To more directly answer your question – from our experience your concerns are valid. My son went to a very competitive high school with no grade inflation, and where there was no “rounding up” of grades, and no class rank. Sometimes he was given a B+ on a paper with no explanation/no points off – it just wasn’t quite as good as someone else’s paper, and the teacher didn’t want to give too many A’s. This meant he had a GPA of about 3.7, whereas if he had gone to the public school is very likely he would have gotten straight A’s. He is also not the type of student who will pester a teacher to advocate for a better grade – he tries his best and accepts what he gets.
This did hurt him in admissions, but at the same time he was able to find several excellent colleges which looked past his grades and accepted him with financial aid and/or merit funds. Now, attending one of these schools, he has an advantage. While his high school grades were lower than the average for his college, he is actually finding the academics easier than anticipated. He didn’t have to go through the “shock” of getting the first B of his life in college, like many of his peers. And he was able to get through the first semester on the Dean’s list while experiencing rather severe medical issues – because of the excellent work ethic and critical thinking skills instilled by his high school.
To me, it is worth it for him to have that persistence, resilience and intellectual curiosity fostered, even if it did cost my son a high prestige undergraduate university. Also, I figure he can always go to an Ivy for grad school if that is where he wants to end up.
@kaaaaatrina you bring up a good point. I’m not an adcom nor do I know any, but my thinking is that most top schools like the ones you’re considering (UCs and Ivies) look at applicants holistically taking into acccount test scores, gpa, course rigor, essay, ECs, awards and LORs. I also think the reputation/ranking of the high school may be considered but maybe not as much as the other factors.
Do you have a hook? That would be the most weighted factor in admissions to tippy tops. In the case of Ivies sometimes it is a crapshoot since most applicants are cream of the crop. Many times they are looking for diversity, a student whose profile would be different and would contribute to the overall diversity of the entering freshmen class. You may have an advantage applying to Ivies as a California student coming from a public school but again you need to stand out in some way. My son and his friend both applied to same Ivy from their competitive CA public school (ranked top 12% in CA for
Public schools). My son got in but his friend didn’t. My son’s hook was athletics and his friend didn’t have a hook.
Good luck and like others recommended, you should talk to your counselor.
@VickiSoCal really? That’s strange. (Although it wouldn’t surprise me if you’re referring to UC schools - that system is a different animal).
Colleges usually require that document (although may call it a ‘secondary school report’), and counselors are sending it- even if the kids may not realize we are! And @labegg lots of schools that don’t use Common App still request one from the counselor, although it is an integrated part of the Common App. And you’re 100% correct- most colleges become pretty familiar with the high schools that send them large pools of applicants!
I thought the school profile report was automatically sent with the transcript. I know that our high school won’t send any transcripts out before October because they are say they are finalizing the school report.
Hhhmmm, now I am curious if the SSR is automatically attached to the transcript for our school. I know that it wasn’t attached to the copy of transcripts we requested for personal use (which was supposed to be exactly what gets sent to schools) or to transcripts requested for scholarship applications. There were several schools that DDs applied to that did not require “official” transcripts with the application, but relied on self reported grades (Pitt, Florida State/UF, UofWash). None of those schools required anything from the HS so would not receive a SSR.
@STF4717 17 My daughter mostly applied to UC’s, Cal States, and UK universities, mostly. No transcripts or school profiles sent. UCs and Cal states the GC has no involvement at all. I get the feeling they take the GPA as is, obviously there is regular weighting but that does not take into account differences between schools. In our district there are several public high schools. I am certain my kids would have a higher GPA at their home high school vs the magnet tech/IB high school. I felt the GPA hit was worth it for the expanded choice of courses and better teachers.
But just in brief comparisons with friends a the home high school my kids spotted glaring discrepancies. AP courses in which my kid got a hard earned B in the class but a 5 on the test, where at the home high school many students with A’s declared it an easy class but got 3’s.
It is all about context. A high-GPA kid with mediocre test scores at a “lesser” high school may simply be hampered by fellow students who cannot be pushed as hard, therefore that “3” on an AP test is less about them not being able to master the material and more about their teacher being unable to cover as much material given the demographics of the class. You don’t know for certain whether that same kid wouldn’t get a “5” if in a classroom surrounded by students who routinely do better on tests, etc. Likewise, if that same kid gets a “5” when almost no one else even takes AP classes, it stands out all the more that this kid is perhaps special.
My wife was an AO for several years and she has always said that GPA was a far, far better predictor of college success than test scores. Test scores allow you to differentiate, to a certain degree, among applicants all at the same GPA level, but again you have to adjust for context. Someone getting a 33 ACT from a richer, bigger high school, where test prep is common and kids retake the tests, is perhaps not as impressive as a 30 from a small, rural high school or a troubled urban one, assuming both have performed equally well in GPA and have equivalent Teacher recs, etc.
On a related note, my kids go to an uber-competitive private high school, with an average ACT in the low 30s and a substantial cohort of NMF every year. First, a few years back they instituted weighted grades for the first time in school history because students were losing out on certain state school admissions/scholarships because their unweighted GPAs were being compared by some programs directly to weighted GPAs from other schools—a steady outcry from parents finally changed their mind on what had been a strong philosophical commitment not to participate in the GPA arms race. Second, students from this school were nonetheless doing quite well in selective college admissions relative to GPA applicant averages, so clearly the “quality”” of the school was benefitting the students vis a vis the average applicant. Again, context matters in both.
What I worry about as a parent is what happens when my kids apply to schools that do not have a history of evaluating students from their school—all this discussion about context is fine when the AO or the college has some experience with the high school or the category (one small rural high school can be easily understood by reference to others, perhaps), but what about when your kid is the first applicant to a college in 9 years from that high school?
@BooBooBear, my DD2016 was exactly that kid…the first one from her HS to apply to several of her choices. They were mostly LAC type schools that review holistically, she faired very well. I would say rigor, ECs and essays won the day! Not sure how that works at large publics universities that rely more heavily on stats, except to say that both of my kids have faired pretty well with their apps to those types of large publics schools and where maybe a handful of classmates have applied.