Doolie Grades

It all depends on the grades...Doolies will have Military grades (MPA), Academic Grades (GPA), and then Physical Fitness Grades (PEA)...

All those are dependent on how well you prepare yourself for the very rigourous first year. Academics are a heavy course load and stem driven. The Military and Physical fitness are new to most doolies. It can be a challenge to learn.
 
ADACOL said:
What do 1st semester Doolie grades look like over the years?
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Not quite sure I understand the question, but, the classes aren't easy, and you'll be very busy. Those letters that look like 8s are called Bs.:) Doolies do fail out, however, there is absolutely no reason to. USAFA wants you to do well. Put your pride to the side, and ask for help. The place is like Hogwarts, and help will always be given to those who ask. The cadets that get in trouble either, don't want to be there, can't come to grips that they are no longer the smartest kid in the class, or are too prideful to admit they need help. You'll find your groove. And, don't despair, every doolie (with the exception of very few) will feel like they are struggling and days away from being eliminated. You'll make it.
 
Almost every doolie entered USAFA as a straight A, top of the class, well rounded, above average high school student. USAFA is a totally different creature. Some students continue to excel academically without too much effort, but for the majority, it's a struggle to balance academics, athletics, and military training, in addition to probably adjusting to being far away from home and their support system for the first time.

Those same straight A students often find themselves making Bs and Cs, possibly even struggling to pass certain classes. My cadet told me he studied more in 1 week at USAFA than he did in all 4 years of high school. He spent 1st semester of doolie year learning how to study and figuring out what worked best for him. His GPA was lower than he wanted, but he's already seeing drastic improvement and encouraged so far this semester.

As a parent, I simply encourage and praise all progress. Doolies have access to their academic class rank, but not details about other cadets. The dean's list is no longer published publicly, so I don't know of a way to know what percentage of the class had a 3.0 or above, etc.
 
ADACOL said:
What do 1st semester Doolie grades look like over the years?
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1st semester 4 deg year, I got a semester GPA of 3.3 and I remember I was somewhere around 470th academically. 2nd semester 4 deg year, I managed to pull a 3.57 GPA which brought my overall academic ranking up to 330s. These may vary across the years but not by much...just for your reference.
 
As an AFA graduate and a former AFA Physics instructor, I can tell you that both your classmates and your instructors will recognize that 'you' earned the right to be at USAFA, so the assumption is that you can do the work. You will want to accomplish your best work in your academic classes, but prioritizing and using your study time effectively will be critical. Be sure to learn 'how' to study and take challenging high school academic courses (as recommended by USAFA and the other SA's). As I've written before, I tell my students today that drive, determination and self-discipline are important. In many ways, like muscles, they get stronger with practice and use. Now is the time to 'make' those muscles stronger. Best of luck with your preparations to become a cadet!
 
My kid was worried he would not get the full academic challenge compared to some other high end engineering programs and was told it is as hard as you want to make it. You can pile the classes on if your want and my kid said time management is always in play.
 
My DS is a Doolie this year. He got a 3.5 his first semester and when rankings came out, he was at about the 32d percentile. It looks like a fair number of students do well from this one datapoint, but he also has a slightly larger share of AcPro students in his sqdn compared to others. The critical things are to manage your time. Know you are going to have your hope for a B type of class (Russian), and try to be on the upper range of the grade band since some classes curve at semester.
 
I got straight A’s in high school, and never had to study once. Last semester, I got all A’s in my classes except for physics. I put the same amount of effort I put in for high school (which wasn’t very much), and i ended up failing physics (but managed to pull off A’s in my other classes). Biggest piece of advice is don’t be afraid to ask for help, and make sure you are putting the work in. I am retaking physics and have an A now, but it is all about the effort you put in!
 
LTBob87 said:
My DS is a Doolie this year. He got a 3.5 his first semester and when rankings came out, he was at about the 32d percentile. It looks like a fair number of students do well from this one datapoint, but he also has a slightly larger share of AcPro students in his sqdn compared to others. The critical things are to manage your time. Know you are going to have your hope for a B type of class (Russian), and try to be on the upper range of the grade band since some classes curve at semester.
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Are you sure a 3.5 is in the 32nd percentile? That would place your DS in the bottom third of the class. That doesn't sound correct to me.
 
