GPA deflation

OtakuWeeaboo

I know it's kinda early to ask about admission stuff as a sophomore but I am really concerned about my GPA. My school (Wesleyan U in Middletown, CT) has a terrible policy of using 94% as the bar between A and A-minus; thanks to this policy I got a straight A-minus for this semester and I fear that this trend will continue given the general deflation at my school. Moreover, since I am aiming for law schools in Canada (U of T, Osgoode Hall, and Ottawa), I have the feeling that they do not know much about the deflation thing going on at Wesleyan. What should I do? How can I inform these schools about the situation at my school?

Seeking Perfection

What you should do is to worry about spinning whatever GPA you wind up with later. For now get as high of a GPA as you can and then later as good of an LSAT score as you can.

I'm not as familiar with the Canadian law schools, but I know that law schools are aware of grading trends at undergraduate schools because of the Academic Summary Report generated by LSAC when you send in your transcripts. American law schools by and large don't usually end up caring about this data because it doesn't factor into their US News ranking the way LSAC GPA or LSAT score does. Asking them to care with an inflation addendum is usually a waste of time.

I'm also somewhat unaware of the norms for grading with pluses and minuses since my school goes straight from a 4.0 to a 3.5 sometimes at a 90, but at grades as high as a 94, depending on department. I take it that you are upset that Wesleyan has a cutoff of 94 instead of 93 or 92.5 for an A-? If so, it seems to me unlikely that all your grades will fall within that 1 or 1.5 percentage point gap. I would assume that you will get grades other than an A- while at Wesleyan. To get only A-'s and especially only ones that otherwise would have been A's with only a slightly different grading scale would seem to me to be an impressively consistent performance. It is one thing for people to graduate with all A's, but the odds of graduating with all A-'s all B+'s or at my school all 3.5's or 3.0's is really unlikely. If you did get all A-'s though you would have a 3.67. That isn't insurmountable at top schools with an excellent LSAT score. Just do your best in all your classes and on the LSAT.

Alex

@zsun01 said:
I know it's kinda early to ask about admission stuff as a sophomore but I am really concerned about my GPA. My school (Wesleyan U in Middletown, CT) has a terrible policy of using 94% as the bar between A and A-minus; thanks to this policy I got a straight A-minus for this semester and I fear that this trend will continue given the general deflation at my school. Moreover, since I am aiming for law schools in Canada (U of T, Osgoode Hall, and Ottawa), I have the feeling that they do not know much about the deflation thing going on at Wesleyan. What should I do? How can I inform these schools about the situation at my school?

Hey Zsun,

Believe it or not, Wesleyan's grading policy is based on a very standard scale (94% being an A). Also, don't worry about trying to inform schools. They know which schools have grade deflation; e.g., MIT, Princeton, CalTech, etc. If you want straight As, you'll just have to work harder to get those 94% + grades.

Regardless, you're only a sophomore and have plenty of time to get those As, so don't worry too much. Even if you end up with an A- average of 3.7x, you'll still have a good shot at many of the top schools in Canada/U.S.

kimpg_66

Honestly, almost every student I've talked to whose school does As and A-s has the cut off at either 94 or 93, so this doesn't fall under "grade deflation." It also means that thousands of other students are working within the same system as you. Work on getting as many As and A-s as possible, and I'm sure you'll be fine.