Improving trend in grades

Graduate School
1

<p>I've read that it is a positive to see an improving trend in your grades and that the last couple years GPA is very important. But I've also read that your overall GPA (including freshman year grades) is also very important just b/c departments want their admitted students to average a high GPA to boost their rankings in USNews or something. How true is this?</p>

<p>My trend is as follows:
1st semester: 3.46
2nd:3.5
3rd: 3.82
4th: 4.0
5th: 4.0
6th: 4.0</p>

<p>So my last 60 credits is almost a 4.0. I messed around my freshman year and didn't care. The classes are got Bs in were very easy and were not weed out courses.</p>

2

<p>I don’t think that graduate admissions committees really pay much attention to USNWR. For graduate programs it is simply a reputation contest and GPA of entering students is irrelevant. They look for students who meet their requirements and have good promise. Your improvement in grades is excellent and does not need to be explained. Lots of students have a first year adjustment and yours wasn’t even that bad.</p>