I am a junior and planning for next year. At my school, an a-=a=a+=4.0. Because of this, I have gotten a few a-'s over the years I recently heard something like the Ivies look at a-'s at 3.7’s instead of 4.0’s. Does anyone know if this is true, and if so, will this affect me for when I apply to the Ivies?
Yes, A- is generally considered as a 3.7.
All Ivy League colleges evaluate holistically. Grades are just one part of the package. Fewer A minuses are obviously better, but nobody can say how it will impact you.
Does it say A- on your transcript? Or by A- do you mean 90-93 percent?
If that is true then aren’t kids that go school systems that use the +/- system at a disadvantage to those that go to schools that don’t? My kid school doesn’t use +/- so if you get a 100 or 90 for your semester grade you get an A on your report card/transcript which would be an uw 4.0. I would think the colleges would do something to normalize this for comparison.
“I would think the colleges would do something to normalize this for comparison.”
They do. Well, some do. Some of them recalculate GPAs of applicants to adjust for this AND to adjust for things like gym/health being counted at some schools and not others. It also helps smooth the different ways schools weight GPAs. It helps them make apples-to-apples comparisons.
Yes, it would, so I don’t agree with the statement. Schools know how to work with different grading schemes, which are provided by your HS.
I’m confident that a transcript full of 93 (A-) would be regarded at least as well as one full of 91 (A) from a school with no +/-.
It used to somewhat balance out when everyone had A’s and B’s, so what you lost with an A- you would make up with a B+. With grade inflation these days, it doesn’t work. I know schools that have +/- but keep an A- at 4. Carnegie-Mellon is kicking this around, per an article in the campus newspaper.
It can also depend on how competitive the high school is. If a significant number of kids from a HS are applying to a particular highly selective college, the college will be able to see the difference between a transcript filled with A- and a transcript filled with straight As regardless of whatever convert to 4.0 scale rubric the HS uses.
Imo, odd thread. Tippy tops look at your transcript. If full of pure “A” grades, great. Only a start, though.
“I recently heard something like the Ivies look at a-'s at 3.7’s instead of 4.0’s.” Well, TT adcoms aren’t sitting around reassigning gpa points. Or making admit decisions solely based on gpa. I worry more about aiming high with off info from who-knows-where. Or fretting about middle school grades (other thread.) You’ve got to be far more aware what ultimately matters.
If your school offers A-, okay. Not superb, but still in top range, still an A quality. But, as @tdy123 notes, full of A- and you’d be considered “low range of A grades.”
OP needs to understand a LOT more about what it takes to get into a tippy top.
What about your rigor? They see that in the transcript, too. You understand how rigor in cores matters?
Btw, sure, one B can stand out in the wrong ways. But it depends on your goals and record, what course and what else makes you a great candidate, in their eyes. Better figure out what that means, darned soon.
If this is true then the applicant that may have the exact same grades, but who’s school dosen’t use +/- will have an advantage. I just don’t think that is true for most schools.
Now I understand this has become a somewhat hypothetical debate because there is a lot more (like rigor) than just this small difference in gpa that goes into admissions. Sorry for the hi-jack.
Related but slightly off topic. I had a conversation with a parent whose private HS graded on the A=94-100 B=87-93 etc. He was annoyed at the HS because of the way the college his son was applying to looked at GPA for merit aid. He recalculated his son’s GPA if were done on the A=90-100 scale (most public schools in the area grade this way) and felt it cost him about $4000 per year or $16000. I guess a couple of years after his son graduated they changed the grading scale. He surveyed local universities and all of them said they didn’t have the time to be adjusting all of the GPA’s for students so they took them at face value. Perhaps elite schools have more resources.
@lvvcsf Here is the letter grade conversion used by a NYC public HS the WSJ rated #1 in the US in their last HS rating:
A+ 97 - 100%
A 93 - 96%
A- 90 - 92%
B+ 87 -89%
B 83 - 86%
B- 80 - 82%
C+ 77 - 79%
C 73 - 76%
C- 70 - 72%
D 65 - 69%
F 0 - 64%
My D went to a HS where a 93 was a B+. The grading scale was part of the school report that went with her transcript.