AMCAS Year-by-year GPA

[Vihsadas]

Hey guys, I did undergrad for 6 years. Two years as a music major, and four years as a physiology and physics major. Unfortunately, it seems, AMCAS counted my first and second years in music as my freshmen and sophmore years, my first year in science as my junior year, and my last THREE years in science as my 'senior' year.
This is unfortunate because now my AMCAS transcript says that my senior year GPA is a 3.44 instead of a 3.84 where it should be. I have a feeling this, on top of applying late is going to kill my application...
Georgetown cited, 'insignificant improvement of academics after experiencing a slow start in university.' I suggested to them that my AMCAS senior year was actually my last three years, and the person on the other end paused, and then just said, 'unfortunately, we still cannot re-consider your application.' Which of course I knew.
Anyone had any experience in convincing AMCAS to distribute the grades how they should be distributed as indicated on my transcript?

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[pedro4199]

They did the same thing to me. I had 71 hours in my "senior year" lol. I thought about saying something to them, but I didnt bother. Doh! Stupid AMCAS!

 

[Bre]

Yeah I think that's standard procedure for AMCAS. I wish they just seperated it into 1st year, 2nd year...etc for as many years as you took classes.

 

[patrickd223]

I graduated from high school half a year early and did 9 hours at a CC. I then transfered to a 4 yr university and began like I normally would have. Are you saying that AMCAS will include the CC grades + 1 semester of univ grades as "freshman year". If so that is really stupid!! 👎

 

[Vihsadas]

Wow. This news is really disheartening. I think I'm going to draft a short letter to outline this situation to the schools that I have left on my application. It's pretty infuriating that an administrative loop may kill my chances at higher level schools. Has anyone had luck getting AMCAS to correctly report grades?

 

[littlealex]

I graduated from high school half a year early and did 9 hours at a CC. I then transfered to a 4 yr university and began like I normally would have. Are you saying that AMCAS will include the CC grades + 1 semester of univ grades as "freshman year". If so that is really stupid!! 👎

I don't know what I did, but somehow all of my CC credits during highschool was correctly listed as under highschool.

 

[MedStudentWanna]

Wow. This news is really disheartening. I think I'm going to draft a short letter to outline this situation to the schools that I have left on my application. It's pretty infuriating that an administrative loop may kill my chances at higher level schools. Has anyone had luck getting AMCAS to correctly report grades?

They are correctly reporting them. The rule is that the first 30 hours is freshman year, the second 30 is sophomore, the third 30 is junior, and anything and *everything* after that before graduation is considered senior year. Didn't you guys read the website? It states it quite plainly.

 

[Vihsadas]

They are correctly reporting them. The rule is that the first 30 hours is freshman year, the second 30 is sophomore, the third 30 is junior, and anything and *everything* after that before graduation is considered senior year. Didn't you guys read the website? It states it quite plainly.

Just because it states it some way doesn't mean its fair...And yes I know that nothing is fair, but I would like fair representation of my development.

 

[0Complications]

Just because it states it some way doesn't mean its fair...And yes I know that nothing is fair, but I would like fair representation of my development.

I agree with you on this one. The best way to handle it though is probably to touch on it in your PS or in your secondaries.

There are a lot of things in the application process that could be tweaked a bit.

Hopefully they take a closer look at your app. I'm going to go through the same thing next year, so I'm pulling for you.

 

[ChubbyChaser]

They are correctly reporting them. The rule is that the first 30 hours is freshman year, the second 30 is sophomore, the third 30 is junior, and anything and *everything* after that before graduation is considered senior year. Didn't you guys read the website? It states it quite plainly.

Hmm I usually take 18 or 19 huors a semester, how does that work?

 

[MedStudentWanna]

Just because it states it some way doesn't mean its fair...And yes I know that nothing is fair, but I would like fair representation of my development.

What do you want them to do? Senior year trial one, senior year trial two, senior year trial three? They're not going to split them up into year one of college - year eight or however long it took you to graduate because it would be ridiculous. Every college student is different. Some are there only three years, some three and a half, some four, some five, some six, and some even more than that. Adcoms can't judge a person who was in undergrad only 3 years vs. someone who was there for 6 because years 4, 5, and 6 won't appear on the year-3 guy's transcript. So instead, they break it up into freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior with average caps. This way, two transcripts can be comparable -- to see how they both did in their first 30 credits while trying to adjust to college vs. how one did in his first 30 and how another did in his first seven credits, which is all he took that first year. The only possible exception is senior year since some people took more than 30 credits while others didn't.

