Class of 2024 (and beyond) parents - any questions?

[Lord Manhammer]

I just wanted to add to the conversation about community colleges. Some states have [CC to State U] transfer agreements, so that, if planned out correctly, all CC credits transfer to State U, and there might be a just a small requirement to take additional courses depending on the major. (In MA, it‘s just two classes, max.) Something worth looking into if your student is considering the community college option. I do think it’s a good one for some students.

Ex: https://www.mass.edu/masstransfer/ (Check your state!)

It’s unfortunate that some high schools don’t encourage cc’s more, which was the case in my kids’ school. There’s some sort of stigma there, and that’s too bad, because for many, it’s a realistic option. (My state is talking about making education free there in the coming years, which will be great; even now, though, they’re pretty affordable.)

One thing one of my kid’s HS senior teachers told parents was something important to look at: Not just where freshmen college students went, but where, or if, they were enrolled their sophomore year. That tells more of the story, she said. Some families get caught up in the excitement of it all, but some of their choices may not be the best, or realistic. We used to visit college campuses all through HS and have lunch there. Mine knew right away whether they liked the feel of the school or not. They wound up going to the school they felt most comfortable at, which was also my school, and a really great place to study.

DD was sure of her major, and what school she wanted. For years. She also had a good GPA, but tanked her SATs. She did have strong volunteerism and work history, with just one AP class. She got into her school of choice, but not the program she wanted, which presented a problem that lasted about a year and a half, until she managed to fight her way in by getting excellent grades the first year, volunteering in the program, and reapplying. It was interesting because many who got in from the beginning either dropped out or back, as it was very rigorous. (Nursing.) She went straight through to finish the program. Only about 80 of their class of 150 graduated on time. Just last week she graduated from a Master’s in Nursing program (which wasn’t planned initially; she decided to do it once she started working, seeing how hard it is to work in hospitals today and wanting other job options). She was highly motivated, obviously, and worked her butt off these past six years.

DS had a couple of options on the table. He also had a strong volunteerism and work and sports history, though took no AP or Honors classes. (That was a conscious decision on our part, not wanting that type of pressure in HS - everyone is different in this, but saying it so others see they can still get into college without them.) He went with the school where he could play his sport, though he was less sure about his major there, and changed it after freshman year. Thankfully it didn’t slow him down too, too much (though it did cost him an extra semester). He did play his sport for four years and I think that was what really motivated him to get through - tough coach and positive pressure being part of a great team. He’s been working hard in his field, but is now considering the option he didn’t choose initially, and that’s causing him to have to make some tough decisions, but he’s seeing it through and it’s all good. He has a very strong resume already and solid job and leadership experience.

I think in some ways, for some kids, it’s tough asking them to plan what they want to do for their entire lives when they’re 17 or 18 years old and their decisions have such a lasting impact both financially and emotionally.

I also think it’s ok to slow down. Think about things. Get some experience. I know there’s a danger they might choose the wrong path, do nothing, or not ever make it to school, but that has to be weighed against making decisions that aren’t right and coming out owing a lot of money (frightful in this day and age, IMO) and having to do something they don’t really like or aren’t passionate about. I do think that it’s good if passions develop early on, and are encouraged by families. Nothing beats having the support of people who love you, around you and pulling for you.

I know this is getting long but I just want to also post this, which someone here posted when my kids were in HS. It really helped me to put things in perspective as far as cost went. You don’t have to have a goal of being “debt free” to read it, but it will help you analyze costs and help figure out how to pay for school if money is tight. So check it out.

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Good luck, everyone!

There really isn’t just one way to see the college experience. Find your own way!

I teach in Massachusetts and the mass transfer compact has come in very handy for many of my students who transfer from the CC's.

 

[Pea-n-Me]

I teach in Massachusetts and the mass transfer compact has come in very handy for many of my students who transfer from the CC's.

Good to hear!

 

[TiggerTrigger]

Just jumping in to say my senior got her first acceptance today! She really wants to go out of state and have a big campus experience-both of which I totally support. We will see how the money works out. this school is part of the Western States Tuition Exchange-would actually be cheaper than staying in state which is nuts.

We're seeing some of that as well. While our state is not part of Western Exchange and our so-called bordering state agreements don't cover many of the big flagship schools in neighboring states, priority/early action submission timing along with GPAs and test scores seem to be the ticket to getting tuition on par to in-state costs (or cheaper in some cases).

