Final Grades/GPA thread/School/University Discussion

[Firestorm]

If all you've got to put on your resume is the name of your school, it's probably not going to come down to "this person went to a better school". I'm building up my portfolio and doing Co-op terms for experience while in university. I'm also in the process of setting up a blog to get experience with writing and as a portfolio piece. I assume that's going to make more of a difference than a name.

I didn't even apply to the "better" named school in my province because it didn't offer any of the programs I was interested in.

 

[Wobby]

Alright so guys, I don't really know if this is out of place or not, but I am taking AP US History next year and I was wondering if anybody could give me an idea of how the course works? My friend that took it a few years ago told me that they "weed out the slackers with excessive homework in the first few weeks." I'm super freaking scared! Even the summer assignment is going to take me at least two weeks! My questions are...

Does the work load ease up? I know that different people have different teachers, but there must be some similarity.

How did your teacher grade you? More on participation and homework or more on tests/quizzes?

And overall, is the material difficult to comprehend? Is the course more information-based or discussion-based?

EDIT: You can say your grade that you got...to make it more relevant...

 

[Fabbles]

As I also took APUSH last year, I can give a little advice. Hopefully, your teacher will be testing you with actual AP questions from past tests. This is the easiest way to study all year for the multiple choice section of the exam.

If you are able to convince your teacher (if not, do it by yourself), do some practice essays from old AP tests as well and time yourself. There are plenty of resources you can use that will have practice essays and grading guidelines which have many bullet points of what the grader is looking for. Aside from actually knowing the topic, the thesis is the biggest part of the grade. If you have a weak thesis, even with good information in the essay, don't expect higher than a 6 or 7 at best.

Lastly, my best advice to you is read. Even if you are not assigned reading, read up on some of the more important topics to understand them better. Not only will this help in the multiple choice section with some of the more obscure questions, but the readers like it when you put some out of the way, yet still very important information in your essay.

Luckily for me, my teacher was very experienced (and a Quaker!) so I learned a lot from his daily lectures / discussions. He knew what the AP test is looking for so he made sure that we covered the topics well.

Without studying, I managed a 94 in the course simply by reading the text every night as assigned. As we had to take 2 pages of notes from about 10 pages of reading, it really stuck in my head when my teacher discussed it the next day. If you keep up your reading, the only thing you need to prepare for the actual AP test is the essay.

Good writing and memorization skills (along with an interest in the topic) get you far.

 

[Haitian]

just graduated high school :naughty: 15th out of 490 people

Attending George Washington University next year ;)

ya idk what my grades are because new york gets out of school fucking late but i'm going to gw in the fall too! georgetown's way too fucking expensive while gw gives out tons of financial aid. good deal.

 

[Polis4rule]

AP US History is a push over. In fact, in relation to the other AP tests, the history exams are just a pushover. It's all about manipulating the exam. You don't need to do extraordinary on the MC portion in order to even get a 3. You just have to do well on the essays and DBQ (well is a 5 on the essays). And that literally is manipulation, especially the DBQ where you don't need to know a lot of outside information in order to do well on that.

But that being said, practice tests will help. I suggest getting a study book, like the one from Princeton Review or Baron's to help you with that, in case you don't do it in school.

 

[Nate]

At my high school, teachers were sometimes rewarded based on how well their students did on the AP. As a result, they would do exactly what you described and attempt to weed out as many people they didn't think were capable of getting a 5 on the test as possible. After a month or so, the pace would settle down, and everybody remaining in the class would get a 5.

The workload will, for the most part, come down to reading a lot of stuff every night, the occasional test, and writing a fair amount of stuff. If you can read quickly and write an acceptable paper quickly, you won't have any trouble. If you hunt and peck / read with your index finger, the work may bring you down.

 

[tennisace]

I'll join in I guess. I'm a junior, soon to be a senior. I don't do the whole excuse thing, what I did was what I did, and really I don't give a damn. I could have worked a little harder in the end, but I chose to actually do a ton of extracurriculars with friends than burning myself out with non-stop studying. My school doesn't offer AP anymore, so Honors Classes are college classes with a college curriculum ('cept for Physics).

Italian III - A
I can't speak the language worth a damn in reality but come on, the teacher reviews the quizzes before she gives them. She even did that on the final.

Honors Physics - A+
Pushover class, I got 8 college credits for a supposedly college level class. We had no calculus in it, and even then we didn't do like any formulas. It was ridiculously easy. I took one look at the Physics SAT2 book and didn't bother taking the test in the end because the class was so bad. Still, big boost, and my teacher loved me. I got the underclassman award in this class.

Gym/Peer tutoring/Health - A+/Pass/A+
Jerks don't give me a 100 for peer tutoring anymore, which is me helping kids in Algebra I Part I learn to do simple math. I also showed up for every gym class and changed for gym class, so I got a 100. Health was a repeat of Sophomore health.

