How important is general grade trend?

<p>I was wondering how important the general trend of grades are. For example, I have a GPA that is extremely low, roughly a 3.2. This, however, is mostly the result of a bad freshman year; after that I drastically cleaned up my act. I currently get straight A's. However, does this really matter? Or will colleges just compare GPAs and disregard any trend?</p>

<p>Some colleges, like Stanford, don’t consider freshman year grades when applying.</p>