Where are your kids Getting in?

[Anonymous]

DD is graduating from Emory this year. I encourage y'all to pick a smallish school. My DD could not step out of her declared major and take a business course or a computer course because they were being 'reserved' for those in that major. Very inflexible due to size

I'm guessing you meant -- DO NOT -- pick a smallish school. I think you had a typo. If so, I agree. I loved a large state school where I could try out different courses/different majors. Still graduated on time, pretty much .. w/addition of 1 summer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That’s just recalculating. It is not the same thing as using the high school’s weighting.

Exactly. They don’t use the high school weighting. They use their own.

Well I have yet to see any student under a 4.0 get into UMCP this year on college confidential unless their weighted was above 4.0. I highly doubt the kids admitted here are smarter than these top schools with lower GPA averages. Something doesn’t add up here.

Looking at average GPA here:

UMCP 4.3

Penn 3.9
Brown 4.0
UC Berkeley 3.8
Harvard 4.1
UMich 3.8
MIT 4.1
Wisc 3.8
Notre Dame 4.0
BU 3.6
Georgetown 4.0
USC 3.7
Williams 4.0
UVA 4.1

If you’re using College Confidential as your data source you’re doing it wrong.

This data may come from Common Data Sets, though, which comes directly from the colleges. What I've seen is publics like UNC Chapel Hill may have higher GPAs than any top private. (UNC-CH also has higher GPAs than UVA and W&M, BTW.) This may just mean those states have grade inflation at the high school level.

Colleges are permitted to submit GPA data in their common data set as they see fit. Some reports contain unweighted, while others have weighted, recalculated, or no GPA data at all. The UMCP average GPA is obviously weighted and is pretty worthless considering all of the MCPS kids with ridiculously inflated GPAs in the mix.

Oh good lord, why do people have such a hard time understanding this? If the colleges weren't recalculating GPAs to ensure they're comparing apples to apples - which they all do - then a school district should just change its grading system to a 6-point scale. Most kids would have a 5.0 or higher and could get in anywhere they applied!

I don't think you understand. You can recalculate weight. So yes, MCPS gives a whole point just for honors classes and a whole point for AP's. They can recalculate that. What they can not recalculate are the fact that everyone but remedial kids in MCPS take honors and AP's and that is not the same in other districts or privates. And most importantly, they can not recalculate the games given the kids. MCPS does not post number grades, just letter grades. They have a system that no matter that an A+B will ALWAYS (ALWAYS!!) equal an A. They also no longer make kids take final exams. They also curve grades, they allow retakes of tests and don't combine the grades, just take the highest one. They give participation points as extra credit as well. These are things that UMCP can not recalculate because they do not know.

If Sally gets a 79.5 and an 89.5 and gets an A for her final grade. Not a B, not even an A-. An A. How do you differentiate another kid in the same school that got a 95 and a 98 for final grades, which also equals an A? They look EXACTLY the same on paper. There is no way to differentiate kids in MCPS. And then when you have other counties and private school kids getting lower GPA's, they are in the first cuts. It isn't like UMCP decides to take a few from every school. That isn't how it works. And if you think UMCP actually doesn't have 1 or even 2 rounds of non-holistic cuts to lower the number of apps before looking at anything else, I have a bridge to sell ya. They received over 40K applications this year. You think they did the "26 step process" on all of them? Yeah right. GPA is the first thing state schools look at. Always have and always will.

This is exactly right about MCPS, but my son (in state), who goes to private high school and had a 4.12 GPA (low by MCPS standards) got into UMCP and was Banneker Key scholar. A friend of his at a top MCPS high school with a 4.5 GPA and similar test scores got admitted to honors college but did not get Banneker Key. So they must look at other things beyond the test scores and GPA data.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That’s just recalculating. It is not the same thing as using the high school’s weighting.

Exactly. They don’t use the high school weighting. They use their own.

Well I have yet to see any student under a 4.0 get into UMCP this year on college confidential unless their weighted was above 4.0. I highly doubt the kids admitted here are smarter than these top schools with lower GPA averages. Something doesn’t add up here.