Also, obviously, the 6-year student had a greater chance of getting a higher (or even a lower) GPA by either taking fewer classes each year or having to retake classes, etc. Imagine if they're comparing year one of two students. Student A only took a total of 15 credits the entire year and managed a 3.8. Student B took 32 credits and got a 3.6. You don't think it should be taken into consideration that Student B took double the number of credits that year and that when Student A reaches the 32-credit mark, his GPA might be a bit lower too? They would clearly see this if the application was broken up by freshman year (credits 1-30) because both Student A and Student B would be on a level playing field.

Adcoms can only compare the GPA by credits and in order to break it down by credits, AMCAS is going by the average. Schools everywhere consider the first 30 hours to be freshman year and the next 30 to be sophomore year, so it isn't like AMCAS is blazing new ground here. The way they're doing it makes it uniform. It lists under each year how many credits were earned that year so it isn't like med schools think your senior year was only 30 credits when it was 90 or something.

Hmm I usually take 18 or 19 huors a semester, how does that work?

I don't know. You should call and ask.

 

[BDNF]

i'm a little confused, so amcas splits your gpa into 4?

e.g. freshman 3.3
sophmore 3.5
etc..?

Do they have a total gpa, somewhere? If so, then you shouldn't worry right?

 

[MedStudentWanna]

i'm a little confused, so amcas splits your gpa into 4?

e.g. freshman 3.3
sophmore 3.5
etc..?

Do they have a total gpa, somewhere? If so, then you shouldn't worry right?

Yes, they break it up per year and then there's a slot for "overall GPA," a slot for math and science GPA, a slot for "all other" GPA (meaning all classes except math and science), a slot for "post bacc GPA," and a slot for "grad GPA."

 

[Myuu]

This is exactly what it looks like, minus the blobs and sloppy handwriting.

 

[MedStudentWanna]

Quick question. If a course is still in progress at the time of submitting your AMCAS, does it show up or are you just required to submit it afterwards? I plan to send in my AMCAS in June, but I'll be taking a summer course that goes from May - July.

 

[Vihsadas]

What do you want them to do? Senior year trial one, senior year trial two, senior year trial three? They're not going to split them up into year one of college - year eight or however long it took you to graduate because it would be ridiculous. Every college student is different. Some are there only three years, some three and a half, some four, some five, some six, and some even more than that. Adcoms can't judge a person who was in undergrad only 3 years vs. someone who was there for 6 because years 4, 5, and 6 won't appear on the year-3 guy's transcript. So instead, they break it up into freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior with average caps. This way, two transcripts can be comparable -- to see how they both did in their first 30 credits while trying to adjust to college vs. how one did in his first 30 and how another did in his first seven credits, which is all he took that first year. The only possible exception is senior year since some people took more than 30 credits while others didn't.

They should just report every academic year as a separate row. This way kids who took more credits in a given year could be given an advantage since they worked harder in that year. Just to be clear, this rule would be fair, and it would WORK AGAINST ME...but its still fair. Grouping years together doesn't highlight any growth or development that occurs in a chronological year, AND, it is a disadvantage to students that took 30+ credits in an academic year vs. a student that only took 24.

Also, obviously, the 6-year student had a greater chance of getting a higher (or even a lower) GPA by either taking fewer classes each year or having to retake classes, etc. Imagine if they're comparing year one of two students. Student A only took a total of 15 credits the entire year and managed a 3.8. Student B took 32 credits and got a 3.6. You don't think it should be taken into consideration that Student B took double the number of credits that year and that when Student A reaches the 32-credit mark, his GPA might be a bit lower too? They would clearly see this if the application was broken up by freshman year (credits 1-30) because both Student A and Student B would be on a level playing field.

See above. of course the student with more credits should have that fact taken into account.
Furthermore, perhaps you didn't see that I completely switched majors, AND departments. I switched from a Bachelor of Music to a Bachelor of Science. I effectively STARTED OVER as a freshmen in my 3rd year. I took 120 credits in years 3-6 just like any other freshmen student starting in year 1.

