Do you grade too hard? Or too easy?
In my blog post about Reconsidering Homeschool Grades, one mother shared her experience:
It is so amazing that I came across this article today because if you had published this last month I would have just ignored it, but it just so happens a college admissions officer came to visit our co-op and said these very words! She said that homeschool transcripts lacked courses designated “Honors” or “Advanced”. She said that it didn’t have to be called “Advanced Placement” (a College Board® designation) in order for it to be “Advanced”. She said that *our grades were low for the amount of work the kids were doing *and that we were not weighting enough of those grades and giving a weighted GPA along with an unweighted one which meant that we missed out on a lot of scholarship money! Honestly, I was surprised by this revelation, but it has been an eye-opener! Thank you Lee for bringing up this issue!
But should homeschoolers always get all A’s?
Are you saying that all the grades should be “A’s”? While I think taking all things into account is fair, I would imagine that a college might view all “A’s” from a home school student with skepticism. My son had A’s,B’s, and B+’s. He also had 3 “A’s” from his Community College classes. I often wondered with each course if the grade was too high or too low. I kept records of everything I could keep track of.
Absolutely not! However, sometimes homeschoolers are MUCH harder graders than other teachers. When a homeschooler has all A’s in high school and all A’s in community college, then YES, they deserved all A’s at home. You want your homeschool grades to be reflected by some outside documentation, like SAT scores, or community college, or recommendation letters.
If you have all A’s you are not at a disadvantage in college admission!
For more information, I have a free webinar called “Grades, Credits, and Transcripts, Oh My!“
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