GPA calculation retake question...

[terpgirl]

No, I'm not here to whine over a 'B' and think I'm doomed to a lifetime of flipping burgers at McDonalds...

I was wondering if anyone knew about the affect of retaking a class on the GPA. Is the class counted twice with both grades factored in, or is the higher one only counted once?

I'm asking because... long story short, I'm handicapped and didn't recieve proper accommodations, ended up very very ill-- withdrawing from 2 classes and a professor failed me in his course because I missed 2 exams, one being the final (I was in the EMERGENCY ROOM!!), reduse to let me make them up--even though I was batting an 80% in biology class--but those 2 exams were around 50% of the grade. It was serious enough of a condition that I later needed surgery. Can't say the surgery was a bad thing, I am a patient at Hopkins (for the last 18 years), and every resident and doctor I/my parents met were so suprised that I didn't let this get me down, and that after all of my surgeries I still love hospitals! Plus, it's nice when you meet people sitting on the admissions committee--voting memebers at that ;-)

And yes, I intend to teach my university a lesson for withholding proper accommodations for no other reason than they felt like it... looking to file a multimillion dollar lawsuit, or settle for tuition (tuition is what I'm aiming for, because I want to put it all behind me, and have them simply admit they did something wrong--and it's a small compensation of the semester of my life/decent grades gone because of them).

Oh, I attend the University of Maryland-College Park.

And yes, I'm new to the forum

-Liz

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[exmike]

the two grades are averaged.
For example:

If you take a 4 credit class and get at C, and retake it and get an A, it becomes 4 units of B.

This is why retaking in most cases if better than taking another class. If you took another 4 unit class and got an A, you'd have 8 units of B. Much harder to raise your GPA against 8 B units than 4 B units.

 

[terpgirl]

Do they just look at the grade, or will the look at the pattern of "Oh, she got an F because of a bad circumstance, and when she retook it she got an A"??

 

[exmike]

the AMCAS is just a straight plug and chug. You can explain extenuating circumstances in your personal statement or in your secondaries.