Adcoms can only compare the GPA by credits and in order to break it down by credits, AMCAS is going by the average. Schools everywhere consider the first 30 hours to be freshman year and the next 30 to be sophomore year, so it isn't like AMCAS is blazing new ground here. The way they're doing it makes it uniform. It lists under each year how many credits were earned that year so it isn't like med schools think your senior year was only 30 credits when it was 90 or something.

I don't know. You should call and ask.

I realize that. But in reality, how long does an adcom look at anyone's application? A major thesis of my application was the improvement I showed in fulfilling my academic potential in my last few years, and on the MCAT exam. Too bad the Adcom may look at my app for only 1 or 2 minutes, and see '3.44' in my "senior" year and say, 'Huh. He didn't improve at all. NEXT!'...When in reality I improved drastically. If they see a '3.8' vs. a '3.44' its going to have a different effect...regardless of the number of credit hours listed.
This is unfair in my case, because the adcom may not realize that the GPA they are seeing stems from a completely different degree than what is listed in my 'freshman' and 'sophmore' GPAs. Having the grades reported year by year would be fairer to students such as myself, and to student who took more credits per year, and it would not change the final cumulative GPA.

 

[paradocs we are]

They are correctly reporting them. The rule is that the first 30 hours is freshman year, the second 30 is sophomore, the third 30 is junior, and anything and *everything* after that before graduation is considered senior year. Didn't you guys read the website? It states it quite plainly.

I am not sure if that is entirely correct. I didn't read their website though. But I do have my verified AMCAS report and the first year is 30 hours, 2nd year another 30 hours, 3rd year 33 hours, and the 4th year 30 hours. So they did put all my 3rd year courses together and listed it under my junior year (despite me going over the hour *limit* by 3 hours).

 

[MedStudentWanna]

I am not sure if that is entirely correct.

It is correct. It's written in plain English on the AMCAS site and if you look at the post that has a scanned transcript, you'll see that it backs me up. His senior year credit hours for BCMP and overall were 43 hours and 59 hours respectively. Who do you know who can take 59 credit hours in one year? Obviously, that was done in more than one year and they lumped it together under senior year, whereas every other year had roughly 30 or so credits. In your case, since it was 33 instead of 30, they probably allowed it, but I bet if it had been 40 for your junior year, they would have split it up.

They should just report every academic year as a separate row. This way kids who took more credits in a given year could be given an advantage since they worked harder in that year.

Say student A took 8 credits for the whole year (say he took Chem I and Bio I with labs) and got a 4.0, but student B took 40 credits for the whole year (say he took Chem I, Bio I, Physics I, and Orgo I with some other gen ed classes) and got a 3.6. Using your logic, you're saying that student B would have an advantage since he worked harder, but your reasoning is flawed. If it's split up by year, then all the adcom looks at is "first year a 4.0" vs. "first year a 3.6." If it's broken up by number of credits, then the adcom can equalize the two students and see that once student A racked up 30 credits and got past the Chem I and Bio I, his GPA dipped a little too. In other words, he can compare by saying "30 credits, a XXX GPA" vs. "30 credits, a XXX GPA" insted of "first year" vs. "first year."

Furthermore, perhaps you didn't see that I completely switched majors, AND departments. I switched from a Bachelor of Music to a Bachelor of Science. I effectively STARTED OVER as a freshmen in my 3rd year. I took 120 credits in years 3-6 just like any other freshmen student starting in year 1.

I did see that, but it doesn't matter. Do you have any idea how many people actually earn a degree in something totally unrelated to medicine and then come back to do the pre-med classes and/or earn a second degree? ALL their coursework is counted too and everything after their first graduation is counted as post-bacc classes. You can't make special rules that just because someone changed their major and started over, their first few years shouldn't be mixed in with their others. If that was the case, then anyone who screwed up freshman year would just adopt another major so they could get a fresh, clean start.

Too bad the Adcom may look at my app for only 1 or 2 minutes, and see '3.44' in my "senior" year and say, 'Huh. He didn't improve at all. NEXT!'...When in reality I improved drastically. If they see a '3.8' vs. a '3.44' its going to have a different effect...regardless of the number of credit hours listed.
This is unfair in my case, because the adcom may not realize that alot of what they are seeing are from a completely different degree than what is listed in my 'freshman' and 'sophmore' GPAs, and that I effectively started over as a new freshmen in the sciences.