 

[bjscheel]

Well, ,I think we have decided. We are going with Community College and hopefully transfer to a four year school after that. I decided to cancel out SCAD open house weekend that's coming up because I don't think it would be kind to show DD what school she won't be going to.

As much as I would lover her to experience the freshman on campus college experience, I cannot justify spending $50K just for the experience. I just don't think she is ready for an art school at this point.

My DD25 did an AAS in Graphic Design at a community college. It is meant to be a stand alone degree, not one where you transfer later. We did a lot of comparisons and found that the AAS had just as many graphic design credits as the 4 year degrees, just less gen eds. DD was all for just learning what she needed and getting out into the work world after 5 semesters.

She lived in student housing next to campus, and there were some campus activities, so it was somewhat a traditional college experience but not totally.

We didn't qualify for aid but she applied for the school's foundation scholarships every semester and was awarded $500-$1000 in 4 out of 5 semesters. She also received a national graphic design scholarship that was renewable each year of about $1500. I will message you a link- the app just opened for this year. Between all that and the tax credit, we paid no tuition out of pocket.

It did take her several months after graduating in 2019 to get a full time job in her field. Whether having the AAS instead of a Bachelors turned off any employers, we'll never know. But she landed in a good place and now that she'll have years of experience when/if she changes jobs, it will be much less of a factor.

 

[SandyinMonterey]

I have a 10th grader. I keep hearing that college is much more competitive than when I went in the mid 90s. What GPA do colleges look for? Do they look at weighted or unweighted? If a kid is not in the top% of the graduating class, will they get in anywhere? He has all A’s and some B’s sprinkled in. Right now he wants to major in computer science. He not involved in sports or any extra curriculars. He is helping out a little in tech theater. This worries me. He’s not the competitive type and some of the extra curriculars are competitive.
hubby took him to the college fair and he walked around but didn’t talk to any of the recruiters.
I already told him that this is his future, not mine, and that he needs a plan of some sort.

I'm in the thick of it now. We've been to 6 college visits. Only one being out of state. We've visited many types of colleges: More selective to the colleges we know she would be accepted. Each college has their own requirements. The more selective the school, the more requirements. There are 2 college/universities in the state I live in that just about everyone wants to get into. Requirements for the public university are high: The average student GPA is 4.0 or higher, average SAT 1270-1470 with minimum of 7-10 AP/IB classes and would also like to see dual enrollment and has a 30% acceptance rate. The Tech college student average GPA is 1370-1530, SAT average 4.07 and AP/IB and dual enrollment is a must and has a 16% acceptance rate. In other words, the very top of your class. Some schools look at weighted and some look at unweighted, depends on the school. If your son is hoping to go to a more selective school, he will probably not only need the A's and B's but also the AP/IB classes and dual enrollment (if his HS offers that). The schools we have gone to all ask for information regarding the HS the student attended. It gets sent from the HS guidance counselor along with transcripts. Within that it looks at HS rigor and what the school offered. If his HS doesn't offer that, they do (at least they say they do) take that into consideration. My daughter took an SAT prep class, which by the way didn't help and cost a small fortune, but I will say that their counselors have been more help in 3 months than my daugher's HS counselors in 4 years. My daughter doesn't play any sport but did join several clubs and in one the clubs landed a leadership role. According to the counselor at the SAT prep, colleges like to see some sort of leadership role. Also, if your son is interested in Computer Science, definitely find a club about computer science/STEM. Counselor said that to my daughter, that she's interested in STEM but at the time didn't belong to any club about that. College admissions will look at that. Volunteer work is also good. My daughter makes sandwiches for the homeless. Her HS guidance counselor asked if she had a job, which she does. Just a couple of hours a week and never on a school night. Said to keep the job that a college admissions person told her that "kids these days don't want to work" and look for that. My daughter is a huge procrastinator, I'm the complete opposite. I have tried taking the wheel and pointing her in some directions but I have backed off a bit too. I've been so stressed about it too I had to stop and think if I'm this stressed, how is she handling it? My daughter started seeing a therapist about 8 months ago for anxiety and her anxiety is 98% related to school (high school and getting into college). Therapist office is filled with teenagers. Took me months to even find a therapist who was accepting new patients. In all this I've learned to take a step back, not push too hard but always be there to help her, not do it for her but help her. People have told me there is a college for everyone, I believe that to be true. An SAT test, GPA, or one college will not be the deciding factor of success for my daughter's future. She will be.

