I’m sure questions like this have been asked before but…
So, I understand the differences between weighted and unweighted GPA and how mine get weighted. But I would like to know which one colleges look at. My unweighted GPA is a 3.6 but my weighted is a 4.3. Because of the .6 difference between my GPAs I obviously want them to only look at my weighted GPA. Will colleges dismiss the large gap due to my high weighted GPA or will the gap negatively affect me?
Millions of times.
It depends. In general, unweighted, because different high schools weight differently. The possible exception is an AO evaluating multiple applicants from the same HS,then s/he would likely compare weighted GPA amongst that select group. Alternatively, a college may reweight everyone’s GPA according to its own parameters. Few colleges, though, state which they consider. File it under “it is what it is.”
Actually D18’s experience was that quite a few schools used the weighted GPA to qualify for admission and merit. These were not the super high-tier schools, but good state flagships like Indiana U, U of Iowa, UIUC (I think), and some privates (UDayton, Butler). Some were not as transparent. I know UMichigan unweights and does their own formulation. You have to investigate each school’s policy if you want a conclusive answer.
A college doesn’t only have the either/or choice between looking at OP’s 3.6 or the 4.3.
Many schools will recalculate using their own formulas. This makes it an apples-to-apples comparison. It will even things out for different policies, such as one school including gym grades and another school not including them, or one school giving more weight to AP or IB classes than honors levels and another school giving them the same weighting.
Thank you guys for the fast and helpful replies !!!
Some colleges which use weighted GPA recalculate with their own weighting method.
Surprisingly, some colleges take weighted GPA from high school transcripts at face value. This can be advantageous to students from South Carolina (see https://ed.sc.gov/scdoe/assets/File/districts-schools/state-accountability/NEWUniformGrading.pdf ) or who are enrolled in high schools with similarly exaggerated weighting.
Top kids at my D’s HS have weighted GPA’s in the mid-5’s. I’m pretty sure AOs are smart enough to not simply conclude they are all the smartest kids in the country - way smarter than all of those 4.7 kids.
Most schools we talked to normalize weighted GPA’s - not only with standardized weighting schemes but also by taking consistent subsets of courses (i.e., your A in Honors Gym probably isn’t going to help…)
I’ve had this question too. Thanks! Following up:
- What is an example of “standard weighing?” My son’s HS includes gym and weights both H and AP classes.
- Anyone have specific schools that take weighted for merit etc?
- There is no universal standard weighting method for calculating high school GPAs. There may be standard weighting methods used within the context of a specific university or university system when it recalculates applicants' high school GPAs.
- You have to look up each school individually to see how it uses high school GPA.
Schools do this differently. There is no consistent procedure. The highly selective schools tend to look at class rank as well as unweighted Gpa that is standardized to their scales. If no class rank is assigned, they have their formulas to come up with one based on school profile