Karen asks:
“I wonder if you could post something explaining the shift of colleges from a 4.0 grading scale to the whatever-it-is-now! I can’t understand why a 4.0 student now is not the top of his class, and how this all fits into meeting college requirements for seniors.”
Back in the good ol’ days, giving 100% meant giving it your all. And back in the good ol’ days, getting a 4.0 in high school was a perfect score, and you couldn’t do any better than that. You’ve heard about people “giving it 110%?” That’s happening in transcripts, too!
Some high schools around the nation are giving a 5.0 in some classes! Can you believe that a perfect score can now be 5.0? It’s true! Many high schools will give a 5.0 for a student that receives an A in an Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate class (That’s AP or IB, to you and me.) Some high schools will even give a 5.0 to some classes that are “just” honors classes. Other schools will give a 4.0 to AP classes. It’s as if some classes are measured in “feet” and other classes are measured in “meters.” The article below says simply “there is no single standard for weighting secondary school grades.” They aren’t using the same scale. But 100% is still 100%, and you can’t really give more than that.
So how does a college evaluate grade point average, if we aren’t using the same scale? Usually a college will pick and choose classes for making certain determinations. A college may drop Driver’s Ed from a transcript, or they may only calculate the GPA from a select group of rigorous courses and leave off “fluff” grades. Keep in mind, they do this for public school students too! It’s not a homeschool issue – this is a HIGH SCHOOL issue.
My advice is to choose a grading system that YOU like, and be consistent with it. If you choose to grade on AP class with a 5.0, then grade ALL your AP classes with a 5.0 grade. It may help to emphasize the rigorous nature on the transcript, to make sure the class doesn’t get lost in a sea of grades. On the other hand, since those scores are going to be re-calculated by colleges anyway, it probably doesn’t really matter whether you choose a 4.0 scale or a 5.0 scale. We used a 4.0 scale and it seemed to work out just fine for us. Colleges will take the necessary steps to convert the meters to feet, and vice versa. Just be consistent throughout your whole transcript.
You can read more at questbridge.org, if you want to get a public school view on the topic.
Do you have a question for The HomeScholar? Email me (homescholar@gmail.com) and put “Blog Question” in the subject line!
Related posts
- Homeschooling High School? Start Here!
- Online Classes, Community College, AP, and CLEP?
- How Do You Teach the Creation-Evolution Debate?
- AP, CLEP or Community College: Which is Best?
- CLEP and AP - What is the Difference?
- How Long Should The SAT Essay Be? (Part 2)
- College Application Essays - "BEE Yourself"
- Foreign Language Credit Value
- Homeschool Transcript Not Necessary?
- Keeping Your College Options Open
Christianbook.com Curriculum Page
Karen says:
Thank you for your post! That helped. So, here is my situation. I have two children doing Tapestry of Grace history (which is considered honors if you do all or even most of the assignments). My daughter is getting honors credit, as she always gives “110%” to her work. My son, however, will do the minimum (or less) required to get by. Any thoughts on grading my son? How do you make the decision as to whether to give a grade of C with an honors credit, versus giving a grade of B without the honors? Thanks so much for your help!
May 27th, 2008 at 6:59 am
Lee says:
Dear Karen,
Excellent question, and I’ll talk about that on tomorrow’s blog post. I’ve heard wonderful things about Tapestry of Grace and working together. We did almost every school subject together, even through high school, and it worked great!
Blessings,
Lee
May 27th, 2008 at 5:21 pm