Special student at MIT

<p>In the past, I was admitted into MIT as a special student, non-matric, and I took 4 challenging EECS courses, and got all A's.</p>

<p>However, in my home institution, Stony Brook, my undergrad GPA is a 3.7, after 100 credits, if I apply to MIT for graduate school, would my straight A's at MIT influence their decision. Wouldn't it show that I can handle MIT standards?</p>

<p>Please participate, since I look forward to your response.</p>

<p>It seems that after a certain point (usually around a 3.5/4.0) that GPA doesn’t really matter for graduate school admissions. Having strong research experiences and reccomendations is more likely to influence your decision in the graduate school admissions process.</p>

<p>Depends on the discipline. In some disciplines, undergrads who want to go to grad school are expected to do research and so that is valued highly. In other disciplines, undergrads rarely do research so GPA + letters are what matters. Strong letters from MIT faculty would be very helpful though.</p>

<p>It sounds like a good strategy to boost your resume’.</p>

<p>Engineering grad school admissions is more based on classroom performance than lab-based disciplines like chem or bio. So I wouldn’t say everything above a 3.5 is equal in engineering. That said, they won’t care about humanities grades.</p>

<p>Core classes may be given more weight than specialized classes–sometimes more advanced classes are easier than the introductory ones. What classes did you take?</p>