American's Werid (Grade) Ranking System!?

Relwarc · February 15, 2006, 8:50am

Has it ever occurred to you that maybe in a more difficult, grade deflating Canadian high school, an 80% may as well be a 90% in a regular American high school? Perhaps you shouldn't always be shooting for doing as little as possible to scrape by.

Last I checked, colleges don't find that terribly attractive.

ECEngineer2010 · February 15, 2006, 8:26pm

In my school it's:

97-100 = A+ = 4.3 GPA
93-96 = A = 4.0 GPA
90-92 = A = 3.7 GPA
87-89 = B+ = 3.4 GPA
83-86 = B = 3.1 GPA
80-82 = B- = 2.8 GPA
77-79 = C+ = 2.5 GPA
73-76 = C = 2.2 GPA
70-72 = C- = 1.9 GPA
67-69 = D+ = 1.6 GPA
63-66 = D = 1.3 GPA
60-62 = D = 1.0 GPA
0-59 = F = 0.0 GPA

kpusa1981 · February 15, 2006, 11:51pm

Compare the above exams to our AP exams
<a href="http://www.collegeboard.com%5B/url%5D">www.collegeboard.com</a>

What do you think of the diffculties of these exams?

cowgirlatheart · February 16, 2006, 1:41am

I don't really know much about the private schools in Canada, but I think my school is definetly the best public school in Canada. I go to Western Canada HS.

Using some of the links from coolness_rookie's post...

National Biology Competition: School ranked 11th

National Chem Exam (2000-2005 as a sample):
3 x first place
3 x second place
2 x third place

Leonardo Da Vinci Competition:
1 x top competitor (7th)
1 x top team (2nd)
3 x Da Vinci Scholars with Distinction
16 x Da Vinci Scholars (beat that one!)

Chem Olympiad:
2 people out of four in Canada were from Western in 2005 and 2000.
In 2003 and 2001 we sent one person.

Physics Olympiad:
In 2005, 2001, and 2000 we sent one person.
In 1999 and 1998 we sent two.

Model UN:
Went to Harvard's Model European Congress and won 30% of the awards of Excellence (I was there...).
City champions at the U of C MUN for 7 years in a row (until last year, damn).

So far this year in Athletics:
Four city championships and one provincial. The next best school in Calgary has one city championship.

Plus awards in music, jazz, math competitions, etc.

:)
Go Western! (nothing wrong with school pride)

_feeling · February 16, 2006, 6:43pm

not all schools in Canada use 100-80 as an A BestMiler1.
In our school, and also all the other schools in the Province, 100-86 is A. And each yr only about average 4~7 ppl in each school in our city graduates with 92+ ave so i don't see why Canadian schools are considered "easier" than Amercan's. haha

kchen · February 16, 2006, 7:04pm

I have a friend who transferred from an American school to a Canadian school, so the range of an A went from 90 - 100 to 80 - 100. According to her, the classes are much harder, so people end up with lower numbers, hence the huge range for an A. I personally think it's just two different systems that cannot be compared number v. number.

dooit · February 16, 2006, 8:24pm

Those BC exams seem really easy... so are APs though :/

martinez · February 18, 2006, 12:53am

Alright, i went did Ontario canada public schooling all my life till this year i am a freshmen engineer at cornell university, in engineering physics and play varsity squash.

For those private school canadian kids bickering throughout this thread about which high school is better in canada, ive never heard of any of those school, who cares about high school? To be honest theres very little private schools at least in non- highly populated areas (toronto would be highly populated) . So all us "regular" school kids to be honest yeah alot of ppl think of private kids as rich, snobby, and wasting money on a very similar education except you guys bring laptops to class..oooh...oh and you have many sports and stuff that are well funded(by your parents pockets). Then you also live in dorms?No more living at home? And also you have classes late, mandatory studying, saturday classes i dunno its crazy..I dont mean to put you down but thats how all the public schools i know see private schools, sort of.

Now, as for the grading, i was tearing out my hair trying to figure out american grading all senior year and never did understand it till my 1st prelims were over here at cornell. As for high school grading i cannot say much because i dont know american high schools.

Let me clarify americans, in ontario at least NOBODY ever talks about or writes their grades as A, B or A- etc. NEVER! EVERY single assignment, test exam etc you get your mark based out of 100%, your average then would be average % of the classes you take, so your average would be something like a 90%.