Looking at average GPA here:

UMCP 4.3

Penn 3.9
Brown 4.0
UC Berkeley 3.8
Harvard 4.1
UMich 3.8
MIT 4.1
Wisc 3.8
Notre Dame 4.0
BU 3.6
Georgetown 4.0
USC 3.7
Williams 4.0
UVA 4.1

If you’re using College Confidential as your data source you’re doing it wrong.

This data may come from Common Data Sets, though, which comes directly from the colleges. What I've seen is publics like UNC Chapel Hill may have higher GPAs than any top private. (UNC-CH also has higher GPAs than UVA and W&M, BTW.) This may just mean those states have grade inflation at the high school level.

Colleges are permitted to submit GPA data in their common data set as they see fit. Some reports contain unweighted, while others have weighted, recalculated, or no GPA data at all. The UMCP average GPA is obviously weighted and is pretty worthless considering all of the MCPS kids with ridiculously inflated GPAs in the mix.

Oh good lord, why do people have such a hard time understanding this? If the colleges weren't recalculating GPAs to ensure they're comparing apples to apples - which they all do - then a school district should just change its grading system to a 6-point scale. Most kids would have a 5.0 or higher and could get in anywhere they applied!

I don't think you understand. You can recalculate weight. So yes, MCPS gives a whole point just for honors classes and a whole point for AP's. They can recalculate that. What they can not recalculate are the fact that everyone but remedial kids in MCPS take honors and AP's and that is not the same in other districts or privates. And most importantly, they can not recalculate the games given the kids. MCPS does not post number grades, just letter grades. They have a system that no matter that an A+B will ALWAYS (ALWAYS!!) equal an A. They also no longer make kids take final exams. They also curve grades, they allow retakes of tests and don't combine the grades, just take the highest one. They give participation points as extra credit as well. These are things that UMCP can not recalculate because they do not know.

If Sally gets a 79.5 and an 89.5 and gets an A for her final grade. Not a B, not even an A-. An A. How do you differentiate another kid in the same school that got a 95 and a 98 for final grades, which also equals an A? They look EXACTLY the same on paper. There is no way to differentiate kids in MCPS. And then when you have other counties and private school kids getting lower GPA's, they are in the first cuts. It isn't like UMCP decides to take a few from every school. That isn't how it works. And if you think UMCP actually doesn't have 1 or even 2 rounds of non-holistic cuts to lower the number of apps before looking at anything else, I have a bridge to sell ya. They received over 40K applications this year. You think they did the "26 step process" on all of them? Yeah right. GPA is the first thing state schools look at. Always have and always will.

This is exactly right about MCPS, but my son (in state), who goes to private high school and had a 4.12 GPA (low by MCPS standards) got into UMCP and was Banneker Key scholar. A friend of his at a top MCPS high school with a 4.5 GPA and similar test scores got admitted to honors college but did not get Banneker Key. So they must look at other things beyond the test scores and GPA data.

Last, you are a snore. You are one person repeating the same stats about one kid in private, which ironically has weighted grades. There is no point

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:GPA 4.3 from FCPS (weighted, rigorous courseload), SAT 1420, White female, no particular hooks
In: UVA (in state), W&M (likely postcard), VT, UMd-CP (oos), Pitt

Why are all these schools so close?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:GPA 4.3 from FCPS (weighted, rigorous courseload), SAT 1420, White female, no particular hooks
In: UVA (in state), W&M (likely postcard), VT, UMd-CP (oos), Pitt

Why are all these schools so close?

we have yet heard from the others out of state.

[Anonymous]

Pretty similar here:

GPA 4.2 from FCPS (weighted), state 1530, white male, no hooks. Engineering.

In UVA, VTech, W&M (postcard), Northeastern, Rose-Hulman.

Rejected: MIT, Georgia Tech, CalTech, Harvey Mudd.

Still waiting to hear: UC Berkeley, Carnegie Mellon.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That’s just recalculating. It is not the same thing as using the high school’s weighting.

Exactly. They don’t use the high school weighting. They use their own.

Well I have yet to see any student under a 4.0 get into UMCP this year on college confidential unless their weighted was above 4.0. I highly doubt the kids admitted here are smarter than these top schools with lower GPA averages. Something doesn’t add up here.

