<p>Alright so I'm just curious as to how high school grades have compared to college grades you have received. Are they about the same? I know that many factors go into it, but I am self motivated and I don't need my parents there to tell me to study or do my work. I'm sure it differs from person to person but I want to see what you guys have to say.</p>
<p>Personally, I was at about a 3.9 weighted GPA in high school, and I am at a 3.2 in college. I didn’t have to work nearly as hard in high school as I’ve had to work in college for my grades. Really, it depends a lot on how good of professors you end up having and which courses you take. I excelled in biology and chemistry in high school, and did okay in history and physics, though in college, I only did okay in bio and chem and excelled in history and physics. As long as you work hard and get a professor that knows what they are doing and is clear about how and why they grade things the way they do, you should be just fine, and end up in the same range as you did in high school, but don’t expect a class to be easy just because you did well in something similar in high school; that was my downfall and it hurt my GPA.</p>
<p>They went down. They go back up after a while but in general they go down as everyone thinks you can go through College “high school style”.</p>
<p>not to mention its a life transition as well as a school transition. you are moving away from home on top of adjusting to a new school and new people.</p>
<p>High School grades are supposed to be the best predictor of College grades, correct?</p>
<p>…as opposed to…middle school grades? The grades you got in high school aren’t necessarily what you’re going to get in college. see my experience as I stated above.</p>
<p>My grades have been comparatively higher, since the average UW HS GPA of admitted students where I go is about 1 point higher than the average UG GPA, however the actual value of my college GPA is about .4 lower than my HS GPA was. </p>
<p>If you go to a relatively selective college, chances are the average UW HS GPA of enrolling students is higher than the average UG GPA at the school, and thus you should expect the actual value of your GPA to be lower in college than it was in high school. However you won’t likely be comparing on the same scale. In high school, a 3.8 or 3.9 is no big deal (except at some very competitive high schools), in college it’s very high.</p>
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As opposed to test scores or some other objective measure. Though I know the SAT was designed to predict college performance, so I added “correct?” because I was unsure. There are, of course, other things that produce stress to new college students, but past performance will usually entail future performance of a similar caliber.</p>
<p>Eh, I don’t put much weight on the SAT. People choke on high-pressure tests. But high school grades won’t necessarily predict college grades. College is a lot more of a balancing act, and if you don’t do it correctly, your grades will slip your first year below what they were in high school. Don’t worry too much though, cause you aren’t necessarily done for if you have just one bad semester; it is perfectly understandable and happens to most people.</p>
<p>Some do better in college than in high school while others are the opposite. They are two completely different environments and some are better in one environment as compared to the other.</p>
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Speaking of the SAT, how exactly is the SAT’s usefulness in predicting college performance evaluated anyway? I am convinced that the SAT would be an excellent predictor of college performance if everyone attended the same college, but earning a 3.8 at MIT is not exactly the same as earning a 3.8 at Podunk U. Of course I wouldn’t expect the SAT to be a good predictor of grades when I restrict my attention to an individual college which enrolls students with very similar SAT scores.</p>
<p>^ The SAT wouldn’t be an excellent predictor of college grades. It’s teachable, meaning any form of test prep that familiarizes a student with the testing format and types of questions improves scores significantly, and studies have shown that SAT results correlate with household income more than with first semester college grades (which is what the College Board says they predict). SAT scores are not terribly useful in predicting college grades, though it’s said that the Writing portion is better for predictive purposes than the other two are.</p>
<p>The SAT score does improve with studying test methods and content. If a student is willing to spend a lot of time studying this, though, one might assume that they will be spending a lot of time studying to get good grades, too. The SAT is a decent predictor of college grades, but far from perfect. And yes, there is a large socio-economic discrepancy.</p>
<p>My freshman year in college I got higher grades than I did in high school, while investing only half as much time into academics.</p>
<p>If you spend as much time on schoolwork in college as you did in high school, you’ll be fine. However, that’s much harder than it sounds like because you have much more freedom. You will spend less time in class and it is expected that you do more work outside of class - however, no one will check that you actually do. Think 3 exams per semester instead of weekly quizzes or daily graded assignments.</p>
<p>Thanks for the input everyone!
Honestly, I’m the type of student that does the minimum requirement for the A. I’m guessing this mind set will have to change in college. I really don’t spend that much time on high school work, but in order to maintain the same grades I have now i will most likely have to increase my effort.</p>
<p>I agree with BillyMc. I would assume that students who are motivated to study for the SAT are also motivated to study for class. While there’s a correlation between household income and SAT score, I bet there’s a similar correlation between grades and socio-economic standing. There are relatively few rich students in general and remedial classes, while poor students seem less likely to take the hardest courses offered. (Though that’s personal experience and I don’t have hard statistical data to back this up.)</p>
<p>4.2 weighted in high school, 4.0 in college so far, so not much change for me, but I actually had to work for that more in college than in high school. If you did good in high school, you should be fine in college as long as you keep the same habits (go to class, study, etc.)</p>
<p>How’s the few big exams/semester schedule working out for you guys? What if you mess up on one test?</p>
<p>My college grades have been far superior to my high school grades thus far (although I will admit, I’ve only completed one year). I graduated from high school with a 2.97uw GPA, and have a 3.19 cumulative GPA so far (it was brought down severely by anatomy&physiology – a 4 credit class in which I got a C+).</p>
<p>Then again…in high school, I never really did more than I had to.</p>
<p>In my experience, there haven’t been big/few exams in the semester…except in my history class where we had multiple papers instead. But in most of my classes we had 3-4 tests other than the midterm and final.</p>
<p>Doing minimum for an A does not work in courses where there is competition to do better if the class is curved to a strict guideline. </p>
<p>My college GPA (3.8+) is much higher than high school, but in high school i did not try much cause I was bored, especially the non honors or AP courses. The regular courses brought my high school gpa down because I refused to do stupid homework assignments.</p>