses this. See the link. It is basically an unweighted GPA and they throw out the pluses and minuses. So, a B-, B and B+ are all a 3.0 in their calculation.
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To be clear I was talking about grades and related GPA calculation for UMich students. UMich students are given letter grades, which then translate into numbers. For that, the oddity is that an A+ is a 4, as is an A. But every +/- and letter below that is otherwise as you’d expect i.e. A- is 3.7, B+ is 3.3, B is 3, etc.
I’d say it’s also an oddity that an A- is not a 3.67 and a B+ is not a 3.33, but at least you can sorta kinda understand why they do it the way they do. A+ and A both being 4? Not so much.
@NYRB has posted the answer to your question about how admissions recalculates HS grades.
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a lot of schools don’t give extra points for an A+, my older son’s does not either and he doesn’t go to Michigan.
is this include PE?? how about high school courses like algebra or geometry took as elementary or middle school?.. my daughter has couple Bs for PE
That’s not odd at all. Neither my kid’s high school nor my high school or college gave a bonus to an A+ vs an A. Both were treated as a 4.0. I think my college did away with the A+ after I graduated make this clear.
Looks like Indiana also does this.
Grades and Grading: Policies: University Policies: Indiana University.
I’d actually be interested to see if you know any universities giving a 4.3 for an A+. I haven’t seen that.
Agree to disagree. It’s odd to me that it exists as a differentiated grade, yet conveys no distinction in the GPA. Doing away with it, as your school apparently did, makes sense. Either have it mean something, or why bother having it?
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Does Ross use the same recalculation system?
All of this is fascinating but it doesn’t help get the families into Michigan EA. Once they are there they will learn the system. I can tell you about the questions in engineering that have to do with OSU (yes, the rivalery is real)… Lol.
For those applying any grades in high school are converted to their system which is A=4,B=3 and so on with Core classes so gym class isn’t being factored in but. If it’s a poor grade in gym someone with eyes will see it.
So how do they know if your taking AP with rigor if they down grade it? They read your school report. They read your counselors report and so on. The AO is usually familiar with the schools also.
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There’s actually a discussion on this from a few years ago if you want to dive further.
Best of luck to you and your student!
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Hmmm…but that’s not what the GPA recalculation page linked above says:
We will convert all first-year applicants’ GPA to an unweighted 4.0 scale using all classes in 9th through 11th grades
But, I respect your Michigan knowledge, so maybe you know more detail?
it also says 9-11 grades. what about a kid skip 10th grade? are they gonna use 8th grade info (it is on transcript)
They use absolute grades no +/-
We do not use a weighted GPA scale in our evaluation process. We will convert all first-year applicants’ GPA to an unweighted 4.0 scale using all classes in 9th through 11th grades, and we use only the absolute value of the grade in the recalculation process (A+ or A or A- = 4.0).
It’s pretty much been this way. They will look at senior grades if deferred /postponed
They won’t use 8th grade grades. This is a special circumstance and I would call admissions to see how they jandle it.
They typically use core classes to focus on. But understand what your saying.
I was talking about core vs all courses…they say they use ALL classes in the GPA recalc which would include electives like PE, engineering, arts, etc.
the circumstance was explain in common app … not sure how they gonna do it. couple other school using 10-11th grade told me they count last 2 years
So we are all correct on the question of GPA in high school used.
I just talked to admissions and from what I know it’s been the same for year’s. Yes, they look at “all” grades but… If the “B” in gym isn’t related to their major interest like engineering… It really isn’t looked at.
But if a “D” was given in pre Calc. They would “weigh” much more substantially for an engineering major.
Make sense?
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Again, just call admissions and they can answer that question.
The school where I work would look at the two years of grades/courses we do have. The bigger issue is how competitive will the applicant be without three years of HS at application time…they will likely have fewer core courses, less rigor, less time for ECs, etc etc. It is uncommon my school would accept an applicant who graduates early.
OTOH, there can be compelling reasons why a student must graduate early, and of course there are extremely advanced academic outliers…I am not talking about these students.
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