Looking at average GPA here:

UMCP 4.3

Penn 3.9
Brown 4.0
UC Berkeley 3.8
Harvard 4.1
UMich 3.8
MIT 4.1
Wisc 3.8
Notre Dame 4.0
BU 3.6
Georgetown 4.0
USC 3.7
Williams 4.0
UVA 4.1

If you’re using College Confidential as your data source you’re doing it wrong.

This data may come from Common Data Sets, though, which comes directly from the colleges. What I've seen is publics like UNC Chapel Hill may have higher GPAs than any top private. (UNC-CH also has higher GPAs than UVA and W&M, BTW.) This may just mean those states have grade inflation at the high school level.

Colleges are permitted to submit GPA data in their common data set as they see fit. Some reports contain unweighted, while others have weighted, recalculated, or no GPA data at all. The UMCP average GPA is obviously weighted and is pretty worthless considering all of the MCPS kids with ridiculously inflated GPAs in the mix.

Oh good lord, why do people have such a hard time understanding this? If the colleges weren't recalculating GPAs to ensure they're comparing apples to apples - which they all do - then a school district should just change its grading system to a 6-point scale. Most kids would have a 5.0 or higher and could get in anywhere they applied!

I don't think you understand. You can recalculate weight. So yes, MCPS gives a whole point just for honors classes and a whole point for AP's. They can recalculate that. What they can not recalculate are the fact that everyone but remedial kids in MCPS take honors and AP's and that is not the same in other districts or privates. And most importantly, they can not recalculate the games given the kids. MCPS does not post number grades, just letter grades. They have a system that no matter that an A+B will ALWAYS (ALWAYS!!) equal an A. They also no longer make kids take final exams. They also curve grades, they allow retakes of tests and don't combine the grades, just take the highest one. They give participation points as extra credit as well. These are things that UMCP can not recalculate because they do not know.

If Sally gets a 79.5 and an 89.5 and gets an A for her final grade. Not a B, not even an A-. An A. How do you differentiate another kid in the same school that got a 95 and a 98 for final grades, which also equals an A? They look EXACTLY the same on paper. There is no way to differentiate kids in MCPS. And then when you have other counties and private school kids getting lower GPA's, they are in the first cuts. It isn't like UMCP decides to take a few from every school. That isn't how it works. And if you think UMCP actually doesn't have 1 or even 2 rounds of non-holistic cuts to lower the number of apps before looking at anything else, I have a bridge to sell ya. They received over 40K applications this year. You think they did the "26 step process" on all of them? Yeah right. GPA is the first thing state schools look at. Always have and always will.

This is exactly right about MCPS, but my son (in state), who goes to private high school and had a 4.12 GPA (low by MCPS standards) got into UMCP and was Banneker Key scholar. A friend of his at a top MCPS high school with a 4.5 GPA and similar test scores got admitted to honors college but did not get Banneker Key. So they must look at other things beyond the test scores and GPA data.

Last, you are a snore. You are one person repeating the same stats about one kid in private, which ironically has weighted grades. There is no point

You have options to act on: 1. Don't apply to UMCP, 2. Talk to your school district and get them to change the grading system, 3. Move your kid to MCPS to take advantage of all the things you mentioned MCPS does. Options 1 and 3 are totally in your control while option 2 depends on your power of persuasion. Good luck.

[Anonymous]

" re: uva rejection of high stats kid.
decades ago they rejected me, and Duke accepted me. We all heard they did not want Maryland kids.

Similar story here. Waitlisted at UVA, admitted to Harvard. No joke. Applying from MA though."

Could be yield protection or part of your applications were lost in the mail.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That’s just recalculating. It is not the same thing as using the high school’s weighting.

Exactly. They don’t use the high school weighting. They use their own.

Well I have yet to see any student under a 4.0 get into UMCP this year on college confidential unless their weighted was above 4.0. I highly doubt the kids admitted here are smarter than these top schools with lower GPA averages. Something doesn’t add up here.

Looking at average GPA here:

UMCP 4.3

Penn 3.9
Brown 4.0
UC Berkeley 3.8
Harvard 4.1
UMich 3.8
MIT 4.1
Wisc 3.8
Notre Dame 4.0
BU 3.6
Georgetown 4.0
USC 3.7
Williams 4.0
UVA 4.1

If you’re using College Confidential as your data source you’re doing it wrong.

