<p>Hey,</p>
<p>I am applying to top universities (ivy league, etc.) as an international student from Austria. Now, a few days after I submitted my application to most of these unis I just realized that the Austrian grades 1 and 2 (there are 1 to 5) are both officially converted to an A in the U.S. because our schools are said to be a little harder. I have only 1s and 2s in my transcripts.</p>
<p>My question: will the adcoms know that my gpa is the u.s. equivalent to a 4.0 or will it be considered more like 3.5-3.7?</p>
<p>Thank you very much in advance,
Gab</p>
<p>It sounds like you have a very strong transcript. Top tier colleges get loads of international applications and as a result they have had to learn about the education systems all over the world. Yes, all your schools will be familiar with Austria’s system and will be able to evaluate your grades in that context.</p>
<p>Thank you very much for your quick response!</p>
<p>Another problem is that in Austria we get many transcripts and the Common Application only allowed my counselor to send a maximum of four transcripts (they document only my last two years in secondary school) Do you think I should ask my counselor to send the remaining transcripts to them by e-mail, or will they request the transcripts anyway if they need them?</p>
<p>And regardless of whether he sends additional transscripts or not: Do you think my counselor should inform the colleges about how the grades are properly converted just to be safe? (I got more 2s in the older transscripts that definitely should not come accross as American Bs)</p>
<p>Your counselor can type a document for the Optional Report, with something like
1-2: A
3: B+/B
4: B-/C
5: D
(or whatever scale your counselor feels is appropriate).
It may help if the counselor indicates what percentage students in your school get 1’s and 2’s (ie, 40%, 10% …?)</p>
<p>Your counselor can scan and combine several transcripts into a single pdf file for uploading. Otherwise, most schools will accept email submissions of additional materials from internationals. You need to coordinate this with the international admissions person at each college.</p>
<p>The school report form allows the GC space to provide context for your grades. Providing more detail about grading criteria than just a raw conversion chart can be helpful to adcoms. For example in the school report the GC might say both 1s and 2s are given sparingly and reflect extremely high achievement, or they are allocated to only the top 10% of each class, or something along those lines.</p>
<p>Thank you so much again for both of your responses.
Unfortunately, my counselor has sent the first school report already, so he cannot add any information (neither transcripts nor grade conversation info) to the school report.</p>
<p>Sending that info with the optional report generally sounds like a great idea, but Iasked my gc today and he said that there is no space to write a text in this report (and they have to check an affirmation that they only upload transcripts as pdf).</p>
<p>Now i have already applied to 15+ colleges. Do I (or my gc) really have to contact each of them one by one or is there any other option I am currently missing how I could convey the grade conversation info?</p>
<p>And would they request additional transcripts if they are missing any, or should my gc really send the ones that are left to all the unis I applied to?</p>
<p>I am sorry that I ask so many questions about this single topic, but I am really worried that this could be the only factor deciding about me getting admitted to rejected. I really appreciate that you take the time to answer these question!</p>
<p>If you know some transcripts have not been sent, then yes you do really need to get those sent to your schools. Don’t wait for the schools to follow up with you on this.</p>
<p>In the optional or mid-year report your GC can check ‘yes’ to the question “do you want to update your evaluation of this applicant” and then attach a separate page explaining that the evaluation of the applicant remains highly favorable (or whatever) and explain the grading system.</p>
<p>That is great thanks!</p>
<p>One short last question: Could he also upload all remaining transcripts with the optional report, or do they only accept more recent transcripts here (in that case: which transcript should he upload in addition to the evaluation since I have no more recent transcript)</p>
<p>I don’t know what I would do without you! Thanks!</p>
<p>Bump. Please niceday or someone else help me, I want to let him send everything missing as soon as possiple!</p>
<p>Yes, the optional report can be used to send additional transcripts that were not include in the original school report. The GC can explain what is attached on that same page where he explains the grading system.</p>
<p>Ok, I’ll do that thank you so much! I hope I can return the favor some day.</p>
<p>I’ve just called admissions at some random college asking to assist with the same issue: GPA conversion. Counselor responsible for international students explained that everything above 10 (12-p scale) is considered A or in other words 4.0. Hopefully my is 11.12. So, don’t worry, schools will count you as highly competitive student with good grade point average.</p>