So many unweighted 4.0s.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's crazy to me how many kids there are on here with unweighted 4.0s. I feel like even last year it was rare. This year 10 replies out of 15 each time the results from another school come up are ALL unweighted 4.0s.
Many are MCPS--it makes sense with their wacky grading scale: you can get 69.5 (C) quarter 1, 79.5 (B) quarter 2, 79.5 (quarter 3) and 89.5 (quarter 4) and end up with an A or 4.0 for the year for the class.
THAT IS INSANE. Many districts are similar. You are a hair what is traditionally failing for a solid quarter (a 69.5) and you still get an A for the year.
And they don't have A minus grades. So an A is a 4.0

Plus retakes (in many classes), no penalty for late work, etc.

Does anyone who does the work, not end up with a 4.0? It really seems like you have to try to do poorly.

Has a 4.0 ceased (even unweighted) ceased to mean ANYTHING? It seems like this is really hurting the kids who are actually super smart. They are lost in the shuffle of so many kids getting "perfect" grades
for doing very average work.

How is that possible? MCPS is based on semesters, not the year. So I am not sure how anything averages to an "A" for the year. In the scenario you gave, this student would not have an unweighted GPA of 4.0.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree MCPS is a whacko but it’s not quite as bad as you are saying. You get an official grade per semester not year, so the lowest you could get for an A is 79.5 one quarter then 89.5 the second quarter - a B and an A averaging to an A.

How does that average to an A? At the very least an A should be 90%. Those two numbers do not average 90%. It’s mid-B (84.5%) Only in crazy DMV land is 84.5% an A!

I'm so jealous. We're in CT (Fairfield County) and an A is a 93. An A-minus is 90-92.

Also, throughout my kid's 2.5 years of high school, no teacher has ever offered retakes. You get what you get.

Same for DS (NY). Grading scale was the same as college (93 A) Syllabus, rubric, weighting for every class. APs only .50 bump. I always laugh when the private vs public discussions accuse public’s of grade inflation. Grade inflation happens at both private and public, but not the majority. In NY, kids take regents exams and AP exams in the same 2 weeks. If a kid desires an advanced honors regents diploma it would require 8 exams including world language vs advanced regents with designation. 4.0 unweighted was impossible for many smart kids in his school. Now a rising junior at one of his top college choices after being deferred. But he worked hard to flip that deferral to acceptance in a clever way, and it had nothing to do with his HS transcript (which was solid, not perfect.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is no grade for the year in mcps. All classes are1 semester long. Everyone always mentions 79.5 and 89.5...but never the fact that 89.4 is a straight B.

But you can literally get what is a C at most schools (79.5%) for one quarter and still end up with an A.

Can anyone who actually attends class get less than a 79.5%? With test corrections and unlimited late work too? I mean tell me, how does a student who does all the work actually do worse than that?

There is no such thing as unlimited test correction. In what MCPS universe do you live? What my child get on a test is what he gets.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:At our MCPS school:

-no retakes
-deduction of 10% for late work
-semester grades not yearly grades (this is true of every MCPS school)

A 4.0 for a challenging schedule is rare at our school, as reflected in GPAs for college admissions contained on Naviance.

Please stop with spreading false information.

At our MCPS high school, late work not accepted. No retakes allowed. And grades are semesters.

OP IS GIVING COMPLETELY WRONG INFORMATION!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At our MCPS school:

-no retakes
-deduction of 10% for late work
-semester grades not yearly grades (this is true of every MCPS school)

A 4.0 for a challenging schedule is rare at our school, as reflected in GPAs for college admissions contained on Naviance.

Please stop with spreading false information.

At our MCPS high school, late work not accepted. No retakes allowed. And grades are semesters.

OP IS GIVING COMPLETELY WRONG INFORMATION!

From what I understand, you can get a 79.5 for quarter 1 and 89.5 for quarter 2 and end up with an A for the semester. Your kid just doesn't know how to work the system.

[Anonymous]

I think what will happen is the admissions officers for the territory encompassing MCPS will be very very aware of the rampant grade inflation and evaluate students accordingly. Yes, there are some really bright students who work hard for those A's, and they will need to demonstrate that in some other way beyond the transcripts, which are garbage data now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At our MCPS school:

-no retakes
-deduction of 10% for late work
-semester grades not yearly grades (this is true of every MCPS school)

A 4.0 for a challenging schedule is rare at our school, as reflected in GPAs for college admissions contained on Naviance.

Please stop with spreading false information.

At our MCPS high school, late work not accepted. No retakes allowed. And grades are semesters.

OP IS GIVING COMPLETELY WRONG INFORMATION!

From what I understand, you can get a 79.5 for quarter 1 and 89.5 for quarter 2 and end up with an A for the semester. Your kid just doesn't know how to work the system.

Can you give some tips on this please!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's crazy to me how many kids there are on here with unweighted 4.0s. I feel like even last year it was rare. This year 10 replies out of 15 each time the results from another school come up are ALL unweighted 4.0s.
Many are MCPS--it makes sense with their wacky grading scale: you can get 69.5 (C) quarter 1, 79.5 (B) quarter 2, 79.5 (quarter 3) and 89.5 (quarter 4) and end up with an A or 4.0 for the year for the class.
THAT IS INSANE. Many districts are similar. You are a hair what is traditionally failing for a solid quarter (a 69.5) and you still get an A for the year.
And they don't have A minus grades. So an A is a 4.0

Plus retakes (in many classes), no penalty for late work, etc.

