Lets say my unweighted GPA was a 98 and my weighted was a 102. Would colleges look more at my weighted 102 GPA, or my unweighted 98 GPA?
Also, would colleges view a huge difference between lets say a 98.7 and a 98 unweighted GPA? Finally would they view a huge difference between a 102.2 and 101.7 weighted GPA?
They look at both. Keep in mind though, GPAs are just simple representations of your transcript, which is what they really care about. So what classes you took, and the grades you got in them are what matters most.
As for those last two questions, I doubt any college would see a “huge” difference in those GPAs. The difference is minor really.
Different schools weight differently so really, schools have to look at your unweighted, and re-weight them so that everything is fair. At my kids’ school, APs got a rather low weighting compared to what I have heard at other places (only a 6% bump). So a 90 becomes a 95.6. Some places I hear it’s a full letter grade.
They will look at the unweighted GPA since weighted GPA’s differ by school. Obviously colleges will take into consideration that you have the weighted GPA, but colleges understand that weighted GPA’s are very subjective.
@gdlt234 just out of curiosity how many points would you consider to be a notable difference, more notable than really minor?
@Defuze Well that’s subjective, but the difference between say an 88 and a 92 is definitely notable.
@gdlt234 how about between a 98 and 96?
What if my school gives only the weighted GPA? Will colleges just look at that?
@Defuze Well those are both A level work, so the difference starts to become negligible. There’s a difference, but it’s not super large. It might really only make the difference if you’re on the verge of being accepted or rejected. I wouldn’t count on it to decide your acceptance though.
HSs use a wide variety of weighting rubrics so colleges don’t generally look at WGPA. It’s more fair to look at UWGPA in conjunction with class rigor. If an UWGPA is not shown they may look at the grades themselves with the rigor.
@Defuze the difference between say a 98 and a 96 might impact your class rank which is the context they will consider when they look at your grades. If your ranks stays the same despite the difference it probably wouldn’t matter as much as if the difference moved you back several spots (so also depends what your school will report for rank). Top schools, I believe, generally recalculate gpa based on your transcript which will most closely resemble your unweighted gpa.
The first thing every college I visited said they look at is the curricular rigor. Many secondary schools do not weight, and the colleges often have their own methodology for weighting. The most selective want to see both. For the next tier, I have no doubt that they will prefer a B+ in an AP or IB class over an A- in a standard class. They definitely will prefer an unweighted 90 on a transcript with intensive academic courses over a 99 filled with Gym and “lightweight” classes.
Absolutely not.
Thanks Brown, any other opinions on… would colleges view a huge difference between lets say a 98.7 and a 98 unweighted GPA? Finally would they view a huge difference between a 102.2 and 101.7 weighted GPA
Generally the admissions committee tries to normalize the weighted GPAs so they can compare apples to apples. The numbers here are close enough to where it won’t make a big deal - it’d be more productive to work on an awesome essay.
@defuze, those differences are minuscule why would they possibly view 0.7 or 0.5 out of 100(+) as a huge difference? We’re talking about less than a percent here.