I’m currently a international senior applying to US colleges. I’m from a Public High School. In my area, there are 3 top Public High Schools, one of which is my school. In general, they don’t differ very much in corriculum. However, my school has a very unforgiving grade scale, students generally can’t seem to break through 9.0 (We use the 10 point scale); and score inflation is non-existent.
In the 2 other schools, however, score inflation does happen (I know this from asking my friends from those 2 high schools) . This situation partly explains for why many of my past seniors didn’t stand a chance when being compared to seniors from the 2 other schools, even though they are as much gifted.
Therefore, I’m considering adding this perspective into my application in the Additional Information section so Admission Officer can get a clearer sense of how my school grade system works, since I’m worried it won’t be explicitly demonstrated by my Counselor. On the other hand, I’m also concerned that doing this may make me look like I’m trying to come up with an excuse for my low GPA. (I’m in the range of 8.7-8.9, btw).
Should I include this information in my application guys ? I would really appreciate any kind of help or similar experiences.
You are correct to be concerned; it will come across as whining. You GC can mention it, and as mentioned above, it will be evident from the school profile.
As said above, every HS sends a school profile with each transcript. The school profile shows things like levels of course offered, average standardized test scores in school, and average grades for subjects in the school. Therefore your transcript will be reviewed in its proper context. This is not something you need to worry about. You can ask your HS guidance counselor if you can look at the school profile (the one for our HS is on the school website so you might look online first).
Do not add an explanation into your additional comment section as: 1) the information is already in the school profile and 2) you will come off as making excuses/whining.
Also in the school profile will be a snapshot of the highest GPA in the class. The colleges will be able to understand your school’s context based on this.
For example, your top GPA might be 9.1
Where as the other schools might be 9.7 and 9.9. Immediately, the college will know that your 9.0 will be very impressive whereas another school’s 9.0 is seen as relatively weaker. Make sense?
Colleges know schools have varying grading scales and differently levels of grade inflation or deflation. Thus, they know how to interpret. Trust this – you’re not the first person to wonder how it works.
Let me add this: there are some public universities who do not differentiate between W and UW GPAs or transcript differences. Thus my kiddo who attended a top 10 HS in the country – her 3.8GPA within a crazy IB program, was seen by some schools as equivalent to some poorly resourced school’s 3.8GPA. That’s the prerogative of those schools of course.