At the schools in my area, regular classes are graded on a 4.0 scale and AP classes are graded on a 5.0 scale. Even if a student here took every AP class offered, the AP courses could never be more than half of their total course load. So the GPA of a straight A student could never be more than 4.5. But I sometimes see weighted GPAs on this site that are way higher than this (4.8, 5.2, etc.). So there must be different systems. I know UC has it’s own method, but just wondering about the different scales that high schools are using.
For this reason, weighted GPAs are generally useless when stated without any context as to what the weighting system is.
Yes, I agree. Our high school weighs AP classes at a 4.5. But they also weigh a handful of challenging senior level high school classes Ike physics. Dual enrolled (community college) classes are not weighted. So a student taking a regular high school physics class can get a 4.5 but a student taking college level physics can only get 4.0. Makes no sense whatsoever…
A HS in our area includes the semester grade in the final weight, hence it is possible that a student who got straight As and not getting 4.0. (but a 3.65 if my calculation is right)
My school weights on a 4.8 scale for AP classes.
My school weights honors classes by .096 and AP or dual-credit classes at .143. After calculating UW GPA, which is pretty universal, they take the total weight of all honors/AP classes taken throughout high school and divide by the number of semesters completed. This meant that for students who took honors math or biology in junior high, their weighted GPAs were outrageously high freshman year (because they’d only been in high school for “1 semester” after the first semester but they had the honors credits from before high school). I think someone in my class had a 5.1 or 5.2, but as the semesters progress, weighted GPA goes down even if you continue to take the most rigorous schedule until it stabilizes around junior year (I believe). I don’t know; I think my school has a weird system but it’d be really cool to find someone who has a similar one.
It is kind of embarrassing to ask this question, but how can I find out the grading system of my ds’ School? Or is it not even that important since unweighted gpa seems to be used by colleges anyway?
Ask his GC. Or better yet, have him ask his GC.
It’s more important for HS things, like selecting val/sal, or determining class rank, or prioritizing waitlists in overenrolled courses. It’s the HS students that seem to obsess on weighting scales. College admissions don’t; since there is no common rubric, admissions will use UW or will weight to its own parameters.
@makemesmart look in your schools coursebook or handbook, you can also try to google your schools name and profile. Schools submit a profile along with transcripts they send to colleges that explains the grading scale, the type of classes offered, number of AP courses offered…
For some reason, some colleges take high school weighted GPAs at face value.
https://scholarships.ua.edu/faq/
This means that a high school with an exaggerated weighting system can make it easier for its students to earn scholarships at the University of Alabama, for example.
@ucbalumnus You are right. I should have used a qualifier, as there are very few questions on this site which will have a one-size-fits-all reply.
Northern Virginia HS: 0.5 points for honors and 1.0 points for AP. We don’t have IB at our school, so I don’t know what the weighting would be for that.
And, even though it’s not Lake Wobegon, a lot more than half of the students are in “honors” classes.
Colleges figure out GPAs in a consistent manner so don’t fret.
My daughter moved schools after her sophomore year. The first school was the US News #1 STEM public magnet school with a 0-100 grading system and all honors courses. We moved internationally for work, so the second was a German International School with an IB program that has a 0-7 grading system. We never knew what her 4.0 scale GPA was. Colleges admitted her anyway and gave her merit scholarships. The only glitch we had was our State Public U that had an automated system for scholarships based on self-reported data. An email to admissions cleared that up and she was also awarded merit.
My point is, don’t worry about it, the colleges figure it out.
That’s interesting that some schools have self-designated “honors” classes or other “challenging” courses that boost their weighted gpa. I understand using AP or IB classes, but to include classes that are not accredited by a third-party audit just seems like grade inflation. Including intermediate school classes in high school gpa is even more blatant.
Does anyone treat any music courses like AP courses? Our school weights jazz band like an AP course, which I don’t understand.
In my district, APs are out of 5.0 and all other classes are out of 4.0. Pretty simple, since we don’t have honors.
It really doesn’t matter that different high schools have different grading scales Each HS sends a school profile along with each transcript which (among other things) makes the grading system at that particular HS and the level of classes offered very clear to admissions officers so the transcript is reviewed in the proper context. Admissions officers are adept at adjusting for different grading scales and some colleges even recalculate GPA based on their own criteria (ex. academic subjects only etc.)
FWIW our public HS does not weight at all and kids do very well in terms of college admissions. And my D was in a program where there were written evaluations instead of grades and even that did not impact her college outcome.
My advice is to not concern yourself with things outside of your control (to include the way things might be done elsewhere). The college admissions process is stressful enough so just focus on making your own application as strong as possible.
I’m not concerned about whether college admissions officers can interpret the weighted gpa’s. I was just looking to see what different systems were being used by various high schools, since it seems that there is no standard method. Just for frame of reference to better understand some of the posts on this site. I didn’t know how a gpa could exceed 5.0 on a 4.0 scale, but now it makes a little more sense after reading some of the responses.
Re: Post #16 I think it depends on the school. Our HS’s profile listed a lot of AP classes, but the reality is that many are not offered and for those that are offered, there are many conflicts. Say AP Computer Science was not offered for many years, but it is listed. The non-AP Computer Science does not really cover much, it is easy for an adcom to question why a kid does not take AP Computer Science (or any Computer Science) if the kid were to plan to major in CS.
@annamom If there were notable schedueling conflicts and/or if classes on the school profile were not actually offered I would ask the guidance counselor to address that in the LOR.