<p>Hello all,</p>
<p>I have recently applied to graduate schools but the transcript that I had sent had the most recent grades from Spring Quarter of 2008 (my undergrad school is on a trimester system). I recently received my grades for Fall Quarter and my GPA went up from a 3.00 to a 3.06. Should I be sending in my most recent transcript to all of the schools I have applied to even though they already have my earlier transcript?</p>
<p>Regards,</p>
<p>smpaladin</p>
<p>Honestly, a 3.06 vs. a 3.00 really isn't a significant difference. If it had gone from a 3.7 to a 3.8, that might be significant, but your difference is less than a 10th of a point and both are below what most grad schools seriously consider (most have a cutoff for even be considered of a 3.0 and most applicants are probably above a 3.5 in just about any grad program)</p>
<p>hm apumic. Most grad schools that im considering (top ones, like stanford, yale, upenn etc.) release their average acceptee information. and i think their average acceptee has 3.5 GPA. (this is for biomedical sciences programs)</p>
<p>im assuming many acceptees will have close to 4.0 GPA,..so to balance this to get the average of 3.5, im sure they accept many students with 3.0 GPA.</p>
<p>EDIT: besides, 3.06 = 3.1 when you round it. I have a 3.57 GPA and I round it up to 3.6 on application forms that only ask you for your GPA to the first decimal.</p>
<p>I read somewhere recently that you should never round a GPA up, only down...</p>
<p>You can look at the median vs. mean of the distribution to determine whether the distribution is normal or skewed, but many I've seen have a higher median than mean, which would indicate that most students are above the mean, while 1 or 2 students who are otherwise unbelievable (LORs from the mentor of their POI, multiple publications, excellent experience, etc.) with a low GPA (e.g., 3.0ish) and/or GREs (below 1200ish in Clinical).</p>
<p>I am applying for Clinical Psych programs, and most of their mean GPAs are 3.7-3.9 range (med. slightly higher than mean) with cutoffs between 3.0 and 3.5 and acceptance rates below 10%.</p>
<p>Unless you are unbelievable in other areas, neither a 3.0 NOR a 3.1 is going to get you into a reputable program, therefore I don't really consider it worthwhile. I know in my field, the adcoms would simply toss the app without looking at it (unless something amazing jumped out at them or a POI pulled it out of the stack ahead of time). When you have 200-300 applications to look through and you only have 5-10 spots to fill, there's little reason to look back at people whose numbers are in the bottom 50% of applicants.</p>
<p>Apumic, this is field specific. I have no doubt that in clinical psychology programs a 3.7-3.9 is competitive. This is common to all clinical degrees eg. dmd, md, etc. </p>
<p>We in the biomedical field take a very different approach. We downplay the role of a gpa, acknowledging that it is strikingly different between departments, courses and institutions and instead favor a model that makes research experience/success most competitive. </p>
<p>While a major endpoint for clinical programs would be a certain score on the USMLEs, boards or whathaveyou, the endpoint for biomedical science is innovative thought leading to publications. A 3.0 ish is competitive in the biomedical science provided it is combined with research whereas a 4.0ish is not if the applicant lacks research experience.</p>