How do they calculate your GPA?

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I will be getting my 2nd degree either ADN or BSN (I already have my Bachelor in Communications). I won't be applying to any accelerated programs because I know my limitations.

I graduated with a GPA of 2.51 from multiple unfortunate circumstances which I do plan to explain in nursing applications.

I'm currently taking prereqs at a community college and anticipate this semester to be about a 3.3.

Do they use that GPA for admissions or do they calculate 2.5 somewhere into the cumulative?

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It depends on the program, but usually when it says "GPA" without any qualifiers, it's talking about the GPA of all courses you have taken. So it would consider what GPA you have with both the courses with your first degree and the prereq courses you've taken sense. You'd have to calculate exactly what that would be.

Some programs though focus mostly on your prereq GPA and some require you meet their overall GPA minimum and then rank/accept based on prereq GPA.

But a GPA of a bit over 2.5 might be a hard sell.

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My adn program only looks at science pre reqs g.p.a and general education requirements for the program. If I didn't find my program, I'm quite sure I would of had to go the lpn route because my Bachelors g.p.a was 2.2 and my community college g.p.a was a 3.3 overall, even with a science g.p.a of 3.9 I was not competitive at all. If you apply at the community college where you currently are going, more than likely they will not include your bachelors g.p.a. Another option you have is enrolling into a school you know you really want to go to, create a g.p.a there and then apply to their school but this is very risky.

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Forgot to add

Option 1: 2.5 + 3.3 = 5.8 divided by 2 = 2.9 g.p.a

Option 2: 120 credits x 2.5 =300

30 credits (guess estimation of credits at Community college)

30 x 3.3 = 99

399 (total of graded points ) divide by 150 ( total of credits) =2.66 g.p.a

I would assume its up to the individual school, you would have to ask an advisor.

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IDK - I've seen some that only look at your last 60 credits or only the prereq GPA but so many of them also the cumulative and/or science GPA requirement to apply even if they don't use that as an admissions decision!

I know 2.5 is a VERY hard sell. I know I could get into one of those cash-cow private universities that will take anyone who pays but I don't want that on a resume, ya know? I don't want a sub-par education either. No point in going through nursing school if you can't pass the NCLEX and I wouldn't want that nurse caring for me.

It has just been SO much research. I have a huge list of schools I've ruled out based on GPA requirements, not taking transfers or 2nd degrees, requiring advanced Chemistry classes, only taking freshman..its crazy!

TURTLE - thanks for the calculations. I wasn't sure how to do that. I graduated from this community college with my associates years ago but I will only have taken about 20-25 total after my Bachelor degree. I also have a GPA from another community college that I took online classes at - about 10 credits. This is why it is getting so confusing for me!

Even above a 2.75 would be better. Yes, hard sell but it would at least allow me to apply to schools that I had ruled out because of that requirement.

As for the community college program - I live in NY, huge population. So the acceptance starts at 4.0 and goes down from there =/

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Im from NY and I have a stack of rejection letters, mostly stating my g.p.a was just not high enough. My partner relocated to the DMV area for his dream program, I figured heck Ill leave too and try my luck in another state. I know how difficult it could be, so many qualified applicants get rejected because of the high number of applicants and competitiveness. I have plenty of friends who drive all the way to NJ daily for their programs, its rough. I always regret not going the lpn route, its 11 months and they start off pretty decent. It's a lot easy bridging into a lpn- rn program. Sometimes you have to get your foot in the door first and move along from there.

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Specializes in Psych ICU, addictions.

It depends on the program. The ADN program I went to counted only the grades in the required pre-req classes..which was good for me as I had a 4.0 among the pre-reqs, but my GPA from my first bachelors' degree from way back when was only 2.7.

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What ADN program are in you if you don't mind me asking

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Howard Community College in Maryland and it happens to be accelerated so its 14 months. I also got more points because I have a bachelors.

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