Why Your Recalculated GPA Is Important to Know

Throughout high school, everyone stresses your grade point average (GPA) as a large part of your college admissions process. While this is absolutely true, many students and parents do not realize not all grades are created equal. Colleges and universities look at your grade point average differently than your high school. In this post, I want to demystify some of the myths (if you even knew there were any!) about a student’s GPA and how colleges use them.

Words to know for this post:

Unweighted- this simply means the student does not get any extra points for more rigorous courses like honors, dual enrollment, Advanced Placement, and so forth. An A in PE would be the same as AP Human Geography.

Weighted- this GPA takes into account a student’s rigor. More points are awarded for more rigorous courses. The more rigor, the more points. Student class rankings are often determined off of this.

Academic Core- These include all courses taken in English, Social Studies, Mathematics, Sciences, and Foreign Language.

Academic Electives- This is sort of a grey area in college admissions. These are courses that students elected to take but are more academic; examples would be Psychology, Human Geography, Speech. Typically these courses are included in the recalculation.

Electives- Electives are the courses that do not fall in the core. These include classes like physical education, computer, business, arts, study hall, and so forth.

What to Know:

1.       Not all high schools use the same system! Some high schools use weighted or unweighted, some do not even use the traditional 4.0 scale. This is why many schools will recalculate all GPAs based on the scale they want.

2.       Colleges look at and use courses differently in recalculating the GPA.

a.       Some colleges will look at ALL course work taken. This includes not only academic core but all electives. Your student may have got an A in AP English, but why did they fail PE?!? That shows poorly in maintaining your responsibilities.  Typically what is on your transcript is what they use. **Check what your high school does!! Do they provide the unweighted and/or the weighted?**

b.      Some colleges look only at the academic core.

c.       Some colleges look academic core and academic electives.

3.       Most colleges use the weighted GPA as the best indicator for college success. Why? Well, the more rigorous courses you took in high school and did well in is a good indicator to how you will do in college. One director of admissions said this, “We put more weight on gpa than standardized tests (ACT/ SAT) because we would rather have four years of grit than one day of good test taking”.

“Colleges and universities look at your grade point average differently than your high school.”

4.       Colleges also look at what opportunities were afforded to you. Typically your school counselor has sent in a school profile that details what advanced courses they give, average test scores and school programming. This is important for those in small schools that might not have a lot of specialized classes, they often compare you to your fellow peers. However, while you may attend one high school, a lot of time there are multiple opportunities to take more advanced courses online or do Dual Enrollment.

Recalculating GPAs

So how does it work… let’s take a look at some hypothetical students and see how they would fair in college admissions. In these examples I have used what the Florida State University System has stated they use for weighting (+1.0 for all Dual Enrollment, AP, IB, AICE & AVID credits, and +0.5 for honors).

Student #1

Class	Grade	Unweighted	Weighted	Recalculated	College Credits*
AP English	B	3.0	4.0	4.0	3.0
AP Physics	B	3.0	4.0	4.0	3.0
Psychology	A	4.0	4.0	4.0	0
Weight Lifiting	A	4.0	4.0	n/a	0
Pottery	A	4.0	4.0	n/a	0
Honors Probability & Statistics	C	2.0	2.5	2.5	0
Average		3.3	3.75	3.625	6.0

* Possible college credits depending on score on AP test and college accepting credits.

So what you see here is that this student has taken on some AP courses and it helps in their weighted gpa. While they received a B in those classes, the extra 1.0 added to their recalculated gpa by the university makes it equal to a regular course at an A. What you can also see is that taking out the electives of weight lifting and pottery, reduced their overall recalculated gpa because those A’s do not count.

Student #2

Class	Grade	Unweighted	Weighted	Recalculated	College Credits
English	B	3.0	3.0	3.0	0
Pre-Calculus	B	3.0	3.0	3.0	0
Psychology	A	4.0	4.0	4.0	0
Weight Lifting	A	4.0	4.0	n/a	0
Pottery	A	4.0	4.0	n/a	0
Economics	C	2.0	2.0	2.0	0
Average		3.3	3.3	3.0	0

While this student is similar and still taking all the requirements for high school graduation, by not taking on more rigorous courses and not as many core classes, their gpa actually went down once you take out the electives. They become a less competitive student than Student #1.

Student #3

Class	Grade	Unweighted	Weighted	Recalculated	College Credits
Composition	B	3.0	4.0	4.0	3.0
Intro to Psych	B	3.0	4.0	4.0	3.0
Intro to Biology	A	4.0	5.0	4.0	4.0
Statistics	A	4.0	5.0	5.0	3.0
Intro to Philosophy	A	4.0	5.0	5.0	3.0
		3.6	4.6	4.6	16

I had to add this in. As disclosure, I work at a collegiate high school where our students earn college credit on a state college campus. I have a lot of parents looking at our program that ask about the difference between college-level programs like AP, IB, AICE, and AVID. While our students typically take less courses, they often take more core classes. Also, Dual Enrollment courses have an added weight, exponentially increasing their recalculated GPA- thus becoming more competitive for admissions.

If your student still has schedule opportunities (especially 10th & 11th graders), mixing and matching courses to maximize a student’s recalculated GPA could mean a huge difference in their admissions. It is best to plan early, talk with your school counselor to see what programs are available (do your research!!), and suggest to your student to continue taking on more core and rigorous courses all the way until the end of high school!

**As a note, GPA for college admission usually goes from 9th-11th grade. However, you do have to put in what courses the student will be taking their senior year. Admissions do look for a continuation or increase of rigor… it is definitely not a time to get “senioritis” or to slack off in the core area.

As a reminder, GPA is only ONE factor colleges look at when deciding if students would be successful at their college. Other factors include ACT/ SAT scores, extra-curriculars, and personal story. But if you plan well by taking more core classes and more rigorous courses your student will be at an advantage going into the admission cycle.