Anyone else go to a college with a nontraditional grading system?

[pnwclimb]

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Hey everyone, I'm new here and was curious if this was an issue that faced anyone else!

I attended The Evergreen State College (BS in biology), where instead of grades, students receive narrative evaluations. I found them to be wonderful, as they not only touched on your academic strengths and weaknesses but also other aspects of your time spent as a student- participation in class and outside of class, your ability to work with others, etc...

But my transcript is HUGE... imagine a 1 page long essay per class I ever took. Who would want to read all of that?

I am now taking physics/chem/anatomy/physiology sequences at the local community college, so I will ultimately have a GPA, which I think will help me out.

So, has anyone else gone through applying to DPT programs with such a nontraditional transcript?

 

[DesertPT]

From PTCAS FAQ:

"If narrative evaluations were used at your institution in lieu of grades, you should list your coursework and use P (Pass) as the grade if pass credit was awarded or NG (No Grade) if there is a purely narrative evaluation of your performance with no associated credit value listed on the transcript. Copies of narrative evaluations will be forwarded to your designated programs."

I would honestly just call each of the PT programs you are interested in applying to and ask you if you will be alright with a GPA that is based off just a few pre-req classes, and if your narrative evaluation will be considered and if you can still be competitive for the program. And since you are going to end up with a GPA, but only because of ~24 credits worth of classes, it would be highly advisable that you get straight A's, as one or two B's is going to affect that GPA dramatically and that GPA may still be used to rank you against other applicants. Scoring >75th percentile in all sections of the GRE will also help your cause. But again, I would ask to speak with an admissions counselor at each school and find out the approach they would take with your application.

Also, if you are pre-physical therapy student, please change your status to reflect such. It currently reflects that you are a licensed PT or OT. And welcome to the forum. 🙂

 

[pnwclimb]

From PTCAS FAQ:

"If narrative evaluations were used at your institution in lieu of grades, you should list your coursework and use P (Pass) as the grade if pass credit was awarded or NG (No Grade) if there is a purely narrative evaluation of your performance with no associated credit value listed on the transcript. Copies of narrative evaluations will be forwarded to your designated programs."

I would honestly just call each of the PT programs you are interested in applying to and ask you if you will be alright with a GPA that is based off just a few pre-req classes, and if your narrative evaluation will be considered and if you can still be competitive for the program. And since you are going to end up with a GPA, but only because of ~24 credits worth of classes, it would be highly advisable that you get straight A's, as one or two B's is going to affect that GPA dramatically and that GPA may still be used to rank you against other applicants. Scoring >75th percentile in all sections of the GRE will also help your cause. But again, I would ask to speak with an admissions counselor at each school and find out the approach they would take with your application.

Also, if you are pre-physical therapy student, please change your status to reflect such. It currently reflects that you are a licensed PT or OT. And welcome to the forum. 🙂

Thank you for the detailed response! I will get in touch with the schools I am interested in and find out how they would approach my application.

 

[DesertPT]

Thank you for the detailed response! I will get in touch with the schools I am interested in and find out how they would approach my application.

Nice. Let us know what you find out so that it can be here for future reference, and because I am curious. 😀

 

[pnwclimb]

Nice. Let us know what you find out so that it can be here for future reference, and because I am curious. 😀

I'm sending out emails this afternoon, so as soon as I hear anything back I will share the news! Thanks a lot.

 

[pnwclimb]

Nice. Let us know what you find out so that it can be here for future reference, and because I am curious. 😀

So I just heard back from SFSU and the admissions office requested I send them copies of the syllabi and evaluations of the pre-reqs I completed at Evergreen so they can review them. Hopefully they will meet their standards, but I imagine this might be a good idea for me to do with each and every school I intend to apply to. I don't intend to apply until next fall, so it is good I am starting this now in case I need to re-take anything!

 

[DesertPT]

That would suck bad if you had to retake classes over a technicality...if I was you I would limit my applications to schools that would accept my pre-reqs as it. Good luck!