Does anyone who does the work, not end up with a 4.0? It really seems like you have to try to do poorly.

Has a 4.0 ceased (even unweighted) ceased to mean ANYTHING? It seems like this is really hurting the kids who are actually super smart. They are lost in the shuffle of so many kids getting "perfect" grades
for doing very average work.

Why is it insane? Are you one of these people who think grades should be distributed on a bell curve or something? The purpose of education is to teach mastery of material, not to ration good grades.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At our MCPS school:

-no retakes
-deduction of 10% for late work
-semester grades not yearly grades (this is true of every MCPS school)

A 4.0 for a challenging schedule is rare at our school, as reflected in GPAs for college admissions contained on Naviance.

Please stop with spreading false information.

At our MCPS high school, late work not accepted. No retakes allowed. And grades are semesters.

OP IS GIVING COMPLETELY WRONG INFORMATION!

From what I understand, you can get a 79.5 for quarter 1 and 89.5 for quarter 2 and end up with an A for the semester. Your kid just doesn't know how to work the system.

It's called a rolling gradebook... look it up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's crazy to me how many kids there are on here with unweighted 4.0s. I feel like even last year it was rare. This year 10 replies out of 15 each time the results from another school come up are ALL unweighted 4.0s.
Many are MCPS--it makes sense with their wacky grading scale: you can get 69.5 (C) quarter 1, 79.5 (B) quarter 2, 79.5 (quarter 3) and 89.5 (quarter 4) and end up with an A or 4.0 for the year for the class.
THAT IS INSANE. Many districts are similar. You are a hair what is traditionally failing for a solid quarter (a 69.5) and you still get an A for the year.
And they don't have A minus grades. So an A is a 4.0

Plus retakes (in many classes), no penalty for late work, etc.

Does anyone who does the work, not end up with a 4.0? It really seems like you have to try to do poorly.

Has a 4.0 ceased (even unweighted) ceased to mean ANYTHING? It seems like this is really hurting the kids who are actually super smart. They are lost in the shuffle of so many kids getting "perfect" grades
for doing very average work.

Why is it insane? Are you one of these people who think grades should be distributed on a bell curve or something? The purpose of education is to teach mastery of material, not to ration good grades.

NP. I would agree on purpose, but college admissions, and discussions here at DCUM still treat grades as if they were somehow a standardized metric. Test optional policies play a role as well.

[Anonymous]

People don't come here to brag about their kids with 3.2 UW GPAs.

Bingo. Both of my kids graduated from an FCPS HS in a class of 500-550 students. The kids who had over a WEIGHTED 4.0 at graduation were given a special recognition in the graduation program. The number of names listed was not 500+ - it might have been around 25% of the graduating class. The number of students who had a weighted GPA over 4.0 when applying to colleges was likely lower. A handful of kids were singled out for some additional recognition and those might have been the ones with an unweighted 4.0.

I had one kid apply to colleges with a weighted 3.96 (unweighted probably around 3.7 - he got a lot of A- grades, no Bs in sophomore year, but didn't take many weighted classes prior to junior year - just honors math) and he was not shut out of college admissions or merit aid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My daughter is in a private school and currently has a 4.0. This is the following grading scale:

Same for our private. Plus no retakes on anything, if they miss a deadline for an assignment they have until the next time the class meets to turn it in with a 30% reduction. After that it's a 0 (actually a zero not 50 that some schools give for missing assignments). They also have mid terms and final exams. What is interesting is that most who post here would judge our school as subpar the MCPS. I don't see how anyone could be satisfied that their children where truly learning with the way grades are calculated in MCPS.

My DC works hard and has an unweighted 4.0. I know it's better for them to earn their high grades and As rather than have a high C rounded to an A and I hope AOs see the truth and admit accordingly.

[Anonymous]

For all the private school parents on this thread: you don’t seem to understand that the reason why public’s so weighted GPAs is because they offer a huge variety of levels for each class, at least large public’s do. I don’t live in the DMV anymore, but for example, my child’s high school offers everything pre-algebra to pre-calculus to 9th graders. For English, there are three levels offered in every grade.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My daughter is in a private school and currently has a 4.0. This is the following grading scale:

Same for our private. Plus no retakes on anything, if they miss a deadline for an assignment they have until the next time the class meets to turn it in with a 30% reduction. After that it's a 0 (actually a zero not 50 that some schools give for missing assignments). They also have mid terms and final exams. What is interesting is that most who post here would judge our school as subpar the MCPS. I don't see how anyone could be satisfied that their children where truly learning with the way grades are calculated in MCPS.

My DC works hard and has an unweighted 4.0. I know it's better for them to earn their high grades and As rather than have a high C rounded to an A and I hope AOs see the truth and admit accordingly.

Why did you choose private if you think it’s grading scale is so unjust?

[Anonymous]

Not NOVA, but our DC private only looks at core classes and fine arts for their GPA.

Letter A, B, C, D, F
Number 92-100, 84-91, 76-83, 70-75, 0-69
Points 4.0, 3.0, 2.0, 1.0, 0

Either way, admission knows about counties or school with inflationary GPAs, or the area rep at least should and if not is shows in the school report. That will put it all into perspective, so no reason to sweat it much IHMO.