GPA for international applicants

Colleges and Universities A-Z Stanford University
1

<p>Hi,</p>

<p>I'll be applying to Stanford this year as an international student and was hoping somebody could help me out.</p>

<p>The thing is that I have a really low GPA of 3.2. But then so does everybody else in my class. Despite this low GPA I've always been in the top 1-2% of my class. In India this is a really good GPA because everybody screws up in 11th grade and there is huge grade deflation. My marks\grades also seem to wildly fluctuate and I was a bit concerned that Stanford doesn't see it as inconsistency.
In 9th grade I scored 90%, in 10th grade 95% (national exams), in school exams I did miserably (80%-85%), in 11th grade 86%. But in India this is kind of normal because the schools really make tough exams in 10th (to prepare us for the national exams - 'Boards') and in 11th (for apparently no reason).</p>

<p>I'm not too sure if Stanford will accept me because of my low GPA! Apart from academics, my ECs and recommendations will be good so no problems there</p>

<p>What should I do? Should I send a note explaining the above stuff?</p>

<p>Thanks</p>

<p>P.S. - In case you haven't realised - I'm from INDIA.</p>

2

<p>It's gonna be tough. The people I know from HK that got into Stanford got like 9 or 10A (out of max of 10 subjects) on O-level (HK version) whose grading curve makes the one in UK looks too easy. I think this year, only 15 have 10A and 35 have 9A out of close to 120,000 students! 50/120000 is top 0.04% of all students, not just in a class.</p>