I don't think it's unfair at all. You own your grades. If there's an improvement, great! Maybe they'll see that. If you're worried, address it in your secondaries. But this notion that it's unfair isn't cutting it. Everything counts. EVERYTHING! You said your senior year is a compilation of three separate years. Great, but if there wasn't an improvement from the start of those three years, your GPA is going to suffer. It's a shame, but it happens. It's the only way to equalize the candidates at least somewhat. They can't compare your year 6 of college with someone else's year 4. It just doesn't work like that and it shouldn't. If it did, then people would spend 5-6 years in college and hammer out the A's in order to impress adcoms since those years will have their very own slot.

 

[Vihsadas]

Say student A took 8 credits for the whole year (say he took Chem I and Bio I with labs) and got a 4.0, but student B took 40 credits for the whole year (say he took Chem I, Bio I, Physics I, and Orgo I with some other gen ed classes) and got a 3.6. Using your logic, you're saying that student B would have an advantage since he worked harder, but your reasoning is flawed. If it's split up by year, then all the adcom looks at is "first year a 4.0" vs. "first year a 3.6." If it's broken up by number of credits, then the adcom can equalize the two students and see that once student A racked up 30 credits and got past the Chem I and Bio I, his GPA dipped a little too. In other words, he can compare by saying "30 credits, a XXX GPA" vs. "30 credits, a XXX GPA" insted of "first year" vs. "first year."

That still doesn't satisfy the argument. By your logic, student A who took the same credits over more time is equal to a student that took the same credits over less time. I mean, clearly the student who took less credits per year is going to have a higher GPA. How is comparing credit by credit a better representation of the academic ability of a student?

I did see that, but it doesn't matter. Do you have any idea how many people actually earn a degree in something totally unrelated to medicine and then come back to do the pre-med classes and/or earn a second degree? ALL their coursework is counted too and everything after their first graduation is counted as post-bacc classes. You can't make special rules that just because someone changed their major and started over, their first few years shouldn't be mixed in with their others. If that was the case, then anyone who screwed up freshman year would just adopt another major so they could get a fresh, clean start.

You are strawmanning my argument. Please don't put words in my mouth. I wholeheartedly agree that ALL of my grades should be counted. In fact, it is more congruent with my secondary essays/PS that they see that I sucked in my first years and improved over the rest of my undergraduate life. I never stated otherwise.
I never stated I wanted a 'clean slate' or 'fresh start'. I only stated that the improvement I made is not accurately represented.

I don't think it's unfair at all. You own your grades. If there's an improvement, great! Maybe they'll see that. If you're worried, address it in your secondaries. But this notion that it's unfair isn't cutting it. Everything counts. EVERYTHING!

I never stated or argued otherwise. I don't know why you keep coming back to this point. The thesis of my argument wasn't that 'These grades shouldn't count'. The thesis was that the chronological depiction in my academics is a better representation of my academic development.

You said your senior year is a compilation of three separate years. Great, but if there wasn't an improvement from the start of those three years, your GPA is going to suffer. It's a shame, but it happens. It's the only way to equalize the candidates at least somewhat. They can't compare your year 6 of college with someone else's year 4. It just doesn't work like that and it shouldn't. If it did, then people would spend 5-6 years in college and hammer out the A's in order to impress adcoms since those years will have their very own slot.

If the level of coursework is equivalent (and it was in my case) then why not? So it's unfair that my 30-credit senior science year in all upper level 'bear' courses be counted against another student's senior science 30 credit year. How the heck is that unfair? Why shouldn't it? So you're saying that just because I'm older and I figured out how to get As, that shouldn't be taken into account? That's ludicrous. My improvement is proof that I am able to handle a large course load and get As. Over my 6 years I've taken approximately 180 credits...just like any student who took 4 years and took 120 credits.

 

[paradocs we are]

It is correct. It's written in plain English on the AMCAS site and if you look at the post that has a scanned transcript, you'll see that it backs me up. His senior year credit hours for BCMP and overall were 43 hours and 59 hours respectively. Who do you know who can take 59 credit hours in one year? Obviously, that was done in more than one year and they lumped it together under senior year, whereas every other year had roughly 30 or so credits. In your case, since it was 33 instead of 30, they probably allowed it, but I bet if it had been 40 for your junior year, they would have split it up.

A little rude, are we?

 

[DavisStudent]

Yes, they break it up per year and then there's a slot for "overall GPA," a slot for math and science GPA, a slot for "all other" GPA (meaning all classes except math and science), a slot for "post bacc GPA," and a slot for "grad GPA."

