Do Senior Grades Matter for ED?Answered
I'm planning on applying to Cornell ED. Will my senior year grades matter? Our school does grades on a semester system and my first semester grades won't be finalized until the decision is released. Also,I know that if you get a D or F colleges will take back your admission status, but will having a few Bs senior year matter?
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2 answers
Yes and No.
No, if you have a strong GPA like 3.9-4.0 unweighted and your junior year was equally strong with challenging course rigor.
Yes, if you don't have an apparent upward trend in your grades and course work rigor. This means if your 10th-grade transcript looks better than your 11th-grade transcript. Or let's say you did take hard classes but you got (6) As and (2) Bs or you were given strong real grades for 11th-grade 1st/2nd quarter, or 1st and 2nd trimester but only received a Pass for the last semester.
The reason they matter for those instances is that usually in the ED application pool are the strongest candidates or those whose top choice is the school they are applying to. So while the admissions rates are typically higher that is deceptive to someone who is not a 1.) recruited athlete, 2.) legacy 3.) development candidate (family with deep pockets committed to donating or has been donating charitably), 4.) son or daughter of a parent who is employed by the school, or 5.) someone who has been earmarked by the dean of admissions for some reason or other (famous person, political favor, etc).
When you take these 5 classes of typical ED applicants out of the ED pool you end up with a pool of competitive applicants that have to compete on merit and their record. Therefore if you are up against someone who has a higher GPA or taken a harder course and did well, then you want to show the admissions committee your 1st quarter grades.
How do you do that?
1.) Ask your counselor to send them in.
2.) If they don't or not motivated to, then craft an email and send them in yourself and cc your HS counselor to cover your a@@ and give credibility to the grades themselves. After all, if you are cc'ing your counselor, you wouldn't be lying.
Hope this is helpful and clarifies whey senior grades matter for ED.
Good luck with your Cornell application.
So I largely agree with match but a very dumbed down version is they do matter but not for admissions.
You applY ED and get admitted then I’m 99% confident you would send in your grades at the tail end of senior year. If you end up having 1 C 1A rest abs you may get your admission rescinded. But it will not matter when they admit you the first time under ED.
Hope this helps and please comment if you need clarification as I’d be happy to help clarify!
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There's also the possibility you get deferred from ED and need to send in senior year grades anyways.