<p>UC seems to calculate a capped weighted GPA that only considers 8 semester of Honors/AP classes. They also say that they only rely on 10-12 GPA. Some questions ... please kindly share your knowledge! This may be very useful to lots of present/future readers of CC.</p>
<p>1)
(a) Irrespective of what they (UC) say, is UC likely to be also significantly influenced by the uncapped weighted GPA?<br>
(b) If student A has higher uncapped GPA then student B, but they both have SAME CAPPED GPA, will they both get the same weight in the admission cycle?
(c) Even if they say (officially) that both students get the same weightage, is there any official policy by which they make sure that the hundreds of application readers are respecting this policy?</p>
<p>2)<br>
(a) Are they also influenced by 9-12 GPA even though they say that they do not consider it in their decision?<br>
(b) How can they influence an application reader to be not biased by the 9-12 GPA? That is because, all of the 9-12 GPA information is visible on the UC application. It is also written on the top of the student's high school transcript?</p>
<p>Decision process is very subjective. Hence, any clarification will be very appreciated! </p>
<p>Capped is ONLY used to determine admissions eligibility. The UC reader will see all three GPAs: unweighted, weighted-capped, and weighted-uncapped.</p>
<p>1 a-c: UC also looks a course rigor as a decision criteria, so uncapped does count.</p>
<p>2) UC will only see senior grades in rare instances. But Grade 12 course rigor is a factor. </p>
<p>Nearly every college that says that don’t use/consider Frosh grades are lying. Period. (Private schools that claim they don’t care about Frosh grades DO care about class rank, and that includes Frosh grades…)</p>
<p>But for UC it is a minor, minor consideration, if any at all. Mostly, its a matter to confirm that the student has completed the prereqs and to see if there is an upward/downward grade trend.</p>
<p>Unweighted, weighted-capped, and weighted-uncapped GPAs are visible to admissions readers, as are all courses and grades. It is likely that they all of some influence, though since the process is holistic (each admissions reader assigns a score to each application; each application is read by two admissions readers, with a senior admissions reader reading for a tie-breaker if they assign very different scores), there is not a set formula as to how each influences the admissions scoring.</p>
<p>Note that transcripts are only used when an admitted student matriculates to verify previously self-reported courses and grades and check that senior year was completed with good enough grades. So what is written on the transcript other than courses and grades which the applicant self-reports into the application does not matter in the admissions process.</p>
<p>Otherwise, why define something called UC GPA if they are NOT planing to make it the dominant GPA in the evaluation process (of course, with a minor weight given to the other variants of GPA such as weighted uncapped GPA) … I understand the performance in local context, and what the school has to offer, and how many AP/honors other kids are taking, etc. but still should not they have some standard metric for computing and comparing GPA? </p>
<ol>
<li><p>14 factors that UC looks at for the admission decision:
<a href=“http://admission.universityofcalifornia.edu/freshman/how-applications-reviewed/”>http://admission.universityofcalifornia.edu/freshman/how-applications-reviewed/</a>
Perhaps I am wondering if they have some formula where the 14 factors are given individual grades and then some type of composite score obtained? Unless one category has some exceptional value … This will make it so logical to compare all of the 100K applications. (And, after this formula is computed then one can look for any subjective aspect that should be given a significant/defining role …). Does any one know?</p></li>
<li><p>At our child’s school they do not compute rank - he did get a letter giving some mumbo-jumbo about him being eligible for ELC but we never heard after that. He does has a 4.0 UW GPA in 10-11-12. But his 9th GPA was not the best (had 3B and 3A). Will the freshman grade still have a lot of weight in deciding his application?</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Sorry for all the rambling. Hope no one minds :-)</p>
<p>The UC weighted and capped GPA is the primary GPA for various things like baseline eligibility and eligibility in local context. Also, nowhere is it stated which of the GPAs is considered more important overall by admissions readers.</p>
<p>ELC means that if none of his applied-to UCs admits him, then a UC with space available will admit him (in practice, this means Merced).</p>
<p>I would not worry about his GPA if he has a 4.0 unweighted GPA in 10th-on in rigorous course choices. The 9th grade courses and grades will be visible, but lower grades in 9th grade are typically less important, since he has an upward trend with a 4.0 unweighted GPA starting in 10th grade.</p>
<p>While each UC is administered separately (and sometimes differently) this is a good overview of
the intentions of the UC system with their in-state admissions.</p>
<p>Capped GAP is ONLY used to determine admissions eligibility.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Neither do most California high schools</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>No.</p>
<p>btw: just to confuse you even more, UC does calculate its own rank of the students from your school who apply to UC, and that ‘rank’ is evident in the UC GPA calculations.</p>
<p>The Hout Report referenced in #5 is a much more comprehensive and detailed look at the admissions reading process than the NYT article referenced in #6.</p>
<p>“1. But then why does the UC say that they will only count 8 semester of Honors/AP courses for the GPA…”</p>
