Calculating Your ATCAS GPAs

Overview

During verification, ATCAS uses the information you entered in the Transcript Entry section to calculate several GPAs, including GPAs for each institution you attended. To calculate these GPAs, each A-F or 0-100 grade you entered in the Grade field is first converted to a ATCAS numeric grade value, then multiplied by the attempted credits. The resulting product is Quality Points.

Your total Quality Points are then divided by your Attempted Credits to determine your GPA.

Non-graded credits are not included in your GPAs. Non-graded credits are earned credits for which you did not receive actual letter grades (e.g., advanced placement credits, "pass" or "satisfactory" credits, college board AP exams, courses taken as pass/fail, etc.). Note: a grade of WF (i.e., equivalent of a withdrawn with penalty, withdrawn failing, etc.) is factored into GPA calculations as an F.

ATCAS calculates all GPAs in semester hours. Courses that were completed in quarter hours are converted to semester hours. The conversion ratio is 1.0 quarter hour = 0.667 semester hours.

Use the GPA Calculator to see how ATCAS will calculate your GPA.

Example:

Course	Transcript Grade	Converted Numeric Grade Value	Attempted Credits	Calculation	Quality Points
MATH 1100	A	4	4	4 x 4	16
ENGL 1310	B	3	3	3 x 3	9
GEOL 1610	C	2	4	2 x 4	8
PHED 1000	D	1	3	1 x 3	3
PSCI 1040	F	0	3	0 x 3	0
Total			17		36
GPA Calculation: 36 (Quality Points) / 17 (Attempted Credits) = 2.12 (GPA)

GPA Types

School GPAs

School GPAs are based on your overall GPA for each school you have listed in the Colleges Attended section. Because of the standardization that occurs during verification, it is not uncommon to see GPA discrepancies between what your schools calculate and what ATCAS calculates. Discrepancies can occur for several reasons, including if:

ATCAS does not recognize an individual school's policies for forgiveness, academic renewal, or grade replacement for repeated courses. ATCAS will verify based on how grades for repeated courses are reported on the official transcripts. All grades earned for repeated courses are factored into your ATCAS School GPA.
ATCAS's numeric grade values differ from an individual school's.
ATCAS calculates all GPAs in semester hours. Courses that were completed in quarter hours are converted to semester hours. The conversion ratio is 1.0 quarter hour = 0.667 semester hours.

Additionally, note that if you manually enter more than one college as an "Unlisted US Institution" in the Colleges Attended section, then your GPA for all the unlisted colleges will be combined into a single "Unlisted US Institution" GPA.

School GPA Example:

School Name	Graded Credits	Quality Points	GPA
ABC College	97.0	334.0	3.44
XYZ University	35.0	94.0	2.68

Year-level GPAs

Using Quality Points, ATCAS calculates a GPA for each academic year. GPAs from your Freshman, Sophomore, Junior, and Senior academic years are subsequently:

Combined with any post-baccalaureate coursework to create a cumulative undergraduate GPA, and
Combined with any post-baccalaureate coursework plus any graduate coursework to create an overall GPA.

Year-Level GPA Example:

Year	Credits	Quality Points	GPA
Freshman	66	166.2	2.52
Sophomore	48	119.4	2.49
Junior	66	223.2	3.38
Senior	60	169.2	2.82
Total	240	678.0	2.83
Post-Baccalaureate	28	112.0	4.00
Cumulative Undergraduate	268	790.0	2.95
Graduate	66	245.4	3.72
Overall	334	1035.4	3.10

Course Subject Category GPA

Course Subject Category GPAs are based on your overall GPA in each course subject category, regardless of academic year. During verification, ATCAS ensures course subjects are placed in the correct categories so that GPAs reflect the appropriate coursework.

To view which course subject GPAs are calculated by ATCAS, refer to ATCAS Course Subjects.

Course Subject Category GPA Example:

Course Subject Category	Graded Credits	Quality Points	GPA
Biology/Chemistry/Physics	84.0	270.0	3.21
English	6.0	15.0	2.50
Mathematics	6.0	18.0	3.00
Other Science	34.0	90.1	2.65