Help!! Advice? Downsides Dual Enrollment, Only submit high school transcripts, not junior college??

Applying to College
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RE: Help!! Advice? Downsides Dual Enrollment, Only submit high school transcripts, not junior college??

Hello - Thanks in advance for any thoughts:

If you are still in high school, is it possible to just show the application committees your high school transcripts and not send college transcripts of the junior college classes you have been taking while in high school since the 9th grade?

In high school I have been too ambitious and took on too much.

I have a 3.8 gpa at high school, but in addition to taking a full load at high school, I also simultaneously took a near full load at the local junior college (11 units) each semester since my high school freshman year. Each semester, I got A’s and B’s at the junior college level while also getting near straight A’s at the high school.

This last semester of my junior year, I wanted to make one final push before applications and so I pushed myself even harder at the junior college by taking college chemistry and statistics and got the first “C’s” in my life on each of these two courses while getting straight A’s during the same semester at my high school.

So my ambitious dual-enrollment junior college classes taken during high school will wreck my 3.8 high school gpa.

Before these two “C’s” I was really excited about applying towards some of highly rated schools I liked. Now, I am sad that I probably won’t get into this same level of colleges I’ve been working towards. It seems that if I had never tried also taking the difficult junior college courses, I would have been better off just taking high school courses and just applied to my highly rated colleges with my high school 3.8 gpa.

My high school isn’t very well off and doesn’t offer any AP courses at all, so I wanted to show I was capable of going “above and beyond” but this meant taking double the number of classes as most high schoolers to get any classes that would count towards a “weighted” gpa (i.e. the one grade point bump for junior college classes taken during high school).

All of these classes are only additional optional classes which fit the California UC IGETC GE requirements, none of them apply or are required toward my high school requirements.

I don’t want my dream schools for the prestige so much as I just like them and they offer more financial aid which I need. Some of the schools that I was working towards which I now think my over-extended semester of 2 C’s has ruined are: Colgate, College of the Holy Cross, University of Richmond, Bucknell, Connecticut College, Wake Forest, among others.

So questions that I welcome any thoughts on are:

  1. When I apply to colleges, can I just send them only my high school transcript with the 3.8gpa and not my junior college transcripts?

  2. Does anyone have an suggestions on how to recover or damage control this situation? Or can correct any of my misconceptions?

  3. Does anyone have any suggestions as to what level of school I can now get into? How to best pitch my situation? What my new financial aid strategy should be?

  4. Is it true, that I would have been better off in my selection of colleges if I had never tried to stretch myself by taking these junior college classes?

  5. Do junior college grades taken while in high school have to be transferred and factored into my final college gpa? So, a class I took when I was 14 years old must be counted in my college gpa when I am 22 years old and applying to graduate school? How long and badly do my high school mistakes on junior college classes follow me later in college life?

Thanks for any thoughts you feel like offering,

Colleen

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1 - 2) I’d say send them. To be honest, all of this is somewhat admirable anyways, and I am interested in what its impacts would be on you. For damage control, try to do better next year and lighten up on your course load, although I don’t think too much damage has been done.

  1. Still go for your tops. Be sure to apply to safeties (that you will be willing to attend) but go for what you hope for. What’s your ACT/SAT? Are you a URM? Do you do something special? Do you have an inspirational story to tell? All of these are factors, and we cannot give a suggestion as of the info you have provided. The 2 C’s do not kill off your chance at a great college.

  1. facepalm Colleges judge you on your achievements in context with consideration for your environment, which means that you would have been very well off if you would have done the “most rigorous” course load at your school. Also, weighted GPA is now prized at top schools like these; the common app allows you to submit unweighted GPA’s which (in hindsight) I should myself have done. I will not condemn your actions as foolish and pointless (It’s actually impressive and may very well be seen as such by colleges), but I will say they were unnecessary in regards to your concern.

  2. No; they are generally different (there are some exceptions, but I don’t think they apply to the ones you were referring to). Make sure with your counselor or a college admission counselor at one of your target schools, but I had a friend who was devastated when he had a C in AP/DE English 102? His CC GPA, however, will be kept completely separate from his Auburn GPA when he goes there, and they will just be accepted as credit.

I will say don’t give up hope. Tell us some stuff about your profile such as your ACT/SAT, URM status if applicable, and special ECs if really cool. We cannot really tell you whether your schools are suitable goals or not. Again, I don’t think the 2 C’s really kill you. Besides, what is your CC GPA? Do you know. If you did 11 units per semester for 3 years and made mostly mostly A’s and B’s, and 2 C’s, it should be relatively ok. The DE would probably be viewed as admirable when taken to your extreme, and I wish that you do well with them.

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If it is dual enrollment, should it actually show up on your high school transcript? You still need to fulfill the high school graduation requirement (partly by taking courses at a college). Otherwise, how can you get the high school diploma? If it is really not shown on your high school transcript, you need to submit both.

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Big Thanks for everyone’s comments and encouragement … some answers to your questions …

Can you explain what you mean by … “weighted GPA is now prized by top schools” … isn’t this unfair to kids from poor school districts who don’t have as many weighted opportunities available??

Junior College GPA might now be down to 3.0 or 2.9 (gasp) when 2 Cs factored in.

Some have said that your junior year is the most important year to show how you will do before applications and the college work done during this time will show how you will actually do at the college level. So this is why I now am afraid the 2 Cs are a killer for the colleges I listed.

