Influence of final transcripts on wait list decisions

[Guest]

I was wondering how much final transcripts influence final grades? I had an upward trend building where I was getting most of my grades in the A's except one class. This semester it looks like I will have perhaps two or three B+'s which should at least be around my GPA but it will end my upward streak of nearly eliminating B's.

I'm trying to get off a wait list and I'm hoping this doesn't look horrible to them. My true explanation is that I had a few teachers who miscalculated some grading percentages on assignments but that's not something you say to admissions committees.

Edited May 2, 2012 by Windfish

[TakeruK]

Are they asking for updated transcripts at this point? I had thought schools don't usually want the final final super official transcript until they've accepted you and you need it to officially register/enroll. Even if your GPA goes down a bit, it shouldn't matter too much, since for everyone else they had already accepted, they made the decision based on December/January transcripts anyways, so why should your case be different?

[Guest]

I suppose it isn't necessarily required and they will hopefully make their decision before final transcripts are even available, but when I visited them they told me that I had the option to send them in as they make decisions of who to crept off the wait list.

[TakeruK]

On applications, whenever something is "optional", I always interpret it as "Only do it if helps you". So if your overall GPA is lower with the final transcript, don't send it in, unless you really want to show that you have a certain grade in a certain course or something. As long as you still meet the admission requirements in the end, it should be okay.

Good luck!