Question about Retroactive Withdrawal

[lesset01]

Hello everyone!

My undergrad university has a academic forgiveness option that will allow me to take off up to 3 semesters from my GPA. This will substantially help my GPA (put it well over 3.0, haven't done the exact math yet). My issue is that it doesn't erase them, it simply removes them from my GPA calculation.

Would it be worth it to do this if AMCAS is going to recalculate my GPA anyway?

The reasons for not withdrawing at the time are basically denial and immaturity. The semesters are from 2003, so I've changed quite a bit in that time and the grades I earned prior to that were mostly As with a couple of Bs. Since returning to school last year I've gotten straight As.

Thanks in advance for the advice.

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[docelh]

Great story.

A university could lose its accreditation over something like this. Call me skeptical.

 

[FrkyBgStok]

hell no! med schools are going to look at your straight Ws and say WTF? IF you get an opportunity to explain this, what are you going to say? If you don't (which is more likely), what are they going to say? i would definitely just take it how it is and work with it.

 

[lesset01]

Great story.

A university could lose its accreditation over something like this. Call me skeptical.

Hmm, considering the school is accredited I do not think that is the case. I believe the true name of the policy is "academic forgiveness" but it behaves in the same way. If a student has been away from the University for more than 4 years, had a low cum GPA prior to leaving and since returning has earned a GPA > 2.5 in at least 12 hours then they are eligible to petition for this.

 

[docelh]

Bulk retroactive redaction of grades is a big no-no in academia.

Moreover, AMCAS may want to know the grades. I don't know for certain, but it seems like they would.

 

[lesset01]

Ack...I think I gave the wrong policy in my original post. I got them confused. Ok retroactive withdrawal is where they replace your grades with Ws. But that policy is for students who had someone in their family die or were ill during the semester and have very good reasons for not withdrawing at the time.

My question is over academic forgiveness which is a different policy. It simply removes the grades from your GPA calculation but not from your transcript. Not sure if this is worth it since AMCAS recalculates your GPA anyway. Sorry for the confusion...I edited my original post so it makes more sense.

 

[MiniMoo]

Ack...I think I gave the wrong policy in my original post. I got them confused. Ok retroactive withdrawal is where they replace your grades with Ws. But that policy is for students who had someone in their family die or were ill during the semester and have very good reasons for not withdrawing at the time.

My question is over academic forgiveness which is a different policy. It simply removes the grades from your GPA calculation but not from your transcript. Not sure if this is worth it since AMCAS recalculates your GPA anyway. Sorry for the confusion...I edited my original post so it makes more sense.

Schools only see the AMCAS GPA calculation on your application, which will include all of the classes, so it won't make any difference.

 

[DrMidlife]

Moreover, AMCAS may want to know the grades. I don't know for certain, but it seems like they would.

AMCAS requires you to submit every college transcript and practices no grade forgiveness.

My question is over academic forgiveness which is a different policy. It simply removes the grades from your GPA calculation but not from your transcript. Not sure if this is worth it since AMCAS recalculates your GPA anyway.

If you want to go to med school you get no benefit whatsoever from using your school's grade calculation policy. AMCAS (in particular) will completely ignore any GPA calculation done by a school. Not even AACOMAS will let you take advantage (unless you repeated all the coursework and did better). If you want to get an MBA or go get a job, and you want a nice GPA on your resume, then sure.

Best of luck to you.

 

[DrMidlife]

Schools only see the AMCAS GPA calculation on your application, which will include all of the classes, so it won't make any difference.

Schools get all the data and can do their own calcs, but they mostly don't. This is how a school like Miami can weight postbac performance for instaters.

 

[MiniMoo]

Schools get all the data and can do their own calcs, but they mostly don't. This is how a school like Miami can weight postbac performance for instaters.

Of course schools can do their own calcs, but from what I understand, they won't see the OP's GPA with the grade forgiveness included since they won't have the actual Ugrad transcripts.