Grades and college admissions

Now that high school students here in the Bozeman area have finished the school year, I'm hearing from my clients and their parents about their grades. All good news so far. I wanted to take a moment to share here some of my general thoughts about grades.

First, I don't think grades are necessarily a great measure of student learning or performance. They are a measure of how each student's performance measures up with each teacher's standards, which can vary and sometimes be pretty subjective. So I think they should be understood with this in mind.

Second, I don't think grades are good motivators for students. External motivators can be effective in the short term, but grades don't foster a lifelong love of learning. I encourage parents not to fixate on A's and B's, but instead to ask their student what they think about their learning and progress.

Third, and most important for my consulting practice, I don't dismiss the importance of grades altogether because colleges and universities do look at student transcripts and GPA's, and these do have a prominent role in admissions, especially at highly selective colleges. What colleges look for most is a student's ability to be successful in challenging courses of the kind they'll be taking in college. They want to see that the student embraces and manages challenges well, and they want to see signs of progress and effort. Colleges make every effort to contextualize grades, and they read students' supplemental essays explaining why, for example, they struggled in math during the pandemic, or handed in several assignments late because of a family emergency. Colleges view the high school transcript as an important piece of the student's overall academic story. This is what I try to convey to my clients. I don't want them obsessing over their grades, but I do want them to have a realistic sense of the relationship between their transcript and college admissions. To the best of my ability, I encourage them to find their own motivation to succeed.

If you'd like to learn more about the college admissions process and how I can help, please use the contact form on my website to schedule your initial consultation.