If the middle 50% is 3.55-3.97, then I think this must be weighted GPA. No way the top 25% fits into the 0.03 between 3.97 and 4.0. I think they scale can still be 4.0, but you can go above that. Its probably their weighting though.
@PAHoosier I still think the middle 50% is unweighted - since it says 4.0 ? I wouldn’t be surprised if the top 25% are between 3.97 and 4.0 - I know a ton of kids at my daughter’s school who have 4.0. Lots of the kids already accepted are high stats in that range.
We need the experts @jlhpsu and @greenbutton to weigh in! (pun intended!)
@lucyvanpelt Given they accept about 50% of 60k applicants (30k) - that top 25% between 3.97 and 4.0 would be about 7,500 kids? That seems too high, but I don’t know.
@PAHoosier hmmmm. maybe ? Are those all UP accepted kids or are those all University wide kids?
@lucyvanpelt Good question. I don’t know.
@PAHoosier @lucyvanpelt The 50% acceptance rate is only for UP. For example, Penn State Altoona has an 84% acceptance rate. I have always thought that it was UW GPA for their middle 50% because of two things (1) it says out of a 4.0 scale so that would be unweighted and (2) it would be impossible to compare GPA’s across the different weighting scale.
My understanding has always been that they take your UW GPA and then look at your honors and AP classes (rigor), what was available at your school, and how you compare to others in your school and recalculate everyone’s GPA to be comparing apples to apples.
They would have to do it that way because many lower income school district students do not have the same opportunities to take AP or honors classes. Maybe they have a 3.6 UW and no increase when you weight because they didn’t have any honors classes to take. And maybe that 3.6 is in the top 10% of their class. Those are the kinds of things that have to be considered and why I think Penn State looks at the UW GPA. Some schools have their scales out of 6. A 4.0 out of 6.0 is not as impressive as a 4.0 out of a 4.5 scale.
Also on the common data set, they state the average of all freshmen in 2015-2016 admission year had a 3.6 out of a 4.0 scale.
I may be wrong of course, but this is my understanding.
@jlhpsu good thoughts. I think you are on track. I know that admissions counselors “know” specific high schools and their rigor as well as their success rates at PSU. Thanks for your thoughts.