How is aGPA calculated? (Details in thread)

[91529001]

I mean, they drop up to 30 credits of your worst year. 

So would a "year" be, for example, fall 2011, spring 2012, summer 2012?
Or would a "year" be, for example, spring 2011, summer 2011, fall 2011?

Also, I took a couple semesters off one year to do co-op and study for MCAT. I only have a few classes that entire year. I did poorly in those few classes and technically, if you're just looking at those classes which I took that year, it's my worst GPA for a year. However, dropping that year wouldn't really help me much since I only took a few classes that year. Will UBC still drop that "worst" year even though I only took a few classes that year? (I'd much rather them drop one of my other years where I technically did slightly better but due to the amount of credits that would be dropped, it'd help my overall GPA a lot more)

Thanks for your help and please let me know if I didn't explain my 2 questions clearly enough!

[Neurophiliac]

By "year" they mean academic year, which runs from September to August of next year (e.g. September 2016 – August 2017).

As for the AGPA calculation, look at their Evaluation Criteria on their website:

https://mdprogram.med.ubc.ca/admissions/evaluation-criteria/

Quote

Adjusted Academic Average Examples

If the academic year with the lowest GPA has less than 30 credits, we will subtract the number of credits in that year from your GPA credit total. If the resulting answer is 90 or more we will remove the entire worst year.

GPA credit total = 120
Worst year credit total = 28
120 – 28 = 92, so we will remove the entire worst year

GPA credit total = 90
Worst year credit total = 28
90 – 28 = 62, so we will not remove the worst year

If the academic year with the lowest GPA has 30 credits or more, we will subtract 30 from your GPA credit total. If the resulting answer is 90 or more we will remove the courses with the lowest grades from the worst year, up to 30 credits.

GPA credit total = 120
Worst year credit total = 33

120 – 30 = 90, so we will remove up to 30 credits of the worst year
GPA credit total = 120
Worst year credit total = 30
120 – 30 = 90, so we will remove up to 30 credits of the worst year (in this case, the entire worst year)

GPA credit total = 118
Worst year credit total = 33
118 – 30 = 88, so we will not remove the worst year

For the adjusted academic average calculation:

• the academic year is considered to be the beginning of September to the end of August;
• credit totals are calculated using courses with grades only (no pass/fail, no thesis courses without grades, etc) and are converted to UBC units. This applies to both the credit total of the worst year and the GPA credit total;
• if the academic year with the lowest academic average includes more than 30 credits, no more than 30 credits (those with the lowest grades) will be excluded;
• if the academic year with the lowest academic average includes less than 30 credits, no further additional credits from other years will be eliminated;
• if any English or recommended science courses are eliminated, these do not have to be retaken.