 

[china mom]

My DD25 did an AAS in Graphic Design at a community college. It is meant to be a stand alone degree, not one where you transfer later. We did a lot of comparisons and found that the AAS had just as many graphic design credits as the 4 year degrees, just less gen eds. DD was all for just learning what she needed and getting out into the work world after 5 semesters.

She lived in student housing next to campus, and there were some campus activities, so it was somewhat a traditional college experience but not totally.

We didn't qualify for aid but she applied for the school's foundation scholarships every semester and was awarded $500-$1000 in 4 out of 5 semesters. She also received a national graphic design scholarship that was renewable each year of about $1500. I will message you a link- the app just opened for this year. Between all that and the tax credit, we paid no tuition out of pocket.

It did take her several months after graduating in 2019 to get a full time job in her field. Whether having the AAS instead of a Bachelors turned off any employers, we'll never know. But she landed in a good place and now that she'll have years of experience when/if she changes jobs, it will be much less of a factor.

My local community College has acactly 1 art class and very little computer design but I have started looking at other community colleges for her. Thank you for sharing a success story.

 

[Skippy918]

I'm in the thick of it now. We've been to 6 college visits. Only one being out of state. We've visited many types of colleges: More selective to the colleges we know she would be accepted. Each college has their own requirements. The more selective the school, the more requirements. There are 2 college/universities in the state I live in that just about everyone wants to get into. Requirements for the public university are high: The average student GPA is 4.0 or higher, average SAT 1270-1470 with minimum of 7-10 AP/IB classes and would also like to see dual enrollment and has a 30% acceptance rate. The Tech college student average GPA is 1370-1530, SAT average 4.07 and AP/IB and dual enrollment is a must and has a 16% acceptance rate. In other words, the very top of your class. Some schools look at weighted and some look at unweighted, depends on the school. If your son is hoping to go to a more selective school, he will probably not only need the A's and B's but also the AP/IB classes and dual enrollment (if his HS offers that). The schools we have gone to all ask for information regarding the HS the student attended. It gets sent from the HS guidance counselor along with transcripts. Within that it looks at HS rigor and what the school offered. If his HS doesn't offer that, they do (at least they say they do) take that into consideration. My daughter took an SAT prep class, which by the way didn't help and cost a small fortune, but I will say that their counselors have been more help in 3 months than my daugher's HS counselors in 4 years. My daughter doesn't play any sport but did join several clubs and in one the clubs landed a leadership role. According to the counselor at the SAT prep, colleges like to see some sort of leadership role. Also, if your son is interested in Computer Science, definitely find a club about computer science/STEM. Counselor said that to my daughter, that she's interested in STEM but at the time didn't belong to any club about that. College admissions will look at that. Volunteer work is also good. My daughter makes sandwiches for the homeless. Her HS guidance counselor asked if she had a job, which she does. Just a couple of hours a week and never on a school night. Said to keep the job that a college admissions person told her that "kids these days don't want to work" and look for that. My daughter is a huge procrastinator, I'm the complete opposite. I have tried taking the wheel and pointing her in some directions but I have backed off a bit too. I've been so stressed about it too I had to stop and think if I'm this stressed, how is she handling it? My daughter started seeing a therapist about 8 months ago for anxiety and her anxiety is 98% related to school (high school and getting into college). Therapist office is filled with teenagers. Took me months to even find a therapist who was accepting new patients. In all this I've learned to take a step back, not push too hard but always be there to help her, not do it for her but help her. People have told me there is a college for everyone, I believe that to be true. An SAT test, GPA, or one college will not be the deciding factor of success for my daughter's future. She will be.

Thank you for your detailed response. this helps a lot. School doesn’t stress him out at all. He’s going the AP class route. he took AP human geo in 9th, comp sci A this year. I saw his choice sheet for next year and he plans to take AP physics, AP US history, and AP English. Dual credit is an option but we don’t know if that transfers to out of state. He took the Psat 10 a few weeks ago. I hope scores will be released soon. My husband owns a business and he works there over the summer in the kitchen. Most restaurants won’t hire 15yo’s in the kitchen doing food prep.

 

[Skippy918]

When did you start planning college visits and tours? Summer between 10th and 11th grade or after that?

