<p>I'm a high school junior and in my first year of the IB diploma program (in Europe). I love it- I'm learning so much!- and I'm doing fairly ok, I think. But I'm starting to worry about grades. My school is preparing us IBers for our final exams. The Christmas and Spring grades are just to "show us how we're doing" and "can go straight in the trashcan", "don't matter", etc. Sure, they don't matter for for the diploma. I could get all 1s for the winter and spring grades and still end up with a 45 diploma! </p>
<p>But since I'm going to be applying to American colleges these grades WILL matter, probably more than what I get on the diploma! I'm working my hardest of couse, and I do think I'm doing alright. But since the teachers are already grading thing according to the IB marking criteria, it's impossible to do very well (they're grading us on what we should know a year and a half from now). Before IB I've always done very well in English. A few weeks ago we got back our first essays, and I got a 3 or 4! So despite doing well in relation to the other people in my grade, I know I won't be able to get all 7s on my report card. </p>
<p>How will this affect me when I apply to colleges? </p>
<p>Is there any way to find out what the average IB score for students admitted to certain colleges is? Cause of having a different grading system I'm having a hard time figuring out what colleges match me, because the GPA doesn't tell me anything...</p>