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| Chapter 7: Factoring
Numbers in the Real World |
Calculating GPA
Assessing how well students understand what they are being taught is always a challenging task for a teacher. The culmination of that task is the grade earned by each student in the class. That grade combined with the rest of the grades for that semester amounts to a semester grade. All of the grades earned throughout a college career combine to form an overall average grade. This grade is called the Grade Point Average (GPA).
The scale for converting your letter grade to GPA points is listed below
for both 11 point and 4 point grading systems.
| Letter
Grade |
11 Point
GPA |
4 Point
GPA |
| A+ | 11 | 4.0 |
| A | 11 | 4.0 |
| A- | 10 | 3.7 |
| B+ | 9 | 3.3 |
| B | 8 | 3.0 |
| B- | 7 | 2.7 |
| C+ | 6 | 2.3 |
| C | 5 | 2.0 |
| C- | 4 | 1.7 |
| D+ | 3 | 1.3 |
| D | 2 | 1.0 |
| D- | 1 | 0.7 |
| F | 0 | 0.0 |
The formula for computing GPA is:
1) Convert each course grade to the appropriate
scale value.
2) Multiply the number of credit hours for
each class by the course grade.
3) Total the class credit points, as well
as the credit hours.
4) Divide the total credit points by the total
credit hours.
To figure your semester GPA (on the 11 point scale) if you have four
3-hour classes with grades of B, C, C-, and D+:
3(8) + 3(5) + 3(4) + 3(3)
= 60 credit points
60/12 = 5 yields a
semester grade of C
Figure your semester GPA on the 4 point scale. Is the semester letter grade the same?
How could you have determined your letter GPA just by looking at the four grades?
Compute your actual GPA. Figure out what grades you need to earn this semester to improve your cumulative GPA by one letter grade increment.