Now in my school, only about 10 ppl out of i think 350ish students per year get more than 90%. usually 8 are in the range from 90-93% the other 2 are those no lives easy course taking ppl.
We DONT have GPA, ive never heard of a normal public school having them, and in fact when cornell had our guidance counsellors(which literally do nothing) fill out my gpa, the guy said, well, we know this kid is in top 33% of the class, who cares what the actual thing was(fact was it was 3rd out of the 350ish, and then said, well, 33% of 4.0gpa = whatever it is, and filled it out...mass havoc in cornell admissions(and it even says on the sheet do not include gpa if u dont have it, stupid guy)

about 50kids if i remember correctly make the 80% mark, and thats called honor roll, if your in that, ur probably pretty much gauranteed admission to all ontairo universities, which are good quality. and that 80% onlly needs to be in your like grade 11 second semester and grade12, if you get 100% the only difference between that and 80% in terms of admissions is like small 2000$ entry scholarship per year, and first crack at housing first year at SOME universities. Even if you had a 51%(bare minimum) junior year, you can get into high quality ontario university if you get even like 80% last 3 semesters and thats to be safe, you can get like low 70s and your MOST likely to get 1-2 of your top 3 choices at the universities...i know a guy who had low 60s till 2nd semester senior year, and then 74 that last semester, got into mcmaster, good school..(and there is no admission process, extracurriculars, nothing else counts towards admissions, all it is is simply a 5 minute process, 1-pay 99$ (about 80US dollars) 2- check account made for you to ensure your grades on there from senior year are accurate 3- click which 3 universities you want to apply, in order, and which program 4- wait till may to be accepted/denied

that is LITERALLY it, application takes 5 minutes...no strings attached

so back to grades, for high school to high school comparison, my guess is to base it off my stats for number of ppl with 80% above, and 90% above, almost everyone else gets 70%s in high school ontario....

as for ap's, again we dont have them, i dont even really know what they are too much xept for being here at cornell...
from what i know, and can think, our ontario education in high school is standard throughout, and basically if you take university stream courses in ontairo, you're taking the AP'S equivalent...its like its already built into our system i guess, at least for math, phys, chem, bio, languages and stuff i donno

now for grades comparing from can high school and us college, i finally understand:

in cornell, you get your work handed back in grades, like 43/54 or whatever, teachers add up all your percents, and then heres the main difference, they decide based on bell curve which percents will get which lettering, so if the mean is say 60%, then that is a B, or B-, or A+ whatever the prof decides...so basically just aim to be average and you will get those grades consistenly, even if you get 30% in the course, and everyone gets 30%, you get B, or whatever prof makes it....most make it in B- to A- range i think...its harder then because of the curve to get much higher than average and thus into the A grades...its not proportional effor to get into the A's in engineering at least...you need to better the mean by like 15-20% to get an extra letter grade...sort of. then, for some reason, these letters once assigned are converted to gpa by the same explanation in the course roster book, 4.0=A, 3.0=B, etc, and then gpatotal=credits course is worth times the gpa in that course... so if you get grades, you dont want to be stuck in the + range for any lettering, as its HUGELY different GPA than the one letter grade up to - (Ex. B+ and A- is not much different in actual course , but if you get B+ you only get a 3.3gpa, if you put in little bit more effort, a few questions on exams, and get A-, you get a huge boost to a 3.7 gpa...go figure.

why americans dont just keep all into percents, i donno
many things about americans are strange, but to americans, i see there are far greater things about canadians that are weirder and stranger...

i think thats all i needed to say

hideANDseek · February 18, 2006, 3:33am

these are WEIRD systems(i'm referring to American systems). It's pretty much impossible to get A+ at our school:
99-100 A+
98-93 A
92-90 A-
89-87 B+
etc.

kpusa1981 · February 18, 2006, 9:11pm

hideANDseek, how many people at your school get B- to A(80%-98%)?
Americans, please, tell the Canadains how many people in your 11th and 12th grades classes A+'s or A's to A-'s and all B grades.

ubetteraccept_me · February 18, 2006, 9:20pm

My school uses this:

90-100 A
80-89 B
70-79 C
66-69 D
65 and below F

kpusa1981 · February 18, 2006, 9:42pm

ubetteraccept_me, where are you form? Do you go to a private school or a public school?
Do you know how many students at your school have A and B averages?

ubetteraccept_me · February 18, 2006, 10:38pm

I live in the south (Georgia), and I go to a private day/boarding school in Chattanooga, TN (Baylor School). Probably around the top 18-20% have an A average, top 30-35% probably have a B avearage. It really depends on your schedule though, and if your talking about weighted or unweighted GPAs. If you take a bunch of APs, my school offers 22, then your weighted may be an A, and your unweighted a B, so it all depends.

kpusa1981 · February 18, 2006, 11:37pm

Would someone explain the how GPA's work to martinez. How many students attend the school have ubetteraccept_me?

lilmick7 · February 19, 2006, 4:04pm

Hey coolness rookie- reply to 1st page
the reason why that charlottesville virginia kid started flunking at your school is because of the 2 to 3 times greater marajuana you guys have up in Canada. That stuff could turn Bill Gates into Bill Bibbit (from "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest")

kpusa1981 · February 20, 2006, 6:00pm

My high school; Arcadia High School Arcadia, CA LA area. I have been out for a few years.

5.0 for unit for any class D or over 4.0 grade points.

example not my grades
A
A
A
B
B
C
=4.0(5.0)+4.0(5.0)+4.0(5.0)+3.0(5.0)+3.0(5.0)+2.0(5.0)/6(5)
=100/30
=3.3333333333333333333333 or 3.33

kpusa1981 · February 21, 2006, 10:55pm

Is anyone there?

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American's Werid (Grade) Ranking System!?

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