<p>On the application to one of my top schools there is an optional essay about a low grade or drop in grades. </p>
<p>I understand that admissions counselors love to hear the reasoning behind a dip in grades and that sort of thing. Well, in my freshman year I got a 3.1 GPA, which is greatly different than sophomore gpa (4.0) and junior gpa (3.83) Should this qualify as something to talk about?
I also got a C that year in Honors Geometry, which is vital because my major relates closely to math, that being the major of computer science. I want to explain that but don't know how to.</p>
<p>I want to let them know about my freshman year in the optional essay but I have no reasoning behind the lower grades. The only reason is a sudden period of laziness. I'm not positive that this is something I should be writing about. I could talk passionately on how I wanted to make something of myself though. Thanks!</p>
<p>Since your sophomore and junior year grades are decent, do you really need to draw attention to freshman year? Your geometry grade explains itself, since you got good math grades after that.</p>
<p>Unless your explanation is something like “I had leukemia”, rather than the “I was a typical 9th grade doofus”, I’m not sure it’s going to add anything that is a plus to your application. And I’m not sure your grades take much away, either, some colleges care very little about freshman year.</p>
<p>Thats very true, it really wouldn’t add anything. It’s just that the essay question asks very specifically if there was a drop in grades. To answer that, yes there was a drop in my grades…it just wasn’t very significant. That has me very confused at the moment</p>
<p>No, your grades went up. When they say drop, they mean if there was a roll-off your junior or senior year. Say your were 4.0 freshman, 3.9 sophomore, and 3.3 junior, they’d want to know why.</p>