Will a C+ in Middle School hurt my College Admission?

In 7th grade, I took Honors Algebra 1 and ended up with a C+ because as a 7th grader, I really didn’t give much of a damn about school and I was an idiot. That grade was the year before the district made a ruling not to factor grades into high school GPA if they were high school courses taken in middle school, which means that C+ got factored in. I am currently a junior with all A’s since freshman year with a good amount of AP and Honors. My school does not do weighted GPA’s so my UW is a 3.8 due to that one C+. Will that C damage my college admissions considering the turnaround in high school? Also, I got an A in Honors Algebra 2 8th grade even though that isn’t factored into my UW if that matters at all.

No college will care about grades received in MS, even if it’s a HS-level class.

Also, I’m shooting for Stanford/MIT/Harvard/UC’s majoring in Computer Science.

It is not even visible unless it shows up on your HS transcript. Even that, it should not be counted in your HS GPA.

Its on the HS transcript and its factored into my UW for some dumb reason in my district.

You can listen to what they said already, or you can keep worrying. Will it stop you from applying?

A few comments:

–So, the C+ will show up on your transcript. Admission officers will also see that it was a 7th grade class. Nobody here can predict how that one grade might impact the opinion of every single admission officer. But common sense dictates that he/she will take into consideration that it was a class taken when you were 12-13.

–It is not worth spending time and energy agonizing over something you can’t change.

– Don’t get stuck on the hyper-competitive colleges with under a 10% admission rate. When the time comes cast a wide net and understand that there are many schools where you can get a great 4 year experience and get where you want to go in life.

If you’re really worried about it, call the admissions offices of some of your target universities and simply ask outright. Then you’ll know. Problem solved. No need for guesses.

UCs recalculate HS GPA for their admission purposes using grades earned in 10th and 11th grade. Middle school course work for math and foreign language may be self-reported on the application, but, except for geometry, it is usually validated by higher level courses in high school anyway (i.e. if you complete precalculus or calculus in high school, then completion of algebra 1 and algebra 2 are assumed).