Wisconsin is the one school on my list that I have absolutely no clue about whether or not I’ll get in, so any insight at all would be great. I really want to go here for nursing or biology. Thanks!!
UW uses unweighted grades- so your gpa is even lower. With your very high ACT score and low grades you have not shown you have good study skills. You are expected to take the rigorous courses and do well in them. You should be able to get more A’s in AP/Honors classes to be able to handle UW work. Some students mature later than others and will have great junior year grades but a lower overall HS gap. This means they learned how to do the work. You are expected to take advantage of opportunities offered you- “high ranking” HS means nothing. There are plenty of ordinary Wisconsin HS’s with better qualified students than you appear to be. Most may not have as high an ACT but they will know how to study and will have a better knowledge base.
Why should UW take you over another student? You may have potential but you need to use it to do well. Sharpen your study skills this year so matter where you go to college you know how to study and master the material.
your high test scores show potential. you can bring your grades up this year to show that you have started taking your classes more seriously.
Senior first semester is your only chance to wow admissions. It would be helpful to have improving grades for junior year. You are expected to take the tough classes and do well in them.
Sorry what do you mean by saying that they use unweighted grades? They didn’t ask for my unweighted GPA on the common app. Just checking to make sure I didn’t miss something lol
It does not matter what the common app requests. UW uses unweighted gpa’s. This means no extra points for honors or AP/IB et al courses. An A is 4 points, regardless of what type of course it is. An A in a regular class yields the same grade point as the one in honors or AP. This means that students whose school does not give weighted grades or does not offer as many honors/AP/IB classes is not at a disadvantage when their grades are compared to those with such opportunities. If your school offers plenty of more rigorous choices you are expected to make use of them and do well in them.
So- calculate your unweighted gpa. It is easy. Just take the grade, assign it point values on the A = 4.0 scale and…
I find it strange when I see gpa’s for vals/sals listed in the Tampa, FL area we retired to that range from 5+ to 8+. It all depends on how many AP/IB/honors classes available to students within the same county wide district. The only good thing I see with weighting is that for class rank those who take the more rigorous courses get a higher one.
UW erases all of those inequalities between how schools do their grade assignments. You took honors/A/P instead of the regular version. You are expected to do well, not just be a B student. Most of the successful UW applicants will also have taken many AP/IB/honors classes and gotten mostly A’s in them. They will have studied/done the work to earn the high grades. Grades show knowledge and skills- an A in a regular version of a class could mean more of that than a B in an upgraded class.
Get it?
btw- erased the word gained after skills above. Some people enter a class already knowing a lot and their gain may be a lot less than others’. Some also get lower grades because, while they get perfect test scores, fail to turn in the work (concrete example- son got zeroes on AP statistics homework as a HS senior and 100’s on every test, dropping his grade to a B- unweighted as well for his final gpa).
“We also realize that many schools consider GPA on different scales and some do not report GPA or class rank at all. We consider both GPA and rank in the context of your school. We typically see unweighted, academic GPAs between a 3.8 and a 4.0, and a class rank in the 85-97 percentile.”
That seems more balanced than just pure HS GPA.
UW accounts for differences in schools. Not having AP/IB/honors available will not penalize a student. Having options for rigor but not taking advantage of them and doing well in them will hurt- taking away any grade weighting means you can’t do less well. There will be many students who will take the classes and get A’s.
Note the word usage in the quote. They cover their bases- “typically see” shows room for flexibility, plus “context”. Not a purely computer run process. In the past UW admissions people have told audiences that they expect both rigor and high grades when asked if it is better to take the more rigorous class and get a lesser grade or the less rigorous one with a better grade. Frustrating to hear.
btw- regular courses at UW can be just as difficult as honors counterparts. No thinking you will get the A because you could have taken an honors version. Being only a two credit class does not mean it will be easy either.
koyfish1
Don’t let everyone get you down, check your school’s Naviance. S’s out-of-state school has a 80%+ acceptance rate at Wisconsin with average GPA of 3.60 for accepted students. 35 ACT is outstanding, congratulations. Everyone at S’s school above a 32 has been accepted including a 3.2 and 3.4 GPA.
@DIAWS Thanks for giving me hope. I have similar stats - 34 ACT with 3.5UW and 3.8W GPA
out of curiosity, did you end up making it? I always like hearing actual results lol.