Evaluating international GPA

Question

Hi all,

This post is on behalf of all Indian applicants (other international applicants can join in too). Can anyone ,once and for all, end this uncertainty over what is a "good International GPA" and what is a "bad International GPA"? How do we compare our 10 point scale with the 4 point scale in US? There is so much data available on admits and rejects that uses 4 point scale but all of that is futile for an international aspirant who can't convert his/her GPA according to the scale used in US schools.

Thanks!

Admissionado · Answer

The real answer: It's not possible. Plus, your school matters as much, if not more than your GPA. Plus, the school will anyway look at your Indian grade and not some conversion. Finally, finally, let's say that in most places anything above an 8 is fantastic. above 7.5 very good. (roughly)

CriticalSquare · Answer

Jon's rule of thumb is as good as it's going to get rb3007. There's no cut and dry answer here. There are a lot of factors at play that make overlap in comparisons pretty common place. Which, actually, is the case when considering ANY gpa. Your major, pedigree of institution, etc. all play into this. To try to compare or convert gpas is forcing an apple to apple relationship that doesn't exist unfortunately.

Bhavik

Bhavik

RB3007 · Answer

Thanks for your responses. But, all schools report mean/median GPA on their websites and also, the admission statistics shown for various schools here on gmatclub use charts of GPA and GMAT. Then how do they factor in the scores of international applicants while putting out this data?

Insights on this will be much appreciated. Thanks!

Insights on this will be much appreciated. Thanks!

CriticalSquare · Answer

So there's a wrinkle in this entire process. This is self reported information for both marketing and ranking purposes. Schools don't follow any specific methodology when it comes to converting foreign GPAs. They all do things a little differently and that method evolves. So how HBS converts GPA will differ from Wharton which will differ from Ross. There are commonalities, but no industry wide standard (even if you consider WES, etc.). Depending on how schools convert it, your converted GPA could range a bit. So when you look at median/mean GPAs, they include foreign students but exactly how? Well, that varies.

I know this was an answer that wasn't an answer but that's because this is just too grey an area for a black and white answer. I hope it helped a bit though!

Bhavik

I know this was an answer that wasn't an answer but that's because this is just too grey an area for a black and white answer. I hope it helped a bit though!

Bhavik

Evaluating international GPA

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