URI Writing/English 4 - A-/A+
The first part of the year was your standard college Intro to Writing class, equivalent to Writing 101 or Freshman Writing. Hopefully the college I go to will accept this and I won't have to go through it again. I was one of only like 5 A's in the class, it was a complete bitch because the teacher graded for grammar, not content. However I caught on quick and proofread the fuck out of the papers. On the final I lost points because "I didn't decorate the portfolio". Seriously. Second half of the year was a pushover, culminating in a 20-25 minute presentation on a decade. I got a 97, probably because my group got the teacher her favorite coffee xD.

Pre-Calculus - A-
This teacher was hell. And by hell I mean I got a 90 the first test of the year, and a 52 the second. There was a test where I had the second highest grade in the class with a 64. He taught Calculus too, and on their final, nobody passed. Keep in mind the teacher is retiring at the end of the year and it was a class of teachers. He was cruel to everyone, and made jokes about how we were all going to fail. I barely made it out with an A, because I got a 100 on the midterm, third quarter, and the final. Only one other person got an A in that class.

Honors Chem - B
I would have gotten a B+/A-, if I hadn't completely given up quarter 3 and gotten a 74 by sheer luck. I don't even care, I didn't like the teacher to begin with. Somehow I got an award for excellence in this class even though there were a bunch of kids with a higher overall average. Whatever though, I got what I deserved.

By the end of the year, I ended up with 8 college credits each from chem and physics, and 3 from the writing course. Next year I'm going to get either 12 or 18 more credits, depending on whether I take another honors course or not. I also get 6 from Providence College over the summer for free, because they invited a bunch of my kids from my school for a pilot program where they let us take two classes at night.

I also got two awards for excellence in Mock Trial from the judge (given to people who get above a 9 on their performance), two gold medals in Science Olympiad (right place, right time), and I got a 2120 on the SAT Reasoning test (770 math, 680 reading, 670 writing). I'm going to take them again to bring reading/writing over 700, but I'm pretty good with where I am.

All in all, I feel like I did my best under the circumstances and I have absolutely no regrets about this year, and really thats all that matters. (Sorry for the TL;DR, I just felt like I should actually add about my experiences in this thread instead of just saying "lolol i gotz a's".)

 

[Flub]

I'm off to Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology next year. I got into Purdue and Carnegie-Mellon, but Rose is only an hour and a half away from my home and gave me a very good scholarship. Purdue was still cheaper, being a public school, but the small size was really appealing. I'll be majoring in math, mechanical engineering, and possibly physics as well. I did 14 AP exams and therefore have 0 elective requirements, allowing me to only do stuff for my majors.

 

[Adamco13]

High School in M.A

Chem: A
Sociology: B
English: B-
Spanish: B
Pre-Calc: A+
History: A

 

[Aiklap]

What would most of you say is the best way of preparing for exams?

Obviously, getting a good sleep before and doing enough revision. But any unusual habits/ beleifs prior?

I find exams much easier and simpler if I'm happy. Strong, up-beat tunes help this, and I go in feeling confident, prepared and on top of things.

 

[chenman333]

What would most of you say is the best way of preparing for exams?

Obviously, getting a good sleep before and doing enough revision. But any unusual habits/ beleifs prior?

I find exams much easier and simpler if I'm happy. Strong, up-beat tunes help this, and I go in feeling confident, prepared and on top of things.

Before I hunker down and study, a big dose of iced coffee. Hell, I take a big dose of coffee before just about anything. Caffeine is pretty effective stuff.

 

[akuchi]

What would most of you say is the best way of preparing for exams?

Obviously, getting a good sleep before and doing enough revision. But any unusual habits/ beleifs prior?

I find exams much easier and simpler if I'm happy. Strong, up-beat tunes help this, and I go in feeling confident, prepared and on top of things.

Smoking. Lots and lots of smoking.

 

[TheFourthChaser]

Finally got my damn report card, should've came last week.

Honors Bio:B+
Algebra:A
Band:A
PE:A
Art:B+
English:A
GPA:3.67

Yeah, I'm freshman so I got some pretty easy classes even though I didn't want art and couldn't get out.

 

[robalo]

Why does P.E. exist only to bring my GPA down? I had straight A's, except for 1 SEMESTER in which I had a B+ in P.E... I don't even know how I got a B+ in P.E... We don't do anything!

 

[Blln]

What would most of you say is the best way of preparing for exams?

Obviously, getting a good sleep before and doing enough revision. But any unusual habits/ beleifs prior?

