Submitted GPA vs. GPA on the transcript
Hello scholarship administrators. We are struggling with the GPA inputted by students vs. the unweighted GPA on the transcript. Although we specifically ask students to input their unweighted GPA as it reads on their transcript, we have found that often it's not a the same as what's on the transcript...which we discover when staff or volunteer evaluators open the transcript and check. Since so many opportunities are tied to GPA, we obviously can't delete that question from the application. But we'd love to hear any thoughts about how others have considered this conundrum. Appreciate any insights you can share. Thank you!
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Do all the applications show the unweighted GPA? If not, students may not know how to calculate. Another explanation that might explain the discrepancy would be a situation in which the transcript was uploaded at a different time than the application was filled out. I spent last fall reading thousands of admissions applications for a university. The information came from the common app. We recorded place in class where available. There were less than 20 instances, out of thousands, for which the PIC that the student entered on the common app matched the PIC that was on the transcript.
Aside from having staff enter the number, you could try giving explicit instructions to the applicants. Is there a way for students to see third party uploads? I have never wanted them to so I don't know if it is possible, but if it is, you could tell them to wait until the transcript is uploaded, then open it and type in the number exactly as it appears on the transcript.
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