 

[SandyinMonterey]

Thank you for your detailed response. this helps a lot. School doesn’t stress him out at all. He’s going the AP class route. he took AP human geo in 9th, comp sci A this year. I saw his choice sheet for next year and he plans to take AP physics, AP US history, and AP English. Dual credit is an option but we don’t know if that transfers to out of state. He took the Psat 10 a few weeks ago. I hope scores will be released soon. My husband owns a business and he works there over the summer in the kitchen. Most restaurants won’t hire 15yo’s in the kitchen doing food prep.

Someone told me (who is a teacher) that for some schools dual enrollment is an automatic in.

 

[SandyinMonterey]

When did you start planning college visits and tours? Summer between 10th and 11th grade or after that?

My daughter's high school counselor said to visit at least 3 colleges by end of Spring junior year.

 

[Pea-n-Me]

I'm in the thick of it now. We've been to 6 college visits. Only one being out of state. We've visited many types of colleges: More selective to the colleges we know she would be accepted. Each college has their own requirements. The more selective the school, the more requirements. There are 2 college/universities in the state I live in that just about everyone wants to get into. Requirements for the public university are high: The average student GPA is 4.0 or higher, average SAT 1270-1470 with minimum of 7-10 AP/IB classes and would also like to see dual enrollment and has a 30% acceptance rate. The Tech college student average GPA is 1370-1530, SAT average 4.07 and AP/IB and dual enrollment is a must and has a 16% acceptance rate. In other words, the very top of your class. Some schools look at weighted and some look at unweighted, depends on the school. If your son is hoping to go to a more selective school, he will probably not only need the A's and B's but also the AP/IB classes and dual enrollment (if his HS offers that). The schools we have gone to all ask for information regarding the HS the student attended. It gets sent from the HS guidance counselor along with transcripts. Within that it looks at HS rigor and what the school offered. If his HS doesn't offer that, they do (at least they say they do) take that into consideration. My daughter took an SAT prep class, which by the way didn't help and cost a small fortune, but I will say that their counselors have been more help in 3 months than my daugher's HS counselors in 4 years. My daughter doesn't play any sport but did join several clubs and in one the clubs landed a leadership role. According to the counselor at the SAT prep, colleges like to see some sort of leadership role. Also, if your son is interested in Computer Science, definitely find a club about computer science/STEM. Counselor said that to my daughter, that she's interested in STEM but at the time didn't belong to any club about that. College admissions will look at that. Volunteer work is also good. My daughter makes sandwiches for the homeless. Her HS guidance counselor asked if she had a job, which she does. Just a couple of hours a week and never on a school night. Said to keep the job that a college admissions person told her that "kids these days don't want to work" and look for that. My daughter is a huge procrastinator, I'm the complete opposite. I have tried taking the wheel and pointing her in some directions but I have backed off a bit too. I've been so stressed about it too I had to stop and think if I'm this stressed, how is she handling it? My daughter started seeing a therapist about 8 months ago for anxiety and her anxiety is 98% related to school (high school and getting into college). Therapist office is filled with teenagers. Took me months to even find a therapist who was accepting new patients. In all this I've learned to take a step back, not push too hard but always be there to help her, not do it for her but help her. People have told me there is a college for everyone, I believe that to be true. An SAT test, GPA, or one college will not be the deciding factor of success for my daughter's future. She will be.

Reading all that caused me anxiety! Lol. I had twins and one was playing a sport in college, too, so things got pretty crazy senior year. (I had to keep a notebook to keep it all straight.) As I explained in an earlier post, we took sort of a different approach. It all worked out. I fear for people reading that they may think if they don’t do x, y, and z just so, their kid might not get into college. Not so. I truly believe that anyone who wants to go to college will find a way to go. It’s our job as parents to help them navigate this in a way that is right for them (and doesn’t cause a nervous breakdown - in parent or child! ).

Well, ,I think we have decided. We are going with Community College and hopefully transfer to a four year school after that. I decided to cancel out SCAD open house weekend that's coming up because I don't think it would be kind to show DD what school she won't be going to.

As much as I would lover her to experience the freshman on campus college experience, I cannot justify spending $50K just for the experience. I just don't think she is ready for an art school at this point.

Sounds like a good plan! It could change again. But it sounds very realistic. I hope your DD feels good about it!

 

[Skippy918]

Someone told me (who is a teacher) that for some schools dual enrollment is an automatic in.

This is probably state specific. In our state, auto admission is top 6-10% of graduating class for public universities. Top 6 for the more competitive state schools.

