A vs. A-?

Applying to College
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<p>Hi College Confidential! I had a quick question.</p>

<p>SO, at my school, A's and A-'s are calculated EQUALLY in GPA (4.0). But, on one's transcript, that minus is noted (I know because I've gotten an A- in PE). Other than that A- in PE and two other B's in PE (lol I know, it's pretty bad. I just can't run the timed mile under 7:30 so my grade goes down, I only have one other A- in AP Language.</p>

<p>Many of the students I'm supposedly "competing" with, though, receive A-'s left and right (probably half A-, half regular A), and they simply don't care because it doesn't affect their GPA.</p>

<p>Now, I know I should focus on myself and not other, but I cannot help but ask; will I have ANY sort of advantage? Even though my school doesn't differentiate... will colleges realize that A's and A-'s are different? Thank you.</p>

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<p>@sallymeno11‌ -

Some will, some won’t. Many will just focus on the GPA itself and how many AP and honors courses you took. On the good side they will probably realize that your only B’s came in PE and will essentially look at you like you got virtually all A’s. Personally I think it is kind of crappy that your school gives you a lower grade because you cannot run within a certain time. Seems to me that as long as you are trying your best… but oh well.</p>

<p>I agree it’s annoying that your school does this, but you gave yourself the right answer. Forget about it, you cannot change it, and for the most part you really aren’t competing against your classmates for admission to college anyway. Even if you apply to the same college, they are a tiny fraction of the applicant pool.</p>

<p>Obviously you didn’t say anything about the rest of your resume, but assuming it is in line with your class work, you will have many good schools offering you admission. And in the end, that is all that really matters in the realm of this discussion, right?</p>

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<p>@fallenchemist‌ Thank you so much for your response! :slight_smile: It was very reassuring. I have always worked hard and really been very invested in every single thing I do, so I hope it comes across on my application.</p>

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<p>@sallymeno11‌ - I am sure it will. So you are a rising senior? What are the rest of your stats and resume, and where are you thinking of applying?</p>

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<p>@fallenchemist‌ I got a 33 on the ACT on my first try, then a 34 (33 science and reading, 34 math and english), 800 on Math II. </p>

<p>I am waiting for Biology and US History, but I don’t think I did superbly (hopefully above 740…). For those two subject tests, at what scores should I consider retaking them?</p>

<p>I think my EC’s are good, but I haven’t really had many people comment on them. Are you someone who would be willing to do that? I haven’t really had a chance to talk much to my GC @ school (just once or twice).</p>

<p>As of now, this is my list. I’m trying to narrow it down… </p>

<p>All UC’s (except for Santa Cruz and Merced)
Cal Poly SLO
BU
University of Washington
Occidental College
Scripps
BC
USC
University of Michigan
CMU
Tufts
Emory
WUSTL
Georgetown
Northwestern
Pomona
Penn
Rice
Stanford</p>

<p>I want to double major almost for sure. I don’t know exactly in what areas though. For my first major, I’ll either study biochem, biology, neurobio/neuroscience. For my second major, I’ll either study cognitive science (if my major isn’t neuroscience), linguistics, or computer science. I realize this may seem random or unfocused, but these things are truly what I love!</p>

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<p>@sallymeno11‌ - That’s OK about the indecision regarding majors, that is perfectly normal and part of what your freshman year is about. You take a class in each area that is towards the top of your list and see what you think. From my point of view I could see a nice marriage of neuroscience and CS, with maybe a minor in linguistics. That is quite doable at many schools, especially since you are likely to go in with some AP credits I would think. But the main thing is you find the subjects you like best. Don’t be too concerned about how well they fit together. If you had told me your two loves were neuroscience and ancient Mayan history, I would enthusiastically tell you to double major in those. If you don’t do it in college, when are you?</p>

<p>That ACT score is excellent, and combined with your GPA and hopefully strong EC’s you are competitive anywhere you apply. Sure, send me your EC’s. Either post them here, or send them to me in a PM. Or if you already posted them elsewhere on CC give me the link.</p>

<p>As far as narrowing down your list, I have to first ask you about finances. Are you looking for merit scholarships? Applying for need based aid? Or is your family in that large but dreaded middle to upper middle class section that makes too much to qualify for a lot of need based aid but affording college full pay is out of the question, hence a focus on merit scholarships? That will have a lot to do with narrowing the list. I assume you are from California.</p>

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<p>Regarding your original question, a lot of top colleges like you have on your list will recalculate your GPA themselves, and they will weight the A- differently than the A.</p>

