Two Quick Transcript Questions

[JumpyTheFrog]

Do high school transcripts only include the final grade? In other words, do they care about quarterly grades, like on a report card?

Is there any reason that courses need to line up with school years? Does it matter if I have my 8th grader start high school science halfway through 8th grade rather than at the start of 8th or 9th grade? If we started a course partway during the school year would I list the final grade on the transcript for the grade when he finishes it?

[ElizabethB]

Semester grades.  If a course is a year long, break it into two semesters.

[MerryAtHope]

I’ve only seen final grades on transcripts,  so I don’t think you really need to put quarter grades in there. When we had classes that started one year and went into the next, I recorded the class in the year that the student spent the most time on it. If it’s an equal amount into different years, then you could put the grade in  your student finishes the course, or divide it into semesters if you prefer. 

[Farrar]

The public school transcripts I've seen, by and large, use the semester level grade.

I've seen homeschool transcripts that do it both ways - semester and final.

I don't think I've ever seen quarter grades included on a transcript.

I think you can pick. Really, colleges aren't going to be picky about this for the most part. Do whichever puts your student in a better light.

Edited November 22, 2019 by Farrar

[RootAnn]

For awhile, I listed semester grades on my DD's transcript, but ended up changing the format to only list end of course grades.

I think it is fine to list a class in the year it is completed.

[daijobu]

I went back and forth on including semester grades, but ultimately chose to only include final grades just because it looked cleaner, and the semester grades didn't add much information.  If you have any classes that are 1 semester long, it may look cleaner to include semester grades for all classes.  

We schooled year round, and I ended up "squishing" classes that were mostly taught in one school year into that school year, just for simplicity, and who cares about plus or minus a few months?  It makes more sense to have biology in sophomore year, than May of freshman year, through the summer, and then finishing in February sophomore year.  

On my transcript for high school courses taken in middle school (in my case, algebra and geometry), I organized my transcript by subject, with the most recent courses at the top.  So 7th grade would have algebra and 8th grade would have geometry.  Then I would include those in my high school transcript for the box-checkers, but italicized them and asterisked them to indicate that they did not count in high school GPA and the units did not count for graduation.  

[regentrude]

We have listed only final grades. 

We listed the grade in the year the course was completed.

[klmama]

19 hours ago, regentrude said:

We have listed only final grades. 

We listed the grade in the year the course was completed.

Same here.

[lewelma]

We listed courses in the year the majority of the work was completed, rather than when the course was finished.  

[Another Lynn]

I listed final grades only because 2 semester grades and a final grade looked really cluttered to me.  Also, I arranged the transcript by subject and did not list dates or grades (i.e. 9th, 10th, etc)  for the courses at all - again, partly to keep it uncluttered (imho).  Also, in my school profile I added a line explaining that the transcript was arranged by subject because we school year round rather than follow a traditional school calendar.  (Or something like that.)  

Edited November 25, 2019 by Another Lynn