 

[mjkacmom]

Someone told me (who is a teacher) that for some schools dual enrollment is an automatic in.

Automatic in for what? DE courses aren’t even transferable to many colleges. My kids had better luck with AP’s.

 

[SandyinMonterey]

Automatic in for what? DE courses aren’t even transferable to many colleges. My kids had better luck with AP’s.

Acceptance to college.

 

[TiggerTrigger]

When did you start planning college visits and tours? Summer between 10th and 11th grade or after that?

We took an unconventional approach to this and were on the late side with some of our visits. We often couldn't secure official tours when we were in the area of certain schools (either weren't offered on our dates or were booked solid way in advance), so we opted for a number of drive throughs and self-guided tours based on campus maps. My older one said that many schools look to see who has taken the time to visit so if it wasn't an official tour, we'd take a pic of her near an iconic area of campus and she'd post to social media, tagging the school. She also did a number of virtual visits, requesting virtual info from the school, as it just wasn't possible to see it all in person. Most schools understand this...especially if you live further away. Beyond that, my older one is a 2024 and we just got in her last official visit (pre application process) about 3.5 weeks ago. Most people we know finished visits over the summer leading into senior year, but we had two in October.

 

[TiggerTrigger]

This is probably state specific. In our state, auto admission is top 6-10% of graduating class for public universities. Top 6 for the more competitive state schools.

Texas?

 

[TiggerTrigger]

Someone told me (who is a teacher) that for some schools dual enrollment is an automatic in.

I wouldn't say it's an automatic in, especially with more competitive schools, but it looks good and dual enrollment factors heavily into class ranking in our district. I wish I knew that sooner as mine only did one summer of dual. She has classmates that have been doing dual enrollment since the summer between 8th and 9th grade and no amount of AP will match the way dual enrollment has boosted their class standings. While mine have been in AP classes throughout high school, we have another option called "OnRamps" that's offered through University of Texas - Austin and tied to many of the AP classes. So, we've opted for credits from UT Austin over AP. We've actually seen a number of people have both their AP and community college dual enrollment credits count as electives at 4-year colleges (so transferrable, but not for core requirements), but the UT Austin OnRamps credits are treated like taking a core college class at any accredited 4-year institution...which is nice since it's things like physics, calculus, and bio where we've done OnRamps.

 

[VandVsmama]

I have a senior in high school. Here's some stuff we've done in case anyone here finds it helpful:

1. There's a parent board on another message board website which has "Parents of HS Class of 20xx." I follow that. Gives me an easy way to compare notes w/other parents going through the same thing we are.
2. 11th grade - went on college tours. Visited 2 of our in state public universities (we're in AZ). Learned that ODD loves 1 of them, hates the other, and refused to apply to the 3rd in-state public U. Also went to visit 2 in-state public U's in NM because they both have financially attractive AZ reciprocal tuition scholarships for out of state students if you graduate from an AZ high school, thus making it cheaper to attend there than out of state.
3. 11th grade - figured out what the $$ amount per year was that our family could afford to pay. TOLD the child this. Also told ODD that she'll be responsible for paying for her own books & personal expenses (clothing, spending money, stuff like that). Used Net Price Calculators on college websites to rule out a lot of places.
4. 11th grade - went on some college tours in TX. Found 2 small private colleges which she really likes. Explored these based on the high school's college counselor recommendation to do some research on Colleges That Change Lives. some of them have VERY attractive auto-merit scholarships which might make it approximate to paying to attend AZ in-state U.
5. Starting Jan of 11th grade - I set aside 15 min each week on Sunday after dinner to talk college stuff w/ODD. For the rest of the week, we didn't talk about college stuff. Set a timer for 15 min and once the timer goes off, you have to wait until the next week. This helped a lot with ODD not feeling like we were nagging her all the time.
6. During the weekly 15 min sessions, I also gave ODD small 'assignments' to do each week. For example, ODD really loves biology and that's what she'll major in at college. We put together a spreadsheet that she filled out so every week, she'd look up one major's graduation requirements at one college. The next week, she'd do the same for a different major at the same college or at a different school. By the time we went on college tours in March & April, we had a lot more info at hand and it was done in small increments over time, so it didn't feel overwhelming. Having it on a spreadsheet helped because then ODD could quickly scan it and compare 1 biology program to another. You'd think that they're all the same, but they're not. Subtle differences like this major at this school requires a year of calculus, but the same major at a different school requires a semester. That sort of thing.
7. after every tour - Don't tell the kid YOUR impression right away. On the drive back, ask the kid what THEY think. Because THEY are the ones deciding this ultimately, not you. This is the 1st 'adult' decision your kid has to make and it's a big one. Your role is to guide, not do it for them. Once kid tells you what they think, THEN you throw in some of your opinion. Have kid jot their initial thoughts down because I guarantee you that they'll forget several months later.
8. after every tour - You may find that BEFORE the tour, your kid thought that they wanted X type of school, but then AFTER the tour and AFTER seeing the surrounding area/town/etc., their opinion of what they want is changing a little bit. That's normal.
9. Figure out what the most important factors are in the decision for YOUR family. This could be affordability (it was for us!), proximity to home (or to an airport, aka how easy is it to get home for visits), what sort of campus 'vibe' does your kid need/want, does your kid have any learning disabilities/learning differences that you should factor in (if yes, then you should visit the campus's Disabled Students office while you're there and ask questions), how easy (or hard) is it to find housing, do you prefer smaller class sizes or is it ok if your freshman intro to computer science class at UC Berkeley has 1000 students in it (no joke, it really does). You get the idea.

