<p>Our high school uses percentage grades, not letter grades, with a sliding scale for grade point average. A grade of 100 is required for an unweighted 4.0. From reading various posts here, I gather that that is unusual. Do other schools give a 4.0 for any class which falls within the A range? </p>
<p>A very good student could get all 95's-96's but have a 3.7 GPA in this system, rather than a 4.0. I know the guidance counselor can explain this but do colleges take the time to analyze such things? I'm assuming all the posts I read with people with 4.0 unweighted GPAs do not represent them getting all 100's in their courses. That would be some serious grade inflation if it is.</p>
<p>Our school also uses a 100 point scale, and the so does the transcript. I have not been able to get a satisfactory answer as to what colleges do about this. If, for example, they just change every 90-or-above to an A or 4, 80-or-above to a B or 3, etc., my child will have a different GPA than would occur if there was a conversion scale that went by tenths of a point (for example, 97-100 = 4.0, 95-96 = 3.7, or whatever).</p>
<p>To complicate matters, some colleges eliminate all courses that aren't in the 5 academic areas, eliminating PE, music, art, etc. - which would change the student's GPA, sometimes considerably.</p>
<p>Finally, our transcripts list an unweighted and a weighted GPA - such 94.2 unweighted, 111.9 weighted (20 points added for honors course, 30 for AP).</p>
<p>I have no idea how this will play out. I guess it depends on the college. I agree with your implication that our way is more accurate - everyone with a 4.0 can't possibly have nothing but 100s.</p>
<p>4.3+ 4.0+ 3.7= 12/3 = 4.0uw GPA if you have an AP class then you .7 added to your total for each class. EX: 4.3+ 4.0+ 3.7+ 0.7= 12.7/3= 4.233333 w GPA.</p>
<p>This system has created some grade inflation in our school. All of the top 10% have more that a 4.0 uw GPA.</p>
<p>Our school also grades on 100 point basis and reports grades and "GPA" that way, eg 93.8uw, 122w. For the unweighted GPA, all courses are included. For the weighted GPA, only the academic core counts and Honors are adjusted 125%,AP 130%. </p>
<p>All of the colleges we visited stated that they see so many different methods of weighting, grading, calculating GPA that they simply "throw out" the high-school generated GPAs and use the raw grades to calculate it their own way. We visited schools like Trinity, Lehigh, Lafayette, JHU, Villanova, Tulane, Rice, Stanford, Claremonts....</p>
<p>Don't know what the large U's do. And I can only go by what the schools we visited "stated", don't know exactly how they carry this out, but there is, in fact, huge variability in what the high schools do, so it makes sense for the colleges to do it their own way.</p>
<p>Btw, at our school "A" requires a grade of 93. A 92 would be a "B" and get a 3.0 at SBmom's school. Just another example of how inconsistent it all is. So, I sincerely HOPE that the colleges do their own thing instead of just "buying" what the hs sends.</p>
<p>I think it takes a GIANT leap of faith to believe that colleges will spend much time recomputing the GPA. How many man-hours would it take for a school like Harvard -or any other school that is blessed with tens of thousands of applications- to do this? Even with more than 35 admission committee members, it seems farfetched to believe that much "reengineering" will be done. I would rather believe that a school like Harvard must have developed a scale for their technicians to evaluate a number of known feeder schools. The others may not have such luck. </p>
<p>I really believe that schools that depart from established norms are penalizing their students, and the more exotic they become, the worse for the students. The only solution available for the students attending one of the thousands of "unknown" schools is to hope for a VERY clear school profile. The schools that compound the problem of exotic grades by also using a nebulous profile are shooting in their own foot. Making applications difficult to evaluate seems -at least to me- a sure way to widen the path to early rejections. </p>
<p>All in all, I find this situation to be remarkably avoidable. All it would take is for colleges to publish clear policies about their likes and dislikes. One has to wonder what is really discussed at the NACAC conventions, besides the availability of coffee and donuts. :) </p>
<p>PS FWIW, in the back of the "A for Admission", there are a few conversion tables to help calculate the CRS. The conversion from a 0-100 scale seems to be a bit more generous than the conversion to the letter scale. For instance a 93% GPA translates to more than the equivalent of a 3.3 GPA.</p>
<p>From what I've read, it's often not the admissions counselor that is doing the first go-over of an application. Selective colleges have clerical people recalculate gpa's according to their formula. In my humble opinion, it's just too stressful to spend any time worrying how colleges are going to look at my kids grades. They are what they are. You just have to make sure that the HS profile is accurate and reflects how the HS calculates the grades.</p>
<p>I can't speak for all state colleges, but at a visit to Penn State we were told that they just go by whatever grades they are given and do not re-calculate. In fact they just accept a certain gpa and sat and quickly dismiss those under whatever numbers they're shooting for; no accounting for ec's, rec's , etc. They are completely numbers driven.</p>
<p>while not H, Tulane's adcom said that they DO recalc each and every gpa that is presented, in accordance to their requirements. The UC's do the same, as does UAz, so it is likely that H, with more resources than most third-world countries, can build a spreadsheet to run a few numbers....</p>
<p>These issues with GPA are why other factors, including class rank, and, most importantly, adcom experience with the school, are so important. </p>
<p>The latter issue, experience with the school, should be a scary one for anyone applying to a college that had not received many applications from one's HS in the past. Those are the ones at a disadvantage.</p>
<p>Keep in mind that if we amateurs can have this online discussion regarding HS grading inconsistencies, the professonals, adcoms, should know far more that we. Heck, they may even have tools, through professional associations and vendors, to help in these issues.</p>
<p>As another said, we can't fix the issue. Let's focus on those we can, like making sure the school's profile is accurate.</p>
<p>newmassdad - I worried a lot about the points you make during my kids' application processes. They both applied to colleges which have received few, if any, applications from their h.s. I have heard it said on this board that colleges LIKE to get applicants from different schools than their usual pool, but you make the opposite point. I wonder which is actually true.<br>
Also, class rank can be as misleading as GPA, in my opinion, unless it is considered in the context of the profile of the h.s. At our school, slightly less than half go on to four year college and about 30% to community college. I would think a class rank in the top 10% at a school where 95% go on to four year college would have a different meaning than the same rank from our h.s.
Both of my kids are, thankfully, done with their college admissions processes and both were admitted to the schools of their choice, so it is water under the bridge for my family.
But I am still curious about these issues.</p>