Nifty. MCPS does not grade on a curve. |
46% achieved a weighted GPA of 4.0 or higher. What's ridiculous about that? It's out of 4.8 or 4.9! Really competitive colleges are much more interested in the kids who have a 4.5 or higher. I would also be very curious about the percentage of kids who have a higher than 3.8 unweighted GPA, but we don't have that data. |
| I am new to this (kid is headed to MS next year so we haven't had to deal with this yet). Do schools give kids both the weighted and unweighted GPA? Do they report both to colleges? |
Yes, both appear on the transcript. The transcript is also sent with a class profile, like the one posted for BCC. How colleges choose to use/not use the calculated GPA is of course a different issue, many just recalculate to there own specifications. |
I'm hoping that colleges can see that my kid is in the top 10% in his school, even if his high school doesn't officially rank. |
They'll know everything about how he compares to other students who apply from that high school to their college, which is what's more important to all involved. If nine better students apply, your DC is still the bottom even if he's rightfully in the top 10%. |
My daughter's AP Physics teacher curved every single test. And doesn't the 79.5 and 89.5 = A. Wouldn't that be a curve? Because really that equals 84.5 which is not even a B+ |
| My DS was top 10% at a W with a 4.68 (really difficult APs). But that was before the grading changes where you only needed one A paper quarter to get a semester A. Maybe it hasn’t changed all that much. |
You can tell from Naviance. Go to the HYP acceptance history and look there at weighted gpas. My kid seemed to hit the ceiling with a 4.96 weighted (since a few required classes, including PE, aren’t weighted). |
It doesn’t really matter, since they’ll compare him to any classmates who also apply. |
Definitely has. My rising senior has 6 Bs but yet a WGPA of 4.75. |
This is true. Unfortunately most MCPS HS submit a school profile with GPA bands that do a disservice to top students. For example, at Blair/Poolseville/RM it is not uncommon for the top bands to have 50% of kids in them. |
MCPS does not allow grading on a curve where the scores are forced into a distribution based on the performance of the students themselves. Translating scores using a rubric or set formula that applies to all scores and doesn’t set an arbitrary amount of As, Bs etc is allowed. AP and IB teachers may use a process that mimics how actual AP & IB tests are scored to translate an AP 4/5 or IB 6/7 to an A, AP 3 = B, etc. For some AP courses if the teacher gives a fully AP style test, a common equivalence is 10*sqrt(% points earned). This may be the “curve” your teacher used, but it’s really a scaling, not a force fit curve to actual scores. |
AOs aren’t dumb. They assess straight As in the context of rigor, and can see how the weighted grades compare (since specified in the common app). |
Some MS offer other high school credit courses. Some kids take classes in summer school. At the SMCS magnets, some semester courses are 1 credit and kids can take an 8th period. Dual enrollment classes are 1 credit each. I think max credits is 40. |