Question about grades and college admissions--what is really required?

Applying to College
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My daughter is a junior getting her IB certificate (not diploma) and also taking a number of AP classes. She has a few community college classes too. She has only received one B+ so far, but even still, her class rank is only in the top 15%, which seems crazy to me. She is going to end up with 1 or 2 Bs this semester (in weighted classes) with As in her other weighted classes. I think her weighted GPA will end up around 4.2 or 4.3.

Is she going to be competitive for purposes of college admissions if she doesn’t have straight As?

Her SAT is 1440 and she has very strong ECs. She had hoped for schools like Georgetown or Northwestern, but with her SAT and grades, we might be looking at ones like Vassar, Barnard, Wellesley, Scripps, Occidental, etc., plus she will be applying to UCs.

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Your daughter sounds similar to my daughter, though yours is perhaps a bit more competitive. Northwestern and Georgetown, I would say don’t even bother. For the other schools you list, your daughter is a maybe. My daughter (a current senior) will probably apply to Oxy, but I’m not holding my breath for an acceptance. Our daughters will likely get accepted to a few UCs but not UCLA, UCB, or UCSB (but mine did apply to UCSB).

But my daughter has already received acceptances to four schools, with good merit scholarships! Two of them I had never heard of before this fall, but that’s because they are not on the West Coast.

Your daughter is competitive for many schools, but as I’ve learned in the last several months, there are tons of “average excellent students,” so you’ll need to broaden your search.

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I will only address the UC’s.

The UC’s are now permanently test blind so GPA and HS course rigor along with her PIQ (Personal Insight Question) essays will be Very Important in her application review. Her EC’s can help differentiate her from the other competitive applicants.

Class rank is not considered other than in the context of ELC (Eligibility Local Context) which is part of the 13 areas of application review criteria.

There are plenty of applicants for the UC’s that have a 4.0 UW GPA that do not get accepted into their top choices and there a plenty of less than 4.0 UW GPA applicants that are accepted. Also she will be evaluated within the context of her HS so as stated by many, a 4.0 at one school is not the same as 4.0 at another.

She will be competitive but she should first focus on finding some true safety schools (affordable, guaranteed admission and willing to attend). Having a balanced college list is important, so anything beyond identifying these likely schools, is icing on the cake in terms of college admissions.

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She is at a public high school that has very high test scores and sends a lot of students to UCs (which can cut both ways). Personally, I would prefer that she attend a smaller liberal arts school and I think she would like a smaller school as well (as compared to UCs). Her major will likely be political science.

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It’s crazy to say - is she going to be competitive for college admissions with a GPA of 4.2 (weighted) and an unweighted of has to be close to a 4.0

It’s also crazy that it’s only the top 15% -but i suspect the school grade inflates and your daughter is taking less than the top rigor - so that might be a downfall.

There’s a huge difference between Oxy and Vassar btw - and a lot of schools in between.

Today you can apply TO and the 1440 won’t be seen by the Ca Publics - since they are blind. Many top schools - a Wesleyan, BU, Connecticut - 40-60% of their admits are TO believe it or not - so TO is huge!!

btw - a 1440 is the 97th percentile - so yes, look at each school to see if it’s in range - but the question of will she be competitive - is silly.

I know you followed it up with that list of schools so the question makes more sense - but I hope you don’t put huge pressure on your child. She’s phenomenal!!

She’s a slam dunk for Oxy and highly likely (Franklin and Marshall, Depauw, Dennison, Skidmore) and I’d say a match to a Macalester, Lafayette, and Kenyon). And those you list are not out of reality - the UC maybe a lower level one.

If you’re looking UC, then also look at Arizona and Arizona State - because both have great honors college and fantastic merit. One can say the same about U of SC as well.

But your daughter is ABSOLUTELY FINE and if she wants a great LAC, mid size or large school - they’ll all be there for her - just make sure like everyone, you have your reaches (what you listed), matches and safeties.

Instead of a Gtwon/Northwestern - the match/safety would be a William and Mary (low reach), American and Denver, etc.

Good luck.

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Competitive for what colleges?

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Yes, all good points. I guess when I say she won’t be competitive, I am thinking T-20 schools. We are having to shift our thinking and expand our list.