For OUR kid, for example, decision factors in figuring out "The List" have been:

• 'nowhere cold' - this means 'nowhere where there's 6 months of winter' and 'nowhere in the NE'
• affordability - we won't qualify for a lot of financial aid but also can't afford $75,000/year
• where can she get in - ODD doesn't have above a 3.5 unweighted GPA, for example.
• is on campus housing fairly easy to get or is it a lottery and you might have to live in an off campus apartment as a freshman? If it's the latter, then not even applying there.
• what's the bio major program like?
• are there stores/shops/restaurants within easy walking distance of campus? ODD won't have a car freshman year.
• Does the school give AP credit? Does it give CLEP credit (if you don't know about this, go look up a website called Modern States...they talk about it on the "Your College Bound Kid" podcast several months ago). What type of credit does the school give (not all of them are the same, lots of variation here)?
• What are the general ed requirements like? A standard set of requirements for everybody or is it an 'open curriculum' for general ed stuff? (ODD prefers the former)
• How easy or hard is it to actually get the classes you'll need to graduate in 4 yr?

ODD has applied to 7 schools, 4 of which are Rolling Admission schools (if you don't know what that means, go look it up). She's been accepted to the 4 rolling admission schools. The remaining 3 are small liberal arts colleges, to which she applied as EA (Early Action, different than Early Decision...lots of into about this online if you're not familiar w/the terms). Based on CDS (Common Data Set) data on those colleges' websites & based on Naviance data (which your high school would give you access to login to if your HS subscribes to Naviance), I'm pretty sure that ODD will get accepted at the 3 LACs.

And then it'll be a matter of finding out what the financial aid packages are from those LACs.

She's also applying for non-music major performing arts choir scholarships at each of the 3 LACs because she does choir after school and thinks it would be fun to participate in choir in college (the counselor & I also think this could end up being a 'hook' for her at these 3 LACs).

Are the LACs prestigious? No. But we don't care about prestige. 1 of the LACs has a physician assistance grad program, for example, which guarantees you a PA grad school interview if you start at the LAC as a freshman AND you have a 3.5 cumulative college GPA. ODD wants to be a PA, and there's not a whole lot of programs like this with a guaranteed grad school interview, so that's why the school is on the list. Plus, it's not on the other side of the country and she liked the school when we visited AND I think it just might be in the realm of affordable.

 

[mjkacmom]

Acceptance to college.

Acceptance to college is based highly on gpa and rigor, but having DE classes does not equal acceptances. At some schools test scores are still important, and then there are extracurricular activities, letters of recommendation, awards, essays… Tons of HS students take honors/AP/DE classes, which improves the weighted GPA, but most colleges recalculate weighted because there is no standard.

 

[SandyinMonterey]

Acceptance to college is based highly on gpa and rigor, but having DE classes does not equal acceptances. At some schools test scores are still important, and then there are extracurricular activities, letters of recommendation, awards, essays… Tons of HS students take honors/AP/DE classes, which improves the weighted GPA, but most colleges recalculate weighted because there is no standard.

My friend knows 2 girls (one is her best friends daughter) that both got accepted to a selective school. Both dual enrollment. Only AP class between the two of them is AP philosophy and one is a cheerleader.