<p>Does anyone know when colleges post their common data sets, are the listed GPA's of their entering freshman classes weighted or non-weighted?</p>
<p>The more selective the school, the less of a tendency that the GPA is weighted because there is already an expectation that students should be taking the most rigerous classes their school offers.</p>
<p>NACAC's 2006 Annual State of College Admission Report provides analysis of the combined results from the Admission Trends Survey and the Counseling Trends Survey. Based on surveys of school counselors and colleges and universities nationwide, NACAC provides this report to highlight issues of concern to college-bound students, their parents, and the educators who serve them. </p>
<p>Even if you don't read the whole report, you should definitely read Chapter 4 Factors in the admissions process</p>
<p>according to the NACAC:</p>
<p>Colleges and universities receive transcripts and GPA calculations from thousands of high schools, each of which may calculate GPAs differently.</p>
<p>Many high schools use a traditional 4-point scale to measure grade averages, others use weighted 4.5- or 5-point scales, while still others use grade scales that reach as high as 8 or 10.</p>
<p>To provide a standard comparison of grade point averages among applicants, some colleges recalculate grade point averages. Colleges
are virtually evenly split on the practice of recalculating GPAs—49 percent do and 51 percent do not. </p>
<p>High yield institutions are more likely than low yield institutions to recalculate GPA. (Basically more selective schools where if admitted the student is more likely to enroll will recalculate your GPA to a 4 point scale)</p>
<p>I would also suggest reading the The Recipe For Success, a look into how the 11 admission officers at Williams balance scores of priorities from the campus community.</p>
<p>I get the feeling colleges post CDS whenever they get around to it. Some are more prompt than others. It is generally about a year behind.</p>
<p>There is also a wealth of information to be found on IPDES if you have the patience. You can download data to Excel collected for hundreds of schools that provides a lot of the data contained in the CDS. The data for the class entering fall 2006 was just released.</p>
<p><a href="http://nces.ed.gov/ipedspas/index.asp%5B/url%5D">http://nces.ed.gov/ipedspas/index.asp</a></p>
<p>Click on 'guest level' for access.
Make sure you select for bachelor's degree programs. Otherwise you will get barber colleges and beauty academies.</p>
<p>
[quote]
The more selective the school, the less of a tendency that the GPA is weighted because there is already an expectation that students should be taking the most rigerous classes their school offers.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>My bad, I meant to say unweighted. At many schools the CDS ususally does not come out until ~ October, However, there are a few schools that have already released their CDS information.</p>
<p>Thanks for the help! I will check out the above websites.</p>
<p>Most colleges' CDS reports of the freshman class HS GPA are unweighted, but not all. And it's not clear which are which. In my (limited) experience most colleges which post a freshman "profle" (not CDS-based) use weighted averages. </p>
<p>I find HS GPA to be the most frustrating aspect of trying to analyze college admissions variables. Not only are GPA's calculated differently at different high schools, the same student's HS GPA will be calculated differently by different colleges.</p>
<p>If I recall from being a regular contributor to the CDS thread (<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=76444%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=76444</a> ) the proactive schools start getting their CDS' out Dec/Jan time frame for their most recent freshman class....some trickle in to the spring.</p>