She is taking a very rigorous course load and will have 12+ IB/AP classes by the end of senior year.

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@Gbmom

Yes…every student should have a varied list of colleges…and not just top 20 schools.

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I can’t imagine her rank will be 15% then - assuming mostly A.s

Reach for the stars - but have those 2nd and 3rd tier ready.

For the record, few in society will know an Oxy or Macalester or a Washington & Lee.

The people that need to know probably know - and this is no different than a Rice or WUSTL which are also not known by the majority.

There’s a ton of great schools out there and a ton of opportunity.

In the end, your kid will or won’t be a success based on them.

Not based on if they go to Gtwon vs. Denver or Willamette vs. Wesleyan.

Yes, the bigger name helps - but there are gazillionaires that went to San Diego State and people who can’t hold a job that went to Harvard.

Good luck.

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I used to think that you have 1 or 2 B’s you should be in Top 10%. But reality is its not so in many highly competitive high schools these days. We routinely have 10 to 12% of the high school with all 4.0 UW GPA. And I don’t think it is grade inflation in our school because we have 95%+ of AP pass rate with avg score of 4.3+ and Avg SAT/ACT at 1400+ and 33.

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Interestingly, SDSU has an acceptance rate that is comparable to Cal Poly SLO and Occidental. Similar also to UCSD and UCSB.

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This is a long post because my best friend’s son last year, who did have a couple of Bs on his transcript, only applied to top 20 schools last year and was rejected from all of them. He is at community college now. I want everyone to have a balanced list!! Shoot for the stars, but have some more realistic options too.

My 2022 son’s stats sounds somewhat like your daughter (although he did not take as many APs/IBs), and we did not see him as competitive for T20 schools because he is a generic white kid from the suburbs who is not a legacy, not first gen, and not a recruited athlete. He is a very, very good student but doesn’t have the hook or over-the-top academics you need to get into T20s if you aren’t hooked (his public high school has SO MANY mediocre students who go to top schools as athletes - it is infuriating!). He has applied this year with just one B+ (a GPA of 3.97: weighted 4.33), 9 APs/honors courses, test optional, top 10% of graduating class, unique and deep ECs, as well as athletics and clubs. Our daughter is at a T20 school (Princeton), and we knew what it took to get in there, and it was just out of reach for our son. But honestly, he would have been swallowed up at most T20 schools even if he could have gotten in. In my opinion - and I know it is debatable - the point of college is not to just go to the highest ranked one you can get in to, but to have a good learning and social experience, feel successful, and graduate (I went to Stanford and it was an awful experience because Stanford is focused primarily on its graduate programs and I felt so “less than” than all of the other kids - and this was back in the 80s). I didn’t want that for my son (for my daughter ant Princeton, we knew she could hold her own). Absolutely pick a couple of T20 schools and cross your fingers, but I would include mostly T21 and lower range on her list, unless your daughter has something unique (legacy, athlete, first gen, etc.). My son is interested in mechanical engineering, and the top ranked schools on his list are University of Rochester (already admitted - we are thrilled), Case Western (already admitted - we are thrilled), Lafayette, Lehigh, Boston University, Purdue, USC, Villanova. There are other “safeties” too. We live in CA and didn’t even bother with the UCs because there is no way he would have gotten into UCLA, the only one he is interested in, from his high school. We too did not want him at the UCs where resources (faculty, classes, housing) are already stretched to the limit and are only going to get worse these next few years as the UC system has been “ordered” to admit more students, even though they don’t have the capacity to educate them (I have held an academic position in the UC system for 20 years, so my concerns are more than just sour grapes about my kids not being good enough for UCLA). Your daughter sounds AWESOME, just as my son is, and we think he is going to have a great college experience, just as I suspect your daughter will.

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Is there something preventing your daughter from just applying? I’ve never understood the “should I apply” questions. If it’s a place you want to go, apply. If you get in awesome. If not, it’s not different than if you hadn’t applied.

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My daughter just got into a LAC that has a 14% acceptance rate with similar stats. She had great ECs and an amazing essay. We changed our search from large universities to LACs as time went on and couldn’t be happier.

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