<p>Because the UCs are trying to do a difficult balancing act between including all AP courses available from some of the top public schools in the country that are in CA and inner city or rural CA public HS that may have little to no AP offerings when evaluating applicants.</p>
<p>The 8-semester cap on honors points probably exists to retain some incentive for UC-hopeful students to take honors (including AP) courses, while applying the finding about the better predictiveness of unweighted GPA (at the most selective UCs, almost all frosh applicants have 8 or more semesters’ worth of honors courses, and the average number of semesters of honors courses is greater than 8 even at the least selective UCs).</p>
<p>@ucbalumnus, his course load is not most rigorous though the counselor claims that it is so. (It is a reasonably high ranked school). My child has only taken 2 honors in freshman (made B in them); then 2 Honors + 1 AP in Sophomore, 2 Honors + 2 AP in Junior, One college course in summer after 11th. Except freshman grades he has A in all of the courses and 5 in all of the three AP exams. Finally, out of these 6 honors classes, UC is counting only one of them as an honors class :-(. So, basically, for the current UC GPA he only has 3 AP, 1 college course, and 1 honors. Nothing outstanding.</p>
<p>His 12th course load is 3 AP (Calculus BC, Physics-C, and Environmental Science) + 2 college courses planned in Winter and Spring 2015. </p>
<p>Is it too low for UC Berkeley? I know I should be asking this question in Chance Thread (VERY SORRY) but I just wanted to complete the ongoing discussion. I am worried because Naviance shows that for his school, the kids accepted at UC Berkeley have an average of 4.5 GPA for 9-12 (they do not show 10-12 GPA) !!! But his GPA is only 4.35 (9-12).</p>
<p>FYI, He has 2330 SAT, and SAT-subject of 800 MATH-2, 800 USH, 780 Physics. Very good academic ECs, 2 sports (Varsity and Jr. Varsity), and 210 hours of community service, Will these be enough to overcome the low rigor of courses and lower UC GPA? Please reply! </p>
<p>Anyone else reading this: please let us know your valuable opinion. Sorry for asking this question here.</p>
<p>Op,
Don’t forget to check if the classes are really considered “honors” based on your kid’s classes and school on this UC website to calculate the W GPA:
<a href=“A-G Policy Resource Guide”>A-G Policy Resource Guide;
<p>Because “honors” frosh classes are usually not really considered honors, and only a few soph classes are considered honors/AP (I think that it’s limited to 2 semesters for 10th grade).</p>
<p>Edited to add: Oops, I just read your post and seems like you have been checking which are really considered “honors.” </p>
<p>The GPA on your HS Naviance is what the GPA shows on his HS transcript (9-12 W and UW no cap) and has no correlation to what is self reported to the UCs. His Naviance scores are lower than the accepted students from his HS. Do they have any other students who were accepted with his same GPA? Can you compare his UW GPA 9-12 with the other kids? As for his SATs, ECs etcs, rest assured, the other kids with the 4.5 GPAs will usually have these as well. All he can do is apply and find out what happens.</p>
<p>Yes, I am indeed aware of the fact that UC is not counting all of his honors courses as honors for UC GPA purpose. For him, the UC is presently only counting 1 course as honors course (Trigonometry Honors). So, the GPA that I reported above is considering all of this already.</p>
<p>Finally, I am not sure why, but the Naviance is showing only the weighted GPA. And, for that, my son is way below the average accepted value for his school. His 9-12 is 4.35 and the Naviance says that average accept for his school is 4.5 for UCB. Now, his 10-12 is 4.57 (W); so, we do not know how to infer this statistic. </p>
<p>PS: SAT of 2330 (one sitting) is above his school average. </p>
<p>Yes, but the “average” kid at his HS is not applying to Cal.
Maybe his HS GC can show him the UW GPA stats from Naviance. You can’t compare 10-12 to 9-12.
I’m not sure how to look up the stats from Naviance because our HS disables the info so I don’t know what it looks like. </p>
<p>Lastly, does it really matter what his “chance” is? After he applies, he will get his answer soon enough. </p>
<p>Thanks @ucbalmnus. You have been a source of great amount of very useful links. The last link you sent has many people at GPA of 4.68 or even 4.9 … And, they got denied from UCB, even with SAT score of 2350. Terrifying!</p>
<p>This is I suppose what I have been trying to understand. His Naviance shows that the average student at his school who was accepted at UC Berkeley had a weighted GPA of 4.5 (I believe this is non-UC weighted GPA). By everything I have read, my fear is that the UCB evaluates you in the context of where you have come from. And, in his school, that is the type of GPA which is accepted at UCB. (This high school is a very well ranked CA school.)</p>
<p>So, my question is: does UCB look at the past record of what weighted GPA have been accepted from a particular school? And then judge you accordingly? If so, he has very less chances even with SAT of 2330 and 4.57 Weighted GPA. </p>
<p>Due to his family issues, he will need to remain in the SF area so Berkeley is our only reasonable choice. Hence I am fighting so hard to understand every tiny bit of information.</p>
<p>Sorry for dragging this on. I must be the biggest spammer in history
Please feel free to ignore this post but of course, if you have anything else to add, then please please do so.</p>
<p>Godparent- relax. There is absolutely nothing you can do now about his GPA. Obsessing about it isn’t going to magically make the numbers go up. You can’t change the high school; you can’t change the SAT’s.</p>
<p>Apply and see what happens. And if Berkeley doesn’t work out… what is plan B?</p>
