So if I took economics in a community college, and it says “full year” when I look it up in the UC website for DE credits, for the course was just in the summer, do I get +2 honors points for a full year, of +1. Also, if I’ve only taken 2 aps total fresh-junior year, and I took 3 DE courses, does it count as 5 AP courses in terms of course rigor?
1 semester of a college course= 2 semesters of HS credit and it then gives you 2 extra honors points in the UC GPA calculation.
You are limited to 2 AP/UC approved Honors/IB or DE courses for 10th grade and unlimited # of these courses from 11th grade but all the UC’s cap their GPA calculation with a total of 4 of these courses (10-11th) or 8 semesters. UCLA/UCB do however consider the uncapped fully weighted UC GPA in their admission decisions.
@Gumbymom Thanks! The strange thing is taking the additional DE course actually lowers my capped GPA by 0.02 (which makes sense since there’s more college courses, and I’ve already maxed out my extra +8 honors points, but I don’t understand why the GPA is essentially punishing students slightly for taking these additional courses).
A 0.02 difference is minuscule but admissions will note your course rigor which is a plus.
When the UC’s review applications the following are considered very important:
Academic GPA, Application essay, Rigor of secondary school record, Standardized test scores
Okay I understand. I need to take this course in the summer because I took a lighter junior courseload with just 2 APs and a couple honors, so I wanted to see if the effect of a DE course would be the same.
By taking an additional Honors/AP/DE course(s), your capped UC GPA will go down slightly but your uncapped UC GPA will go up (assuming you get an A) which the top tier UCs will also take into consideration. I wouldn’t let the lower GPA discourage you from taking as many +1 classes as you can handle.