I find exams much easier and simpler if I'm happy. Strong, up-beat tunes help this, and I go in feeling confident, prepared and on top of things.

maybe this is just for me but I always do better if I stay up all night cramming than if I had gone to bed and not spent that time studying. As far as I am concerned, as long as you drink coffee or something, you can be coherent and clear headed enough to take an exam even with 0 hours of sleep, and that usually I would prefer to spend the night before an exam doing an intensive review - that way everything is really fresh in your mind when you take the test. I know that is not exactly a popular method and is usually discouraged against but I have honestly found that is the way I do best on tests... or maybe just more specifically memory tests. It's the perfect method for SAT 2s, but I would probably rather be well rested for taking the actual SAT for example.

 

[Fabbles]

What would most of you say is the best way of preparing for exams?

Obviously, getting a good sleep before and doing enough revision. But any unusual habits/ beleifs prior?

I find exams much easier and simpler if I'm happy. Strong, up-beat tunes help this, and I go in feeling confident, prepared and on top of things.

Just do whatever you feel comfortable. On exams, you remember more information and perform better if your exam environment is similar to the one that you learned the material in / studied. If you are not use to staying up late, then don't. Consequently, don't get a full nights sleep if you usually only get a few hours.

Stick with what you did all year. Changing now is only going to hurt you on the exam.

 

[Clifford]

Lolz, less than 15% of all APUSH test takers get 5's, but most don't know about this book: Amsco's United States History: Preparing for the Advanced Placement Examination. Best kept APUSH secret, bible for the Multiple Choice section.

Got A's both semesters and a 5 on the exam with this book + class essay practice.

If you have time, do as many past APUSH practice tests as you can. Practice makes (almost) perfect.

BTW consider taking the SAT II subject test in US History if you think you'll get a 5.

 

[Imran]

Obviously A-Levels havent come out yet, but I'd say I'm guarenteed an A in Maths and FMaths. I need also to get an A in Physics if I want to meet either my final or insurance university offers, which I'm fairly confident in but the final two exams didn't go quite as smoothly as I'd hoped. Who cares about RE, I don't need it but a good mark from last year might help me just scrape an A. Haven't taken STEP II/III yet but its not looking good, we'll see what happens.

 

[akuchi]

I'd fucking better get an A in Politics. No work and no revision but they were exams where I could sit down and just write. Maybe a C in Philosophy and a B or a C in History. We'll see. Doing my A levels alone wasn't hard - I just lacked all motivation for the best part of the year, so only started the course the day before the exams. Will be interesting to see how it turns out!

 

[EspyJoel]

I'd fucking better get an A in Politics. No work and no revision but they were exams where I could sit down and just write. Maybe a C in Philosophy and a B or a C in History. We'll see. Doing my A levels alone wasn't hard - I just lacked all motivation for the best part of the year, so only started the course the day before the exams. Will be interesting to see how it turns out!

I felt similar, I hardly revised for AS till a few days before each exam, just didn't have the motivation. I better get A's in Politics and History because the exams couldn't have been much easier and well hopefully B's in Economics and English. Sadly our school makes us do 4 at A2 which'll be fun considering how annoying doing 4 at AS was, they only care about the school results and not about how we feel, its rather annoying.

 

[akuchi]

4 at A2? Nightmare. I would have done 4 this year except the whole doing exams independently thing meant I had to pay for them.. and I can't be bothered to teach myself one, let alone 4. As long as I've got into uni, it's good. If I'd been in college, would have been 3As all round ;_;

 

[EspyJoel]

4 at A2? Nightmare. I would have done 4 this year except the whole doing exams independently thing meant I had to pay for them.. and I can't be bothered to teach myself one, let alone 4. As long as I've got into uni, it's good. If I'd been in college, would have been 3As all round ;_;

*sobs*. Luckily, the boards were so lazy this year as it was new exams so many of the questions were from past papers, the history questions were basically the same as last years AS ones. I'm going up to Sheffield tomorrow to check out the uni, that's probably where I want to go.

 

[Imran]

I really wish I had dropped RE last year. Doing 4 at A2 doesn't really accomplish anything unless your Uni wants 4 A Levels, which is pretty rare.

 

[Firestorm]

Why does P.E. exist only to bring my GPA down? I had straight A's, except for 1 SEMESTER in which I had a B+ in P.E... I don't even know how I got a B+ in P.E... We don't do anything!

Maybe if you did something you would have received an A :)

You people and your APs... I got a 2 or 3 on my English Lit one :( I think I needed a 4 for it to count as credit in university. Coulda used it seeing as in the semester I entered they started requiring us to do 6 credits of humanities courses x.x

 

[Flamewheeler]

My grades for the semester were great, but my exams were just ok. This is only because I really didn't care about them and kinda didn't need to pass them to graduate. I only had 4 classes becausse I was a senior and I really just took it easy.

English Honors: A
Crimnal Justice 2/3: A
Economics Honors: A
Anatomy and Physiology Honors: B

Not bad if I must say so myself. ^^

Exams...meh: A,B,B,B

I plan on just going to my community college for a bit and then transfering to a state college.