3.96 Unweighted GPA vs 4.00 Unweighted GPA

Answered

Hi,

In my opinion, you're doing great so keep up the good work. If you are a college admissions officer, you are not accepting or rejecting anyone based on Unweighted GPAs not being a perfect 4.00, to begin with. Rather, you are looking at the sum of the parts, not a single part of the whole.

At schools like MIT and Caltech, they do expect you to have either all As or mostly As but an equally important component is course rigor. So if you have a perfect 4.0 GPA and have poor course rigor that really looks back compared to someone with a 3.9 with amazing course rigor.

These schools expect to see AP Calc B/C, AP Physics 1/2/C, AP Chem, AP Bio, AP English (lang and lit), and AP Histories. Plus many admits have taken other higher-level Maths, or CS programming classes, or other classes that evidence their intellectual curiosity.

Hand in Glove with both Grades and Course Rigor are also high test scores. Ideally, you want about 750 EBRW/800 Math or higher or a 35 ACT composite or higher. Since SAT II subject tests are now eliminated, I don't think they count at all. (Also Caltech is TEST BLIND so neither the SAT or ACT will factor in your admissions).

Course rigor is more important than AP test scores because you won't get much credit for an AP test score. At MIT, even if you get a 5, you get zilch for CS, BIO, CHEM, MATH, ENV SCI, PHYSICS 1/2, but you get credit for AP English, AP Physics C, AP History, AP Arts if an only if you get a 5.

At Caltech it's worse. "Please note that we do not grant credit for AP, IB, A Level, Pre-U, or college courses taken prior to enrollment. Each student accepted to Caltech will take a math and physics placement exam prior to enrolling. Based on the results of these exams, you may place out of courses and be granted credit for those courses."

Hope this is useful and helpful.