religion (and english) are the two subjects which I have been consistenly stomped in all 4 years. do they look at religion?
They will definitely look at English classes and low grades in them will hurt for the Ivies.
@TomSrOfBoston ik that and i accepted that but will they look at religion?
Nobody here knows the inner workings of the admissions departments of Ivy schools. Likely there is no one policy that every Ivy or every college will follow. I did hear one admissions officer say that his particular college admission department does look at religion courses as academic coursework similar to a social studies type of class.
As I would tell anyone, cast a wide net in terms of applications. If your English grades are sub-par that would make any Ivy a tougher admit that it already is.
Of course they look at religion - it’s on your transcript. As to whether they put much weight on your grades, nobody here knows the answer, because none of us are Ivy League admissions officers.
My guess, however, is that they do not recalculate GPA without religion. Your HS undoubtedly considers is to be a core academic class. Additionally, every Ivy League school receives hundreds, if not thousands, of applications from students attending parochial schools who had to take four years of religion and received high grades in their theology classes.
Is religion “Religious Studies” where you study religions in an academic matter or is it weekly prayer/bible study?
@iwannabe_Brown Typically both throughout four years of high school. At my school freshman year you take Intro to …, sophomore year is Scripture, junior year is Morality, and then senior year I am taking World Religions but you can also take a class where you compare religious motifs in films. I wouldn’t really say in any of my classes we sit down and analyze prayers or just sit and pray, but in Scripture of course we had to read the Bible often.
At some religious schools kids actually have time set aside with a teacher where they say daily prayers and get a letter grade on their transcript for this. This is different then an academic class where they sit in a classroom and read from a bible and analyze prayers which is done in a different class. In yet a 3rd type of religious class is more of what you are describing which is probably the most common. A friend of the family sends their kids to religious schools (different ones for k-5, 6-8, and high school) that do all 3 and kids get 3 different grades on their report cards. For high school all 3 are included on the transcript that colleges receive. My friend’s high school senior actually has bad grades in prayer because she doesn’t like getting to school on time. Her mother who works at Harvard was told a bad grade in a religious class would look bad but a bad grade in prayer wouldn’t hurt.