I’m in the UK. In secondary school (ages 11-18), we have graded results – F, E, D, C, B, A, A\* – for the qualifications you get at 16 and 18.
Batchelors degrees are graded as 1, 2:1, 2:2, 3. They equate to about (respectively) >70%, 60-70%, 50-60%, 40-50%.
I’m constantly confused when watching American TV shows when they talk about school grades etc! The only term I’ve ever heard used in tv is GPA.
How do the scoring systems work in the USA and what scores do they equate to?
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It varies widely based on who’s assigning grades. Growing up, the common definition below the college level was “90 or above, A, 80-89.99 B, 74-79.99 C, 70-73.99 D,” and so on.
College professors are generally free to use their own grading scales. Some don’t even use letter/numerical grades except for the final course grade.
Grades are A, B, C, D, and F and they will usually they’ll give you a +/- depending on how close you are to the line. The grades will generally correspond to 90%, 80%, 70%, 60% and 50% respectively.
Then to get an overall idea of how you did, they’ll usually translate it to a 0-4 scale to get your “Grade Point Average” which will generally show in a single number how you’ve been doing overall. Someone who says they “Got a 4.0” basically means they’re getting all ‘A’s.
100-90%: A
89-80%: B
79-70%: C (this is also the cutoff typically for “passing a class” in college. If you get a C, usually you can move on to the next class the following semester)
69-60%: D
59% and below: F which is a failing grade
We also calculate our GPA. We do this by assigning numerical values to grades. An A is worth 4.0, a B is worth 3.0, a C is 2.0, a D is 1.0, and nothing for an F. You average out your grades across your classes, and that’s your GPA.
I can explain more if you’d like, but that’s the basics of high school and college grading in America.
EDIT: There’s also more nuance with grades having + and – attached, depending on your percentage. I didn’t explain that as it seemed to be getting into the weeds a little bit, but you can get a A+ or a B+ or a C- or whatever, depending on your actual score percentage.
Grades are usually A, B, C, D, and F. Sometimes E, S, N, F (excellent, satisfactory, not satisfactory, failing). And in college, numbers from 1 to 100 but usually just the top 50 or so.
But grades are also 1st (age 6), 2nd, 3rd, all the way to 12th (age 17-18), meaning what year you are in. So somebody could get A’s in 10th grade.
I have never managed to grasp A-level and O-level though you come across it a lot in reading.
Some high schools use different grading systems. I went to a “Classical Academy” high school that, having read about UK public schools, sounds similar – instruction in Latin, philosophy, history and other “Classics” sort of subjects. Our grading was on a seven-point scale: 93-100 was an A, 85-92=B, 77-84=C, 69-76=D, and below was a failing score.
There’s the standard A-D and then F. The percentage to get these varies from teacher to teacher, as some write “easy” tests and then have to set something like 95% as the bar to get an A. Though at the other end most stop before the test difficulty you see in the UK, with a typical A being about 90%.
This same pattern follows through university. These are then converted to a number 0-4 and weighted against the value of the class. A = 4, B = 3, etc.
Some classes contribute a little to your overall grade, some contribute a lot. If you’re doing “advanced placement” courses (ie – lower level university courses while in High School) an A in these is worth more than an A in regular classes and can give you a 5.
AP classes are approximately equivalent to A level in content.
These numbers are multiplied by the class value, called “hours”, and then divided by the total number of hours taken to give you your Grade Point Average (eg, one class is worth 1 “hour” and you get an A, another class is worth 2 “hours” and you get a B you’re now on (1×4 + 2×3)/3 “hours” = 3.33 GPA = B/B+.
So someone saying they have a 4.0 GPA means they got straight As.
Hours in quotation marks as they don’t literally translate to a given number of hours of the week spent on the course.
Note that these don’t translate to UK degrees in the same steps. A 3rd is approximately a C/C+, 2:2 is approximately a B-, 2:1 is approximately a B+/A-, and 1st is an A/A+
The letters used in the US grading system from best to worst are typically A, B, C, D, and F. These are then assigned a point score, typically 4.0 for A, 3.0 for B, 2.0 for C, and 1.0 for D. The mathematical mean of all the points will give you your GPA, or Grade Point Average.
That’s the simple version.
Here’s where it can get a little complicated. Most commonly, the grade scale is 90-100% is A, 80-89% is B, 70-79% is C, 60-69% is D, and 0-59% is F. However, that scale can vary. Sometimes a 93-100% is A, 85-92% is B, 75-84% is C, 67-74% is D, and 0-66% is F. Or whatever scale the instructor, program, school, or organization wants to use. Whatever the grading scale, the GPA still works the same way… A is still 4.0, B is still 3.0, and so on.
Then, you sometimes will have have an A, AB, B, BC, C, CD, D, and F scale. With this, most often, A is 4.0, AB is 3.5, B is 3.0, BC is 2.5, C is 2.0, CD is 1.5, and D is 1.0. GPA still works the same way, by taking the mean of all the points.
Other times, you might see a +/- version… A+, A, A-, B+, B, B-, and so on. Sometimes the pluses and minuses are disregarded and only the major letters are used to get a point score, as in the first paragraph. Other times, it’ll be A+, 4.33; A, 4.0; A- 3.67; B+ 3.33, and so on.
Finally, the only other exception might be “honors” or “Advanced Placement” courses, which might be given a 0.5 point “bonus” because the courses are considerably harder. This will result in an A getting a 4.5, B at 3.5, and so on.
I’m going to try again as my comment was removed the first time.
The information in the first post is not correct.
In 2014, Michael Gove reformed the national curriculum and one of the changes was the way gCSEs were graded. This does not apply to Scotland.
Up until that point, at GCSE level the grades were a-f, the same as A levels.
From 2017 forwards, the system changed to grades 1-9
Grade 4-5 are both grade C. Four is a low C, 5 a secure C
Grade six is a B
Grade 7 is a low A
Grade 8 is a secure A
Grade 9 is an A*
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