@ OITB1 Your post is what encouraged me to look deeper into their website as I had no idea. I just realized, looking at a few schools, how vastly different they are in information they’re willing to share. The most surprising thing I’ve learned so far, is how a student’s recalculated GPA for admissions can vary significantly from school to school. It’s been interesting!
I completely understand and agree with your comment: “One interesting aspect for us will be to see how our kid reacts to the possible deferrals and even waitlists at some of the places that, were he not in the massive 2006 birth year and applying in the age of test-optional and the Common App and kids spraying out a thousand applications apiece”. So much has changed in a few short years. My S25 was originally looking at a dozen schools, but decided to only submit 5 applications. He wants to stay in the SE.
THIS. This is what I’ve been struggling to get my S25 to understand. He looks at our school’s historical data in Naviance and thinks it’s still accurate, when it isn’t. It might be for a college that has a ton of applicants from our HS, so there’s lots of 2022 and 2023 data, but for those schools that only have 5-20 applicants per year, the data aggregates many years, and you can’t tell which are which, and while I think it looked like a much rosier admittance picture for out of state students (at a UTK, or a Clemson, both on his list) in the past, I don’t think the same is necessarily true now.
Right on. A little bit off topic, but this being our second time through is helpful, and there’s some hopeful context to the strange Naviance results you might see.
Our D23 was playing a different ball game, but based on her stats and where she finished in her HS class, she ended up basically downgrading by about a third of a “tier” in terms of perceived eliteness or selectivity, in the schools she got into compared to what we would have thought of her numbers in a pre-2020 environment. At the end of the day, after everyone’s sifted through the 50% bump in applications (many of which are probably trashbinned pretty easily as “never should have applied here”) and worked through deferrals and waitlists and the top down process of kids accepting their offers to Ivies and then accepting their offers to the next layer of schools and on down, generally speaking the same profiles are ending up at the same places. Which means looking at acceptance rates is pointless. Exceptions apply, there’s more access to more selective/expensive places provided to more kids than in the past, there are a third more high school graduates every year than when we were 18, etc., but ultimately those haven’t completely re-ordered the landscape from where it was 5 years ago. Just shifted it a bit and continued longterm changes.
In other words, we just have to be patient and let the snake digest for awhile. Witness how many students got in off the waitlist into the middle of the summer at places like Wisconsin last year; hopefully this year FAFSA doesn’t push things so late that lots of kids have already committed elsewhere. The key is identifying places like UTK, where there’s been a school-specific policy shift (increased focus on in-state students) or general demographic impact (toward southern publics especially) that are frontrunning things and adjust the value of your Naviance scatterplot.
My OOS son (Maine) applied EA on Oct 13. 1320 SAT, 30 ACT, UW GPA just under 4.0, 7 AP’s (max our school offers: 1 sophomore year, 3 junior year and 3 senior year), school does not rank, started his own food business 5 years ago, 3-sport athlete and captain 3x, Model UN President, leadership roles on campus, school-wide sportsmanship award, school-wide award for scholarship and character, extremely strong LOR’s (according to his college counselor). I have absolutely no idea what UTK will say-- hoping for a deferral?
Has anyone looked at their child’s portal, and under the GPA and test section, it says:
“Calculated Self-Reported Core GPA” with a GPA. Is that the calculated GPA that is done by the school based on the SRAR with only the core courses? Because it is definitely not the GPA that he “reported.” Thanks!
I just looked - I think yes, that’s the re-calculated GPA (because what I see isn’t what my son reported either). I think it can also have weights - 1 for AP/DE/IB courses, .5 for honors, but only if your HS weights those classes. (I know they said that “only if your HS weights it” part at the info session, because I remember wondering what they’d do for our HS, which weights AP but not honors)
Thanks. I get they recalculated from the SRAR. What’s frustrating is the way they recalculate (along with many other schools like Florida), a B- gets the same value as a B+. At my son’s HS, you get different weight based on the specific grade.
They had a live broadcast yesterday and they explained what courses are included in the GPA. It’s mainly core courses and not all of them. I think you can still listen to the recording.
Thanks. I assume it is the same as all the other schools. I just have an issue with how they do it, in the sense that the same value is given for a B-, B or B+. A B- is not the same as a B+ most of the time.
I just checked my son’s UTK GAP and compared it to the information posted on their website, and they match - weighted 1 for AP & .5 for Honors. Based on the information posted below (copied from UTK website), I calculated it through Junior year, so 3 English, 3 Math, 1 American history, 1 World History, 2 foreign language, and 1 performing art. Any extra core classes he took, were not included, such as AP Psychology and other AP courses he took.
It seems like they use a very specific calculation method. His UTK GPA is lower than it would be if all of his core courses were included, but at least they’re transparent. His recalculated GPA at another school was completely different, and much lower.
Core Academic Subjects
4 English
4 Math (algebra, geometry, trigonometry, calculus, statistics, or other advanced math)
3 Science (biology, chemistry, physics, or other science)
1 American history
1 European history, world history, or world geography
DD’s UTK GPA is 4.3 but SAT is 1200. Hoping she will at least get deferred and not rejected?? Crazy that her sister was accepted in 2022 with a much lower GPA but test optional and got merit and honors program. Trying to manage her expectations!
I would imagine the thinking is that most students’ distribution across a letter grade range would approach the middle (i.e., over 4 years the collection of B-'s and A-'s on the one hand and B+'s and A+'s on the other mostly cancel one another out on the average transcript). But, yeah, seems a little lazy and imprecise. A student who’s regularly pulling A- grades looks like a vastly superior student to the one who gets a lot of B+ grades and just misses the A- range, when they’re actually pretty similar in accomplishment. I’d chalk it up to not enough admissions staff, but it’s really just a computing function.
S25 has similar stats with UTK GPA 4.25 & SAT 1240. We are OOS. He was deferred at Auburn & told it was because of his test score. Crazy how much these schools have changed in a few short years.
I know. I’ve heard Auburn ONLY looks at GPA & test scores during the early rounds. I’m hoping UTK doesn’t do the same and looks at the entire application.
I guess they’re trying to use a consistent method to compare students. I know in our area, the public schools report grades as A, B, C, etc… There are no plus or minus, and no numerals. However, at many of the private schools, they only report numbers, with 90-100 considered an A, 80-89 considered a B, and so on.
At my child’s private school, if a student earns 89.4, that is reported as an 89. They will NOT round anything up below .5 is my understanding. In this case UTK would assign the 89 as a B, or 3.0.
@ acs4898 I’ve heard the same thing, so we weren’t surprised by his deferral. UTK’s website makes it seem like they consider the entire application. I hope so!
as I had no idea. I just realized, looking at a few schools, how vastly different they are in information they’re willing to share. The most surprising thing I’ve learned so far, is how a student’s recalculated GPA for admissions can vary significantly from school to school. It’s been interesting!