Is GPA just GPA?

[btf1010]

Assuming you meet the criteria of having 5 courses, with the 3/5 being at the year level or higher... does the school then just look at your GPA?

 

Do they investigate further and see what you actually took? What if one took 6 courses, and still pulled a 4.0, does it do anything for the applicant?

[supafield]

As far as Western says, GPA is just GPA...

 

However if you take 6.0 courses you can drop you lowest 1.0...

 

They consider 5.0 a full course load and if you take more than that you can get rid of your lowest marks that make up the amount over a full course load you took...

 

So if you took 6.0 courses with all 4.0's but a 3.3 in one full year course.... you could say good-bye to the 3.3 and have a 4.0 on the year for Western.

[Ryan]

I have a different, burning GPA question.

 

In order to determine the GPA cutoff for interview, Western uses your best two years. Post-interview, I've been reading that the formula is 50/25/25 for interview/MCAT/GPA. Is the GPA used in this post-interview calculation the same one used for the cutoff? Or is it a cumulative GPA? Does anyone have any insight?

 

In my case, I had two awesome years and two ****ty ones, so it makes all the difference as to my chance of getting off this wait list.

[supafield]

I have a different, burning GPA question.

 

In order to determine the GPA cutoff for interview, Western uses your best two years. Post-interview, I've been reading that the formula is 50/25/25 for interview/MCAT/GPA. Is the GPA used in this post-interview calculation the same one used for the cutoff? Or is it a cumulative GPA? Does anyone have any insight?

 

In my case, I had two awesome years and two ****ty ones, so it makes all the difference as to my chance of getting off this wait list.

 

General consensus, and actually stated in the distant past was your G.P.A. ranking is based on your one best year.

 

Because people could gain conditional acceptance with 1 year of marks, it's not fair to compare people with two good year to someone with 1 great year.

 

So I don't think you'd be hurt by having 2 bad years and 2 good ones.... Mind you Western may have changed there ways without telling us, but I would guess it's the same as it used to be.

[Ryan]

Wow. Thanks man. That helps my anxiety enormously. Now I can make it through the weekend.

[perfect_stranger]

As far as Western says, GPA is just GPA...

 

However if you take 6.0 courses you can drop you lowest 1.0...

 

They consider 5.0 a full course load and if you take more than that you can get rid of your lowest marks that make up the amount over a full course load you took...

 

So if you took 6.0 courses with all 4.0's but a 3.3 in one full year course.... you could say good-bye to the 3.3 and have a 4.0 on the year for Western.

 

5 full courses = 30 credit units?

[rmorelan]

5 full courses = 30 credit units?

 

I do believe that is correct. Just your standard school year really

[Halcyon]

5 full courses = 30 credit units?

 

Yup, some schools go by a system where 3 credits is a semester course and 6 credits is a full credit course.

 

Just to make things confusing, I suppose

[Premedder101]

A classmate told me that its enough for Western to have one year with a 3.7 or higher...but how does the "remove the lowest credit" work in there? If you have taken 4 years full time, how does the lowest mark removal work? My school uses 3 and 6 credit classes (semestered and full year respectively). Thanks!

[AdamP]

Well first off it's now 3.75 and could go up this cycle who knows? It really depends on the applicant pool.

 

The class removal thing works if you take more than 5 full courses in a year. So if in one of those 4 full time years you have more than 5 full or 10 half (or a mix) of courses then the extra lowest ones will be removed, for that year only.

[rmorelan]

A classmate told me that its enough for Western to have one year with a 3.7 or higher...but how does the "remove the lowest credit" work in there? If you have taken 4 years full time, how does the lowest mark removal work? My school uses 3 and 6 credit classes (semestered and full year respectively). Thanks!

 

Are you thinking of Toronto's drop a course system (which is a bit more fancy)? Western just takes your best 5.0 courses per year.

[Premedder101]

So say that I have a year of studies (full course load-30 credits) where after removing my lowest mark (3 credit course), my GPA is 3.80. Does this mean that Western will use this 3.80 to calculate my GPA? And do they only do this for one year or two?

 

Toronto's system I actually understand

[HBP]

they wont remove your lowest mark

 

western only removes grades when you take higher than a full courseload

 

ie, full corseload is 5, you take 6, they remove 1

[rmorelan]

they wont remove your lowest mark

 

western only removes grades when you take higher than a full courseload

 

ie, full corseload is 5, you take 6, they remove 1

 

yeah western kind of "rewards" you for doing more than the normal number of courses but is it. Nothing fancy really - for most people every course you take in the fall and winter terms counts. I suppose they think they are already giving you a break as they only count two of your years anyway

[Premedder101]

ok...thats makes sense. Thanks guys!