<p>I'm a bit confused as to how colleges use GPAs (weighted and unweighted) in admissions decisions. From what I've seen, certain (if not most) high schools over-inflate their students' GPAs (using an easier grading system for instance or w/ different/better weighting) whereas other schools tend to enforce a stricter grading policy. How do colleges account for these differences when using GPAs in their academic profiency calculations? Ex: My school has a pretty crappy system with >= 95%= A= 4.00; >= 90%= A-=3.67; >=87%= B+ = 3.3; etc. Weighting is .25 for honors and .5 for AP. Hence, as you can imagine, most students' GPAs at my school aren't nearly so perfect as those I often see around CC. A little help would be much appreciated! Even if anyone can just point me to a different thread, that would be great also. Thanks.</p>
<p>Colleges recalculate GPAs and consider your GPA in relation to those within your own school. This is why rank matters.</p>
<p>^^ exactly. Colleges don't care how your school does it; they'll do it their own way. In addition, to account for the differences among grading, etc., they take into consideration the rigor of your courseload and, more importantly, your rank. They also get a rundown of your school's system from your counselor.</p>
<p>Some schools recalculate the GPA. Some will ask for the highest GPA in the class to give context to yours. For example, a 4.2 GPA sounds great...until we see that the highest GPA in the class is a 5.6.</p>
<p>Your high schools will staple their profile to your transcript and that's the "filter" through which we look at the information. The profile includes information about your grading scale, how GPA and rank are compiled, what courses are offered at your school, and what limitations, if any, are placed on students (3 APs/year, no honors in 9th grade, etc.).</p>