<p>Regarding your majors, not all the colleges on your list offer all those majors. Linguistics and cognitive science aren’t going to be available everywhere.</p>

<p>Agree that finances are a significant question. You won’t get much aid from out of state at Michigan or Washington, so if you need financial aid, drop those two. Then the next question is if you have run the net price calculators for these schools. The calculators are on the school websites on the financial aid page. You will need your parents’ help to run them. They give you a good idea of what you are expected to pay. But know that if your parents are divorced, have a small business, or own rental real estate, the calculator will often overestimate the amount of aid you would receive. Even if your parents SAY cost is no issue, run the calculators with them anyway. Often parents don’t realize that it is about a quarter of a million dollars to cover four years full-pay at many of the colleges on your list. So make sure you take a financial reality check with them before going further with your list.</p>

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<p>I will PM you my EC’s! :)</p>

<p>So, I have run many net-price calculators (actually, for most schools), and my parents have said that cost won’t be an issue.Of course, I would love to receive some merit based aid, but I know that many of these schools don’t offer it. Those that do only offer it to the very top of the applicant pool. So, I’m not too hopeful about that. </p>

<p>My family is middle class for where I live (Bay Area), so our income is somewhat higher than usual middle class (I think 180,000 a year :confused: ). When I ran the net price calculators, I got very very little aid. When talking to my parents, though, they have told me that the cost will be manageable.</p>

<p>In general though, my parents aren’t helping me out on this. They told me to relax and leave the worrying about cost to them. I don’t really know what to do :/</p>

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<p>I would take them at their word since you have sat down with them and run the NPC’s. I agree that a gross income of $180,000 in the SF area isn’t the same as if you lived in St. Louis or Indianapolis, but it is also quite possible that they have planned for this and so it won’t be quite the issue it is for many families. Of course if you stayed in-state, like at Cal or UCLA, then your costs would be significantly lower anyway, and clearly these are good schools for what you want.</p>

<p>But OK, let’s start narrowing the list based on cost not being an issue. The next step, to me, is to look at what you are really looking for in a school beyond the academics. Assuming that the school meets your academic needs, what would you prefer in terms of size of the school, location, sports scene, Greek life, and any other non-academic factor you can think of? For location, that means urban vs. rural, weather preferences, and access to things important to your life. For example if you are an avid scuba diver, there are plenty of great schools that would still allow you to keep up with that hobby. So a school like Michigan might not be the best choice in that case. It is all about balancing. If everything else was more or less equal and one set of schools allowed you to keep doing that on weekends and others didn’t, why not pick the ones that do? Remember, you are essentially moving to this location for 4 years, starting a career of sorts. Factors that involve personal happiness should not be ignored.</p>

<p>So tell us what your ideal school would be like in relation to those kinds of factors and any other you can think of. Then we can really start doing some damage on your list. If you are one of those people that are very adaptable and would be happy in any scenario regardless of size, location, etc. that’s OK too. It just makes the list a bit harder to narrow down. But as Intparent says, there are other ways to look at some of these schools and get the list to a more manageable size and gain more insight into the schools at the same time, so when you have the choices to make you will have the info to help make it.</p>

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<p>I’ve never heard of a school actually grading students based on physical abilities. This is <em>profoundly</em> unfair and if you are physically incapable of doing this you should get a medical waiver and it should not count against your grade.</p>

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<p>@fallenchemist
Hahaha this is where this gets fun/challenging. I’m super adaptable. The only thing I can’t really bend on is a SUPER DE DUPER small school. The only really small schools on the list are Pomona and Scripps. I’m only considering applying because, from what I’ve heard, it seems like the consortium makes the schools feel much larger.</p>

<p>I’m also not big on Greek life. It’s okay if it’s there, just not prevalent (it’s not something I want to take a part of. Anything that superficially excludes other people is just not for me). This is a reason I ruled out Duke. Are any of these schools heavy in the Greek life? (I know USC and UCLA are, but I have also heard that their student bodies’ aren’t socially split up because of it. I’ve heard that, at Duke, there’s one group in Greek and one not in Greek and that they rarely intermingle…</p>

<p>I do open water swimming, so it’d be amazing to be close to a place that is near a body of water. It is by no means a deal breaker.</p>

<p>I don’t want to go to a school so intensely academic that there is no time for fun. This is a reason I ruled out UChicago. While I realize many of the schools on my list are rigorous, it seems to me that they aren’t cut-throat. I cannot stand cut-throat competition ( a little is OK). This is why I ruled out Cornell.</p>

<p>Lastly, I’d prefer to be near a large city. Less than an hour proximity is perfect :)</p>

