Low Grade in Junior Year

Hi Guys,

I have a 4.0 cumulative so far in high school (my school does not weight GPA, and any A as well as a B+ in advanced classes maintains a 4.0). However, due to some not very good circumstances, I am currently left with a very low grade in APUSH (77 currently). I believe I will be able to get it up to a B- or low B by the end of the semester, and the rest of my grades are solid (A- in AP Bio, 96% or higher in AP Lang, AP Calc BC, Honors French 3, Theology). Additionally, my APUSH grade next semester will likely be an A- due to the path I’m on (better understanding of class, new school), as well as a 4 or 5 on the AP exam.
How does this affect my chances for schools in the 10th to 30th range? (NYU, Brown, USC, Columbia, Vanderbilt, Stanford [largest reach])

Let me know!

So you are saying you will possibly end up with 1 B for 1 semester in an AP class and the rest all As? I don’t think that will make much of any difference.

One thing you may want to watch out for is that you said your school doesn’t weight GPA but then you said that a B+ for advanced classes is counted as 4.0. That is weighting. What percent score is considered a B+ in your school? The reason I ask is that some colleges will normalize GPAs and B pluses may be considered as just a “B” which, if you happen to have a lot of, could significantly change your GPA.

I only have 1 B+ (honors class, freshman year), probably about 7 A-s (all honors or AP for those) and the rest are >92 (some AP and Honors in here)

The A-s will be counted as As but if your B+ is under a 90 then it will be counted a a B for a true unweighted gpa. It will also depend on the college as some, like the UCs, don’t count freshman grades and others may only count core classes.

Some colleges do recalculate GPA so as to make an apples-to-apples comparison among the many different grading systems out there. A B or two in themselves won’t be what keeps you out of any college. It sounds like you’re getting a handle on the class, so just keep doing your best.

So it’s not just one B, there’s also one in 9th? They won’t blindly trust gpa, they look at the transcript, see rigor and grades. These colleges don’t need to recalculate.

Why call your targets 10-30, when you include Brown, Columbia, and Stanford?

If you understood what these colleges look for and how fierce the competition is, I think you would have provided a lot more info. It takes a lot more.

And mentioned the possible major. If your B grades are in related subjects, that matters.

My lone other B is 1 89% in my first semester of Freshman year. I understand that, which is why I mentioned my specific grades. I know how fierce this competition is, from experience through siblings and friends at school. According to US News, only Stanford and Columbia are top 10, while all of the other school I mentioned are in that range. Additionally, that was a list of my reach schools. My targets are more in the 25-70 range. I don’t want a “chance me”, I just want to know how much this one specific facet (a grade 7% lower than anything else I received in high school) would affect anything. I don’t plan on majoring in History at all, and I may go in to something STEM but not Chemistry-focused.