So i'm a little confused. Do adcoms only see the grades by year? Or will they also see the classes and grades per semester (or quarter in my case) as well?

 

[Mandek]

This is exactly what it looks like, minus the blobs and sloppy handwriting.

Whoa! so this is how it looks like 🙂 Do they round your GPA to the next digit? For example, if your GPA really is 3.457 would it be 3.46? LOL...was just curious, AMCAS does things weird. How does FR, SH, JR, SR classifications work? if you took classes in the summer, how do they know which year it belongs to?

 

[pky463]

Whoa, my school must have high credit hours assigned to classes because most kids take 16-18 credits/semester..I've taken 20 most semesters..I wonder how AMCAS will deal with that one.

 

[87138]

Whoa! so this is how it looks like 🙂 Do they round your GPA to the next digit? For example, if your GPA really is 3.457 would it be 3.46? LOL...was just curious, AMCAS does things weird. How does FR, SH, JR, SR classifications work? if you took classes in the summer, how do they know which year it belongs to?

I believe summer courses automatically belong to the coming school year, not the one that came before it. It's been a while though.

 

[Mandek]

I believe summer courses automatically belong to the coming school year, not the one that came before it. It's been a while though.

Ok, what about if AFTER a Freshm year, someone took a a fall semester off for personal reasons and came back in spring semester (as their first sophmore semester) and then just made up the lost semester with summer credits here and there?

 

[87138]

Ok, what about if AFTER a Freshm year, someone took a a fall semester off for personal reasons and came back in spring semester (as their first sophmore semester) and then just made up the lost semester with summer credits here and there?

That I'm not really sure.

But to shed light elsewhere at least:
http://www.aamc.org/students/amcas/2008amcasinstructionsrvs.pdf

"• Assign the upcoming status to summer session courses (e.g., summer
courses between your freshman and sophomore years should be assigned
Sophomore (SO) status)."




Also, there's this:
Applicants who have been enrolled part-time, or who have had interrupted
attendance, should use these ranges to determine their appropriate status for each
term:
High School (HS) College-level course work taken while in high school
Freshman (FR) 0-32 semester hours
Sophomore (SO) 31-64 semester hours
Junior (JR) 61-96 semester hours
Senior (SR) 91 or more semester hours



So maybe the summer courses would be considered part of your soph year and not your junior?

I'd call someone at AMCAS to clarify.

 

[Mandek]

That I'm not really sure.

But to shed light elsewhere at least:
http://www.aamc.org/students/amcas/2008amcasinstructionsrvs.pdf

"• Assign the upcoming status to summer session courses (e.g., summer
courses between your freshman and sophomore years should be assigned
Sophomore (SO) status)."




Also, there's this:
Applicants who have been enrolled part-time, or who have had interrupted
attendance, should use these ranges to determine their appropriate status for each
term:
High School (HS) College-level course work taken while in high school
Freshman (FR) 0-32 semester hours
Sophomore (SO) 31-64 semester hours
Junior (JR) 61-96 semester hours
Senior (SR) 91 or more semester hours



So maybe the summer courses would be considered part of your soph year and not your junior?

I'd call someone at AMCAS to clarify.

Thanks. 👍

 

[SketchLazy]

nvm...

 

[Mandek]

What happens if someone decides to go for a second bachelors degree? Do the grades/credits for the second bachelors degree get mixed in with the senior year GPA section of AMCAS or do they credits for a second bachelors degree go under "post-bacc" section of the AMCAS?

 

[pedro4199]

AMCAS gave me 71 hours in my "senior year."

 

[Gabby]

What happens if someone decides to go for a second bachelors degree? Do the grades/credits for the second bachelors degree get mixed in with the senior year GPA section of AMCAS or do they credits for a second bachelors degree go under "post-bacc" section of the AMCAS?

Anything on the undergraduate level that you take after graduation from college with your first degree is considered post-bacc.

 

[Perfoman]

Hm, this means I'll have like 125 hours listed in my senior year...😕

 

[BabyJ]

double post, accident. . .

 

[BabyJ]

This is exactly what it looks like, minus the blobs and sloppy handwriting.

How do I get to this screen?

 

[SketchLazy]

How do I get to this screen?

Sign into your AMCAS application page. Click on the print application button on the right side of the screen. An adobe pdf version of your application will be generated. You'll see that box after your list of classes. I think the box is only filled out if you are verified by AMCAS.