<p>One more thing! I need some SAFETY schools! I have none. Having said that, I’d rather go to a community college and transfer to a UC than attend Chico State or CSU Long Beach… (though, my counselor is adamant I apply to both of these schools).</p>

<p>@soze I know. It’s not fair at all. I tried that, but was given this example: Does an athlete deserve an A in math if he or she is trying his/her hardest if he/she is scoring poorly on tests?
I couldn’t really argue with it:/</p>

<p>My sophomore year, though, my teacher didn’t grade like this. He graded on improvement. Granted he was MUCH tougher (our mile days consisted of 5 mile runs, not 1 mile runs), he was fair. I hope my B’s don’t make me come off as one with a careless attitude.</p>

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<p>The very top schools like Stanford, and I don’t know what others on your list, will look at every single grade and make note of the A-s. Those schools that have a tough job culling all of the great students, top talent applying , have to look at things like this to differentiate. They do look at every single relevant grade and convert it to one of their own and an A- is not the top grade if As and A+s are also given out at schools. I have not been able to get much info as to how specific schools do their grade conversions–it’s something they keep to themselves.</p>

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<p>@cptofthehouse‌ That’s good to know. In my academic classes, I’ve only received 1 A- (AP Language). Other than that, none. Hopefully that isn’t a big deal :)</p>

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<p>@sallymeno11‌ Greek life actually isn’t too pervasive at Duke. It definitely exists, but it’s not ubiquitous by any means. Just saying. </p>

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<p>@Misanthrope1‌ Thanks for letting me know! I was under the impression that it was a super big thing. I will look more into it!!</p>

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<p>Sallymeno, my daughter was on the admissions committee of her very tippy top school. If you score a 740 or above like you are aiming for, and then retake…they actually look at that as a negative. You should do “one and done” and then spend your time doing other things. Grade grubbers and score whores are not what schools are looking for.</p>

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<p>@GA2012MOM‌ I figured :slight_smile: Thank you for letting me know!!</p>

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<p>

I know this isn’t what we want to focus on, but I just want to say I thought of that same argument but I rejected it for 2 reasons:</p>

<p>1) Schools assign homework and offer extra help so that a student can master a subject. That would be impractical for athletics. If then they simply cannot do math at an A level, be it because they didn’t study as hard as they could have or because they just don’t have the intellectual “chops” in that area, that is what academic grades are supposed to reflect for all kinds of reasons that wouldn’t work if we graded only on how hard they tried. Placement in future courses within that school and admissions to college would be the main two, I think. Colleges don’t admit based on your ability to run the mile.</p>

<p>2) Related to that last point, while it is important that K-12 schools do have phys ed and teach students about diet, exercise, and their relation to a healthy life, schools are there primarily to develop a student intellectually. There is a balance, but the balance is very heavily weighted towards the classroom. In that sense, phys ed is there to support ones intellectual life, not the other way around. It would be a bit ike grading you for whether or not you ate a healthy lunch or a junk food lunch, if you see what I mean. I think the best answer for the school would be to keep grading that way if they want to reflect athletic ability for some reason, but keep it out of GPA calculations. Again, GPA is really supposed to be about academics, not athletics.</p>

<p>ANYWAY, those are great points about your interests and helping you pick a school. I rather disagree that you don’t have safeties. Maybe I am totally off base, but I find it very hard to believe that you won’t get accepted to several of the UC schools that are not UCLA or Berkeley. Not that you don’t have great chances at those two, but they aren’t as likely as UC Irvine, UCSD, UCSB, etc. BU is highly likely as well.</p>

<p>I am sure you will continue to get suggestions. I will digest this all and get back to you. Obviously there is time.</p>

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<p>@fallenchemist‌ Interesting points you make! I actually wouldn’t mind this grading <em>as much</em> if it weren’t calculated into my GPA. Now, my prospects of valedictorian disappear entirely, while those with a BUNCH of A-'s in academic classes are still in the running. Oh well.</p>

<p>I am sure! I will look into each school on a deeper level to see if anything turns me off/on. We’ll see!</p>

<p>I’m currently deciding if I want to apply ED anywhere, so that may have some sort of bearing on how long my list ends up being. We will see :)</p>

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<p>Yes, a decision to go ED changes the landscape some, although clearly you still have to do the other applications in case it doesn’t turn out to be a YES.</p>

<p>BTW, my wife is highly sympathetic. Her high school did it like yours and it was the only thing that spoiled her 4.0 UW. She was mad for a long time, lol.</p>