Anyone think this is true and I now need to get away from thinking that Colgate, College of the Holy Cross, University of Richmond, Bucknell, etc are reasonably possible??

Taking SAT & ACT next month. Self Testing ACT at 29-30. We will see.

Ranked in top 4.5% of my charter network, 1st at my campus within network. Awarded “Student of the Year” at my nearest city.

ECs:

Student Body Secretary
Student Body Vice-President
Now running for President
General Volunteering
Led “Anti-Bullying” Campaign
Drama Productions
Selected from a big nationwide applicant pool to do 8 week environmental internship this summer at a nature reserve
(want to study environmental studies)

Special Story:
First Generation student
Very Difficult Background, don’t feel like detailing online
Small, poor, remote & extremely unusual rural area with poor resources

Don’t need any of these classes for high school graduation requirements. Purely extra. There are different forms of dual enrollment. This is why I had to take double the classes, because the high school’s dual enrollment isn’t organized enough to have for example one math class at the jc level apply to high school requirements … instead had to take two math classes in parallel, etc.

Only thing that shows on my high school transcript is the “weighted GPA number” where the college courses grade points are calculated into the total weighted gpa without listing the college courses. The high school unweighted gpa and class standing are unaffected by jc classes and shown separately. No JC classes shown at all, I have to request a separate JC transcript that then lists JC classes with grades.

Thanks again for thoughts.

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WOOOO! I meant NOT. NOT PRIZED> Sorry! Misspelled! Of all of the words, I missed that one . . .

Anyways, I’d say apply away. I don’t think first gen is really THAT big of a boost (although some may argue), but it helps somewhat. The difficult background and extreme unusual area with poor resources would, in contrast, be a great essay topic that could garner a lot of interest. Your projected ACT/SAT has no real worth to the discussion at this point until you take it (projected says nothing). If you can get into the area of 30, you should be fine to try out for your schools. I will be posting a listing of financial aid schools in the near future (probably August), but I will say that College of the Holy Cross ranked low for me and I cut Connecticut and Bucknell from the list entirely. If FA is what matters, I’d recommend adding Franklin & Marshall, Macalester, Lafayette, Colby, Lehigh, and Hamilton as potentials for consideration (there are some others if you are a girl and want an all-girl one).

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I don’t think weighted GPAs are prized. That is a myth. You have to send both transcripts, unless the HS one shows the college courses on it because it is dual enrollment. You MUST report those grades.

What is your overall unweighted GPA if you count both sets of classes? Say it is a 3.4 or 3.5 – that seems about in line with a 29-30 ACT, honestly. It isn’t like you have poor grades compared to your test scores.

Those schools don’t seem impossible to me given your background. Your best shot to improve your chances is to raise your test scores.

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Thanks again everyone for their comments, big help.

“What is your overall unweighted GPA if you count both sets of classes? Say it is a 3.4 or 3.5”

I know you were trying to help … but this comment above depresses me even more. Throughout my high school career and application process I’ve been thinking / motivating myself on being a 3.8 student, with voluntarily taking some bonus college courses on the side.

The idea that all that extra work brings me down to really now being considered a 3.4 student bums me out. (Absolutely nothing wrong with a 3.4 student, just I personally have been really working hard by being motivated by the idea of stretching myself to maintain my 3.8.)

The high school doesn’t figure in my JC grades when calculating my 4.5% class ranking based on my high school only gpa and the high school transcripts only show highschool calculated in the unweighted gpa.

If my extra college courses are factored into my total unweighted gpa as evaluated by admissions committees making me now thought of by them as a 3.4 than a 3.8, then again I feel like I regret taking any college class while only 14, 15, 16 years of age and sitting next to 22 years olds in the same class … it seems I would have been much better off never taking any jc classes.

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I hope you at least partially stretched yourself to learn more, not just to impress colleges.

You can’t undo it. If you are a really good candidate for those colleges, get your test scores up. That will help.

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Talk to your GC and get their advice. Maybe they can write a letter of recommendation that shares how you are a top student at your HS and that you challenged yourself by taking extra classes and extra load at your CC because the HS did not offer the classes - that will help.

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You are obligated to provide official transcripts from both your high school and the JC. So do that.

Any college or university that cannot look at your record and interpret your JC grades in the context of carrying what is essentially twice a normal high school load, is a place you don’t want to attend anyway. You don’t need that kind of negativity in your life.

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You need to send all grades from all classes. You cannot pick and choose what to send

Talk to your guidance counselor – the dual enrollment classes may be recorded on your HS transcript already. And as noted above, you can ask him/her to explain that you were taking an unusually difficult course load.

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tl; dr

as others have said, you must report all grades. If you think you can “forget” you should understand you will be caught. There is the National Student Clearinghouse that has records of college attendance. When your school verifies you thru the service prior to classes starting you will be discovered and your admission rescinded.

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There is a typical question on all the books I read about college admission a few years ago: Is GPA or course rigor more important?
The answer is both. Try to keep you GPA as close to 4.0 as possible with as rigor as possible course. Scoring low GPA by taking very rigor course may not help, and sometimes even hurt, you chance in eyes of adcom. Every year, there are many over-achieving students post in this forum and learn the hard lesson. If the availability of AP or higher level courses at your HS is limited forcing the students to do dual enrollment, that may be fine as you are not alone in that situation. All course rigor and GPA will be in the context of your school anyway.