DomerDad said:
Are you sure a 3.5 is in the 32nd percentile? That would place your DS in the bottom third of the class. That doesn't sound correct to me.
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Does that ranking include a lower military or PF grade?

I know at USNA - top 20% of class has 3.8 + GPA.
 
ADACOL said:
What do 1st semester Doolie grades look like over the years?
Click to expand...
Two RAND studies looked at nearly 35,000 USAFA records between 1980 and 2011 that were very interesting. One study found 2 year Mean GPAs (from the C4C and C3C years) were 2.81 with a standard deviation of .48 and 2 Year MPAs of 2.89 with a standard deviation of .28. The second study found cumulative 4 year GPAs of 2.96 with a standard deviation of .45. The cumulative MPA was 2.91 with a standard deviation of .28 and a cumulative OPA of 2.93 with a standard deviation of .37.

What this tells me is that most historic academic GPAs are below a 3.0 at USAFA. It also suggests that grades in the first two years are significantly lower than grades in the last two years. To bring a 2.81 up to a 2.96 in two years C2C and C1C GPAs must be well above 3.0. Does the content get easier in the later years? Probably not. Do Doolies develop better study habits as they learn how to be successful at USAFA over time? Probably. Do students do better as they take more classes related to their majors in the later years? Most likely.

This also suggests that MPAs remain very stable over four years.

I can't say what 1st-semester Doolie grades look like, but the data suggests that Doolies average a B+ over the first 2 years. I also believe there has been a small amount of grade inflation in recent years. The last few graduating classes averaged about a 3.05 GPA at graduation. I think the OPA numbers are off over the past couple of years as USAFA has switched computer systems. I believe this because the OPA formula is straightforward forward and the OPA USAFA calculated for my DD was off by about .3 points (too low). She said the students know the OPA is wrong and figured it will get sorted out over time.

I hope this helps.
 
From my experience, folks with a really strong STEM background and brains that just naturally love STEM will excel their freshman year, because they're taking all core classes and most of them are STEM with a few exceptions (english, foreign language, poly sci, ...). After freshman year things kinda average out cause you start getting into major's classes and people either get into harder STEM classes and see their grades go down a bit or they major in a nonSTEM something and their grades go up a bit.

However, that's all just based on what I've seen personally - don't really have the gorgeous data points @DomerDad had :)
 
I should have said the data suggests that Doolies average a B- over the first 2 years, not a B+.
 
I've seen everything from a 4.0 to a 1.2. All I can say about the 1.2 is that they did it to themselves and completely deserved it.

Work hard doolie year, get help when you need it, get a good GPA.
 
The honors lists are no longer on the public website. I think I just noted the younger/est class per each honor roll.:

Term, Class year, # 's for each Honor Roll: Academic/Military/Athletic/Supe List
Spring 2021 C 2024 552/340/253/85
Fall 2020 C2024 587/352/235/84
Spring 2020 C2023 524/331/241/86
Fall 2019 C2022 443/330/279/92
Spring 2019 C2022 523/365/275/91

So for each, that's the minimum that hit the grade to make honor rolls. Could be more, excludes if you are on any probations. Academic is 3.0, exclusive of PE. Military is top 1/3. Athletic is quite difficult; must do well in PFT/AFT and PE grades.

Most of the posts you will see the theme of "Not as All That as When You Were Top Dog in HS". But the opposite can also be true. My DD was not top 10% in HS. She is top 4% GPA now. It's about Study Endurance and Discipline, balancing working hard and smart.
 
An example for "how" to study at the service academies: DD used to set an alarm of 0100 to stop studying & go to sleep.
Sleep in Doolie year is an important factor that you may not consider when you prioritize your schedule, initially.
The saying,"The days are long but the weeks are short" is a positive thought to keep in mind.
 
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