<p>I heard a rumor and wanted to know if anyone could confirm or deny it: the bulk of European and Canadian graduate schools care primarily about your last 2 years of undergraduate GPA (eg: junior and senior year), and not your first two.</p>
<p>Thoughts?</p>
<p>It is never a black and white thing, right - if someone has A+'s all through undergrad and someone has C+ in first two years and A+'s in the last two, I’m sure on that basis alone the first student has a better chance. But it is never just that! But, on the whole, yes, obviously the last two years, but I would say probably 2nd and 3rd year since these are the marks that the schools will see - will matter more, because they are more specific courses, presumably.Having said that, if you took all your program courses in first and second year and spent the last two doing elective, maybe not so much.</p>
<p>Overall, I think marks in the most relevant courses matter the most, regardless when you took them. An up-ward trend in the GPA is always good, but I think as is maintaining a good GPA from the get-go. </p>
<p>I am an undergrad at a Canadian university by the way.</p>
<p>They’re concerned with your grades specific to their particular field. It so happens you only really start taking more specialized courses into your 2nd yr and mostly in your last two years.</p>
<p>A downward trend in your grades is definitely not a good thing but that depends on the circumstances and the courses. </p>
<p>My grades have dropped since 1st yr and my cGPA is 0.15 lower as a result. However, the drop was caused by courses unrelated to my field so that is just about irrelevant.</p>
<p>Also, my course load increased and I’m taking more intense courses while spending a lot of time in the lab.</p>
<p>However, this kind of reasoning applies to most schools including those in the states.
Best of luck!</p>
<p>I would go the schools (you are interested in) web sites to see what their entry requirements are. When my son applied to The Courtauld Institute of Art for art history you had to have a 3.5 to even apply. I would assume that would be the case if you are looking to get into any well-known schools just like you would need to here in the US.</p>
<p>I am under the impression that to get into grad school period you need pretty good scores no matter what school you apply to. I do know that some overseas schools mentioned that if you wanted to share your GRE with them it was optional. They did ask my son what his SATs were which I thought was interesting. </p>
<p>Good luck.</p>
<p>This is all very helpful advice, thanks guys.</p>
<p>But just to re-frame my original question: is there a noticeable difference between the way European or Canadian grad schools evaluate applicants (in general) and the way American schools do?</p>
<p>Thanks again.</p>