The Value of Upward Trends

Applying to College
21

<p>I've heard that if your GPA is about a 3.5 for freshman and part of sophomore year and you boost it and get pretty much straight As for the rest of your high school career, you will be considered on the same level as students who maintained a GPA of about a 3.85-3.9 on a 4.0 scale. A kid from my school who had a 3.5 in mid-level classes in my school in freshman year and then got about a 3.9 from second semester of soph yr on got into UPenn over kids who had similar SATs and ECs with straight 3.8-3.85 GPAs.</p>

<p>It's really circumstantial. Don't listen to people who say that kids with 4.0s in freshman year have a really big advantage, because it's not true. In all likelihood, the people who are saying that are those same kids who had the 4.0 in freshman year and then watched sadly as other kids turned on the heat later. Don't worry.</p>

22

<p>An upwards trend, compared to a downwards, is far better. However, I think that colleges would rather see people who did well before and still do well. In the eyes of an admission officer, there's just less reason to doubt an individual with consistently good grades. </p>

<p>It's the same catch as with AP classes. What's better? An A in an honors course or a B in an AP course? Well...really it's the A in an AP course.</p>