First of all, American colleges/universities only look at my official IGCSE/CIE grade certificates or my internal school grades? Secondly, once I take a CIE official exam of each subject, then that’s my final grade for my whole IGCSE record or do I have to take one every year? I was born and raised in the US. I did all of my schooling from Pre-School all the way up to 9th grade in the US. In 9th grade in the US, I was an honor roll student and had mostly A’s with a few B’s and barely one C. In other words, I had good grades in 9th grade. However, everything changed when we moved to Pakistan in 10th grade. The decision was not mine and uncontrollable on my side. The Pakistan equivalent of 10th grade in the US is O’levels or IGCSE Levels. My grades literally dropped drastically. I was getting F’s, E’s, D’s, C’s, and if I was lucky, a B. English was probably my only A. I don’t have a copy of those grades but they were terrible anyway. Then, I moved onto what was supposed to be my 11th grade year if I was in the US in Pakistan. I switched schools because my previous school was pretty bad. I am currently in the middle of this 11th grade year in Pakistan (IGCSE). I finished my first term and mid terms exams. They weren’t great either, but it was a very slight improvement from last year. So my grades are still ugly (apart from English and one other subject). I still have the remaining year and my 12th grade (In terms of the American system)IGCSE in Pakistan remaining to get my grades back on track like my 9th grade grades. Do you think it’s too late to improve my grades and get accepted into a good college in Pennsylvania (where I’ll return) such as Temple, Villanova, or Penn State? Can I use my moving and shifting to a different school in a completely different country as a valid excuse for my horrible grades in the middle of the year. How would my high school transcript look? It’s confusing because the three years of high school are in Pakistan, and I only have my American 9th grade report card on record. The system is completely different in Pakistan. My personal reason for my bad grades are new environment, language barriers, culture shock, completely different learning/teaching methods such as textbook learning, grades based purely on exams rather than on homework/projects/assignments, different system and style, and the fact that I never took some subjects in my life like Physics, Biology, Chemistry, Pakistan Studies, and Islamic Studies. I didn’t even know the basics of the three sciences I just mentioned above as I never had a chance to take them in the US and the American learning approach is completely different. They take step by step while I was suddenly out of nowhere presented with complex Chemical formulas and Physics problems. Even the Math is different. If I step up my grades starting 3rd term of 11th grade all the way up to the end of 12th grade in Pakistan, would colleges in the US forgive me for my bad grades and accept me? We also have CIE’s over here to take. I’m so confused on what the US colleges look at, my school grades or the official Cambridge International Examinations (CIE’s). Or do you recommend A levels before going back to the US. I am hoping for a response from someone familiar with both systems. Thanks and sorry for the long explanation.
Saying that your excuse for bad grades for 3 years is culture shock or the new system is kind of ridiculous. I could see maybe a semester, but not from sophomore year up. I would recommend you look at requirements for Pakistan as most colleges have charts/lists. Being an international student makes your chances even worse. Also, no, colleges won’t just forgive you for bad grades. If you can’t pull B’s in high school, they’re not going to think your grades will just spontaneously improve to all A’s. If you don’t know any sciences, you’ve missed the entire base for college classes. I would seek a professional and go from there. Your situation is very rare and I don’t think, honestly, anyone on CC is going to be able to give you a 100% accurate answer.