GPA On The Move

In the March 2017 issue, a story was written about transferring students’ GPA. In that story, it was printed that CFISD uses a 7.0 weighted GPA scale, I am here to correct this information and state that CFISD uses a 6.0 weighted scale, not 7.0. Below is the corrected story.

Cypress Fairbanks Independent School District (CFISD)  has their own systems for courses and traditions that can make it challenging for new, out-of-district students to acclimate to. Their systems can cause harmful or beneficial change to new transferring student’s grade point average (GPA) as well as class rank.

Senior Judy Labib moved to Cypress from East Brunswick, New Jersey during her sophomore year of high school. Her previous high school, East Brunswick High School, follows a different state’s education rules and policies when it comes to course selection and grade average calculations.

“At East Brunswick, their honors system is different. Their honors and on level classes are basically the same,” Labib said. “There, it takes a lot of work to be put into honors classes, you have to get recommendations and take tests to be placed in their honors classes. I wasn’t aware of any of that so I took all regular or ‘on level’ classes, but their regular classes  are similar to our K level classes.”

Cypress Fairbanks Independent School districted follows a weighted 6.0 scale, each letter grade and course level has it’s own weight and GPA amount. This unique scale makes conversion of transferring student’s GPA difficult.

Because of East Brunswick’s differentiating system, not all of Labib’s classes transferred to Cy Woods’ ideally.

“All of my credits from my old school transferred as L credits because at East Brunswick the course level system is a lot different. There was nothing I could do about it, I went to the counselors and the district and nobody could change anything about my GPA,” Labib said. “To make up it, I took a lot of AP and K level classes and tried to do well in those so I can attempt to bring up my GPA.”

Senior Joshua Nickolay transferred to Cy Woods after his sophomore year from Del Norte High School in San Diego, California.

“At Del Norte there was only AP and Regular level courses, it was a trimester, but it was also a college readiness school,” Nickolay said. “You had to take all your finals, teachers did not give you any reviews and homework was all online. Teachers were not responsible for reminding their students to do their homework even as a freshman.”

Cy Woods is an extremely academically competitive school, making it hard for those with a lower GPA and class rank to stand out for college acceptance.

“Last year I was having a really hard time because I didn’t think I would get into any of the colleges that I wanted to get into because my GPA wasn’t too good,” Labib said. “After a lot of hard work and extracurriculars, I ended up getting into the colleges that I wanted to like the University of Texas and Texas A&M even though I did not think I would get into them at all because of my class rank.”

Labib and Nickolay both tried their hardest to overcome the GPA they transferred here with, but some was unchangeable and at times, detrimental.

“I’m in the 25th percentile, I didn’t get considered to get into Mays Business School because I was not in the top quartile,” Nickolay said. “I still have higher grades than most of my other classmates, but I am ranked lower than them.”

While some students and colleges take class rank very seriously, a lot of students recognize their effort and course rigor ahead of their rank in comparison of their classmates.

“The whole class rank idea is a big deal in Texas, but once you go out of state it is not that heavily considered,” Nickolay said. “I applied to the University of Colorado in Boulder and got into their business program despite my class rank.”

Moving states is a huge adjustment alone, not including having to transition to a completely different high school.  

“The hardest part about moving to Cy Woods was meeting new people, it was difficult for me,” Labib said. “Moving from New Jersey to Texas was also a big transition because of Texas’ traditions that I had to get used to. I love Cy Woods. I began to love the school’s traditions and the people and the teachers. I love all the traditions and Wildcat related things, my old school was not as pepped up and didn’t have as much spirit as Cy Woods does.”

Cy Woods is known for being a welcoming and accepting school to returners and new students.

“There was not a hard part about transferring here, Cy Woods kind of held my hand much more than Del Norte did,” Nickolay said.

Different states, cultures and environments causes Cy Woods to have obvious differences from Nickolay’s previous school in San Diego.

“Del Norte was the number one public school in San Diego, I love Cy Woods but my other high school was a lot more challenging, a bit more diverse, it was also a bit more efficient at teaching students,” Nickolay said.

Although the class rank and GPA may seem to be defining factors, with hard work and perseverance, recovery from outside factors is possible, which lead to Nickolay and Labib’s acceptance to the colleges that they wanted.

Why does CFISD use the 6.0 weighted scale?

Because CFISD offers three different types of course, K, L and AP, they use the 6.0 weighted scale to differentiate the work and requirements for each level of course. K and AP level use the same weight for GPA in the 6.0 weighted scale. For example, an A in a K or AP class is worth 7 points, while an A in an L class using the 6.0 weighted scale is worth 6 points. Most electives, P.E. classes or fine arts are L level.