Western Gpa Calculation Unfair?

[DentHope2021]

I'm confused, how do schools other than Mac and York work? Do they have a % on their transcript and so that is used? Also when you say ' to give a 5% boost to students who achieve 90% is NOT equal to students who lose 1.5% when they achieve 89%' don't York/Mac students get ~ -4% when they get an 89%, as it would count as an 85% ... I feel like this would be quite common since students aiming for dent are almost always aiming for 90%+ and tend to fall just under, at 89% or so. I'm genuinely curious as to how it works with other schools b/c I didn't know it worked differently unless the school gave out % grades on the transcript ... I completely understand what you mean when you say it's unfair about people getting a 95% if they actually scored lower though, especially if the same rule doesn't apply to other students,

 

At Mac, they use letter grades corresponding to a 12 point scale. In essence, 12 = A+ (90-100), 11 = A (85-89), 10 = (80-84), etc. They have a letter grade show up on their transcript, which gives them an advantage when converting their GPA to percentage. The other advantage is that in most courses at Mac, an 89 is being bumped up to 90 (11 --> 12 = A --> A+) as profs realize that a percentage makes a huge difference to ones GPA. It wouldn't be surprising if the dental class is made up of york and mac students because their GPA is much higher compared to Western students who probably have similar grades but are getting screwed over by the conversion scale.

[inquirer007]

I wish my prof realized how 1 percent makes a difference when he gave me that 79 loool 

[DC-Comics]

Oh wow you're right, if the school gives percentages then that does definitely seem like a disadvantage . I feel like they were trying to make it more fair for people who got B+'s, since those kill your grades when using the GPA system, but when taking percentages, I feel like it's a more accurate depiction of your true grades/performance i.e. a 78% is only a 3% different from an 81% for instance, but on the GPA system, it is going from 3.7 to 3.3, which can really kill your average GPA. But you're right, I would be upset too if I was getting a 90% for a 90% instead of 95% like other schools. And yes, I was talking about York, so i think York students definitely have a bit of disadvantage when getting 85% as A's when a lot of the time they're falling just 1% or so short from an A+, but I guess it is offset by the 95% for an A+ ... even though I'm sure some people get 95%+ sometimes and are still only assigned 95% for the grade, but it could be less common from what people are saying here.

What would you guys suggest UWO dents does for schools that only assign a letter grade on the transcript and no %? Would you prefer the regular GPA system in that case? Just curious to see people's opinions

The way I see it, I don't really understand the point of giving students an "A" or a "12" on their official transcript.  In my mind, its very easy to just put the EXACT percentage achieved in the course.  That way, you aren't OVERESTIMATING for students who get 80, 85, or 90 AND you are not UNDERESTIMATING for students who get 100, 89, or 84.

 

If anyone knows the reason for GPA's (ie. 4.0, 12, or letter -scale), please enlighten me.

[DentHope2021]

The way I see it, I don't really understand the point of giving students an "A" or a "12" on their official transcript.  In my mind, its very easy to just put the EXACT percentage achieved in the course.  That way, you aren't OVERESTIMATING for students who get 80, 85, or 90 AND you are not UNDERESTIMATING for students who get 100, 89, or 84.

 

If anyone knows the reason for GPA's (ie. 4.0, 12, or letter -scale), please enlighten me.

When I was at Mac, this was probably the most debated topic in our student union. What is the point of a 12 point scale? Why can't we all just come up with a universal method across all universities or input our exact percentage on our transcripts. The reasoning that we received was that students tend to push themselves more for that extra percent which results in more stress and competitiveness. The 12 point scale basically gives students who are in the 90s a chance to breathe a bit easier since a 90 is the same as a 100. This way, students plan their exam schedules and study for courses for which they are borderline 11-12, 10-11, etc and worry less about an exam for which they have a much larger leeway to achieve a grade level. Most of the students thought it was more of a Health Sci conspiracy to keep the system as easy as possible to make the route to med school/grad school easier lol. To this day, I don't understand the reasoning behind the 12 point scale but I can see the need for a more standard scaling method in the future.

[DC-Comics]

When I was at Mac, this was probably the most debated topic in our student union. What is the point of a 12 point scale? Why can't we all just come up with a universal method across all universities or input our exact percentage on our transcripts. The reasoning that we received was that students tend to push themselves more for that extra percent which results in more stress and competitiveness. The 12 point scale basically gives students who are in the 90s a chance to breathe a bit easier since a 90 is the same as a 100. This way, students plan their exam schedules and study for courses for which they are borderline 11-12, 10-11, etc and worry less about an exam for which they have a much larger leeway to achieve a grade level. Most of the students thought it was more of a Health Sci conspiracy to keep the system as easy as possible to make the route to med school/grad school easier lol. To this day, I don't understand the reasoning behind the 12 point scale but I can see the need for a more standard scaling method in the future.

That makes sense.  But in that respect, why isn't Waterloo, UBC, or Western following through with that?!  Why must those students stress out due to those reasons.

 

Perhaps there's a bunch of logical explanations that I simply don't see.  In any case, I should have went to Mac

[ottawaliquid]

Is that hyperbole, or is the majority of the class actually York/Mac. Just curious

No hyperbole.. I think it just worked out that way for our year... at least 20-24 students of the 56 are from those two uni-s

[Curious4321]

I don't think the GPA system is fair at all.  to give a 5% boost to students who achieve 90% is NOT equal to students who lose 1.5% when they achieve 89%.  similarly, an 80-84 will equal an 82.5, but lets be honest...it definitely does NOT equal out when students are getting 85+ in their courses.

each 90-100 = 95% and mind you, anything above a 95% is NOT easy.

 

 

Yes, here at UW for example, our final grade is in percent. If i finished a course with a 100, it will show up as a 100. If I finish with a 90, its a 90. And no its not -4%, because the range is 85-89, and the midpoint of that is 87.5. Actually as I type this, I remember a friend telling me that York is actually like you said. That is they only have an 80-89 range, not 80-84 85-89, in which case you would be right for York. But ya for schools that give percents (which doesn't seem too common these days), it looks like we get the short end of the stick 

 

I'm kind of confused about how Western converts letter grades to percents. Can someone please explain how the midpoint of 85-89 is 87.5 or how that of 80-84 is 82.5? Cause wouldn't it be (85+89)/2 = 87 not 87.5? 

[AncientDentist]

I'm kind of confused about how Western converts letter grades to percents. Can someone please explain how the midpoint of 85-89 is 87.5 or how that of 80-84 is 82.5? Cause wouldn't it be (85+89)/2 = 87 not 87.5? 

 

Technically it's the midpoint between 85-89.99999999 which is basically 87.5

[brafadmd16]

The conversion definitely is crazy unfair. I attended a school that gave a percent grade for every course. That's how my average was calculated for Western. When I heard about the York/Mac grading system, I was pretty pissed because that seems like an absolute joke. I still managed to get an interview at Western but as you can tell by my profile image, did not get in haha. Ended up at Temple University in Philly. It's an unfair system but you have to roll with it. At least I'll be more clinically competent when I graduate.