This data may come from Common Data Sets, though, which comes directly from the colleges. What I've seen is publics like UNC Chapel Hill may have higher GPAs than any top private. (UNC-CH also has higher GPAs than UVA and W&M, BTW.) This may just mean those states have grade inflation at the high school level.

Colleges are permitted to submit GPA data in their common data set as they see fit. Some reports contain unweighted, while others have weighted, recalculated, or no GPA data at all. The UMCP average GPA is obviously weighted and is pretty worthless considering all of the MCPS kids with ridiculously inflated GPAs in the mix.

Oh good lord, why do people have such a hard time understanding this? If the colleges weren't recalculating GPAs to ensure they're comparing apples to apples - which they all do - then a school district should just change its grading system to a 6-point scale. Most kids would have a 5.0 or higher and could get in anywhere they applied!

I don't think you understand. You can recalculate weight. So yes, MCPS gives a whole point just for honors classes and a whole point for AP's. They can recalculate that. What they can not recalculate are the fact that everyone but remedial kids in MCPS take honors and AP's and that is not the same in other districts or privates. And most importantly, they can not recalculate the games given the kids. MCPS does not post number grades, just letter grades. They have a system that no matter that an A+B will ALWAYS (ALWAYS!!) equal an A. They also no longer make kids take final exams. They also curve grades, they allow retakes of tests and don't combine the grades, just take the highest one. They give participation points as extra credit as well. These are things that UMCP can not recalculate because they do not know.

If Sally gets a 79.5 and an 89.5 and gets an A for her final grade. Not a B, not even an A-. An A. How do you differentiate another kid in the same school that got a 95 and a 98 for final grades, which also equals an A? They look EXACTLY the same on paper. There is no way to differentiate kids in MCPS. And then when you have other counties and private school kids getting lower GPA's, they are in the first cuts. It isn't like UMCP decides to take a few from every school. That isn't how it works. And if you think UMCP actually doesn't have 1 or even 2 rounds of non-holistic cuts to lower the number of apps before looking at anything else, I have a bridge to sell ya. They received over 40K applications this year. You think they did the "26 step process" on all of them? Yeah right. GPA is the first thing state schools look at. Always have and always will.

This is exactly right about MCPS, but my son (in state), who goes to private high school and had a 4.12 GPA (low by MCPS standards) got into UMCP and was Banneker Key scholar. A friend of his at a top MCPS high school with a 4.5 GPA and similar test scores got admitted to honors college but did not get Banneker Key. So they must look at other things beyond the test scores and GPA data.

Last, you are a snore. You are one person repeating the same stats about one kid in private, which ironically has weighted grades. There is no point

Yes, he has weighted grades, but not weighted at the same inflated level as MCPS. Many are claiming that UMCP is not looking beyond test scores and GPA, and that simply is not true based on the fact that my kid with the 4.12 got a scholarship, but the kid with the 4.5 did not. Perhaps they are reweighing the GPA using their own system OR considering other things in the application such as essays, ECs, etc. I don't understand why you have such a snarky tone.

[Anonymous]

GPA 4.71
SAT/ACT 1590/36
Acceptances
Texas A&M
UMCP
ND
YALE

Waiting
Harvard
Princeton
Brown
Duke
Vandi

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:GPA 4.3 from FCPS (weighted, rigorous courseload), SAT 1420, White female, no particular hooks
In: UVA (in state), W&M (likely postcard), VT, UMd-CP (oos), Pitt

Why are all these schools so close?

because people in VA think there is VA and then the world. narrow

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:GPA 4.71
SAT/ACT 1590/36
Acceptances
Texas A&M
UMCP
ND
YALE

Waiting
Harvard
Princeton
Brown
Duke
Vandi

Nice! Any outstandingly extracurriculars?

[Anonymous]

Guys. Keep this going for those of us with juniors

[Anonymous]

I find that very disappointing about Haverford, PP. If your high-stats kid from DC proper didn't get in-- sheesh.

[Anonymous]

Updating for my DC - 4.7 weighted GPA, 1560 SAT.

In at UMD-CP Honors College, Pitt, U Rochester, UVA, Miami-Ohio, WashU, Case Western Reserve.