I am very confused on how I could have the same weighted and unweighted GPA. She told me it’s because of the schools grading system, however, my grade is still an 87 and a 3.5 would be a 90. Please help.
Every school weighs a bit differently. Go back to your guidance counselor and ask for clarification. There might also be a paragraph or two in your high school’s student handbook that spells it out (you might be able to find this on your school’s web page if you don’t have a copy).
Generally if you have the same GPA for both weighted and unweighted, it means you didn’t take any honors, AP, or IB classes. If that is not the case, you will need to get it clarified by someone at your high school.
A student could have the same weighted and unweighted GPA if that student has not taken any weighted courses. (Typically, weighted courses are AP classes and honors at some schools). All schools differ on how they weigh courses.
When you say your “grade is an 87”, that sounds like a grade in one class, whereas GPA is an average of your grades in all classes, all years of high school.
If you are talking about IB, which I know uses a numerical scale, disregard all the above as I know nothing about IB and GPA, hopefully others will respond.
What if Naviance says it?
I only took one honors class junior and sophomore year
Totally depends on your school’s grading scale and how they weigh courses.
Usually there is a range for GPA. The 87 could be at the very low end of the range for a 3.5 in your school and the 90, at the very upper end. Both would still yield a 3.5.
Be aware that most universities will do a deeper dive of your transcript.
It sounds like your GPA is out of 100. Some schools do it that way.
So a 3.0 is an 85, a 3.5 is a 90, a 4.0 is 95+
You’ll have to ask the high school if that is weighted or not.
My counselor said it was weighted and unweighted-like both were a 3.5
Have you taken any honors, AP or IB classes? If not, that could very well be correct. If you HAVE taken honors classes or higher, then there might be a mistake. Read the school handbook to understand why your GPA wasn’t given weight.
You don’t automatically have a higher weighted gpa just because you took 2 honors classes. If you got lower grades in those and higher grades in non weighted classes, they could balance out. Find out what honors weighting is at your school and ask your guidance counselor how to calculate both.
A non-weighted GPA doesn’t exclude weighted classes. So nothing can ‘balance out’. Weighting should be purely additive.
Yes, OP, finding and understanding your school’s grading and weighting scheme should be step 1. That fact that you are mixing 4.0 and 100 point scales says it’s a somewhat non-standard system. Investing time to figure it out and calculate the numbers yourself will be a better investment than asking others.
Different high schools in the US compute weighted GPA very differently. I have heard of schools where a 90 is a 4.0, and one daughter went to a school where a 97 was an A+ but counted as a 3.7. Universities know that high school GPA does not compare well between high schools.
Universities will look at your actual grades, and might also compare your GPA with other students from your high school whose GPA is computed the same way as yours.
Take the classes that make sense for you. Try to keep ahead in all of your class work. Pay attention in class. Do not worry about how your GPA is computed.
Yes, as everyone else has said you need to understand how your school weights classes. Weighting just means you get a bump in your GPA for taking certain classes. For instance, an “A” in a regular math class might be worth a 4.0 while as “A” in an AP math class might be worth a 5.0. If you didn’t take any classes that give you the bump in your GPA, your weighted and unweighted GPA will be the same.
Every school handles there grading and weighting differently which is why colleges are often mainly interested in unweighted GPAs. At my D’s high school honors classes were not weighted, only AP classes were. They also take into account each schools grading system. At my D’s high school they did not grade an A as 90% in the class, a B as 80%, etc. I think to get an A you needed a 95% (to get a 4.0) and a 93 for an A- (to get a 3.67).
Your school handbook probably explains exactly how grading at your school works and you can probably find it online.
Two of my kids went to a school that did not weight. Unweighted GPA = Weighted GPA there.
Many selective colleges take Just the Unweighted GPA because high schools weight Differently. School A might give double the weight for the same class. So the colleges take the unweighted GPA and conform it to their scale for consistency sake then evaluate the difficulty of curriculum (which is essentially what weighted GPA does.