Weighted Vs Unweighted GPA ?
One of the most important and challenging things for a high school student is to maintain a high GPA as this is a piece of essential information needed in your college application. It is important to have a high GPA to get a good college.
When it comes to comparing weighted vs unweighted GPA, it varies from school to school. Some schools use weighted GPAs while some use unweighted GPAs so it can be confusing sometimes.
So, today I will explain to you the difference between Weighted Vs Unweighted GPA, how you can calculate them, and which is best for your GPA.
Difference between Weighted and Unweighted GPA
· Meaning of Weighted GPA
A weighted GPA scores for the difficulty of a student’s courses or classes when calculating GPA. In general, you can use a scale of 0.0 – 5.0 but it varies from school to school as some use a higher scale. Scoring an A ib AP class will be of 5.0 GPA and scoring an A in a regular class is of 4.0 GPA.
· Meaning of Unweighted GPA
An Unweighted GPA is measured on a scale of 0.0 – 4.0 and does not take account of the difficulty of the class. Here scoring an A is 4.0.
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Calculating Weighted and Unweighted GPA
The numerical values for the unweighted scale are –
A – 4.0
B – 3.0
C – 2.0
D – 1.0
F – 0.0
Unweighted GPA
So if a student took six classes in which he got A in three, B in two, and C in one, then your GPA will be:
4.0+4.0+4.0+3.0+3.0+2.0= 20/6 = 3.33
Weighted GPA
It is a little tricky to calculate. The trick here is you use the unweighted GPA scale for regular and add 0.5 for honors and 1.0 for AP classes.
Let’s take the same scores for regular classes but this time, you have an A in an AP class and two regular classes, a B in an AP class and an honor class, and C in an honor class. Then your GPA will be :
5.0+4.0+4.0+4.0+3.5+2.5= 23/6 = 3.83
What GPA do colleges look at?
Colleges find weighted GPAs more useful but rather than focusing on GPAs they do check on your coursework, determine the rigor and consider your class rank. So just improve your performance.
The Final Words
Last but not the least, whether it is a weighted or unweighted GPA, it doesn’t affect your college application. So I hope this article is helpful for you.