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Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 12:29 am
by Anonymous User
My GPA is, let's say for the sake of argument, 3.596. For resumes that I send out on my own, outside of my school's career services channels (which do have their own rules, requiring 3 decimal places on the GPA), would it be acceptable to round my GPA to 3.60?

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 12:34 am
by Renzo
Anonymous User wrote:My GPA is, let's say for the sake of argument, 3.596. For resumes that I send out on my own, outside of my school's career services channels (which do have their own rules, requiring 3 decimal places on the GPA), would it be acceptable to round my GPA to 3.60?
I would personally round to 2 places, and put "(unofficial)" after it, just so you don't look like you're lying if anyone notices.

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 12:40 am
by Leeroy Jenkins
I think employers care more about your class rank than the accuracy of your GPA to four one-thousandths of a decimal place.

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 12:46 am
by Anonymous User
Lxw wrote:I think employers care more about your class rank than the accuracy of your GPA to four one-thousandths of a decimal place.
My class rank is not reported by the school.

-OP

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 12:48 am
by Anonymous User
Say you have a 2.7846 -- could you round to 2.79 or is that going too far?

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 12:52 am
by Leeroy Jenkins
Anonymous User wrote:Say you have a 2.7846 -- could you round to 2.79 or is that going too far?
That's not rounding.

hth
Anonymous User wrote:
Lxw wrote:I think employers care more about your class rank than the accuracy of your GPA to four one-thousandths of a decimal place.
My class rank is not reported by the school.

-OP
You could do like GPA: 3.60 (to 2 decimal places)

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 12:52 am
by aguacaliente
don't round up. when the employer sees "3.60", they will know automatically that it is rounded, which is drawing attention to the fact that it is actually lower. plus, they will eventually see a transcript if they are really interested in you (maybe not for all jobs, but for the sake of general advice, they will), and while it might not kill your chances, it's somewhat inappropriate to round up. just put your actual gpa.

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 1:06 am
by profs<3mycomments
aguacaliente wrote:don't round up. when the employer sees "3.60", they will know automatically that it is rounded, which is drawing attention to the fact that it is actually lower. plus, they will eventually see a transcript if they are really interested in you (maybe not for all jobs, but for the sake of general advice, they will), and while it might not kill your chances, it's somewhat inappropriate to round up. just put your actual gpa.
Agree. The employer has seen a lot of GPAs before and is not gonna be like "3.59? That sounds pretty bad to me. If only he had a 3.6..."

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 1:56 am
by im_blue
Many law schools post official rules for listing GPAs on your resume, such as allowing truncation but not rounding, e.g. 3.497 becomes 3.49 instead of 3.50.

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 2:08 am
by Anonymous User
aguacaliente wrote:don't round up. when the employer sees "3.60", they will know automatically that it is rounded, which is drawing attention to the fact that it is actually lower. plus, they will eventually see a transcript if they are really interested in you (maybe not for all jobs, but for the sake of general advice, they will), and while it might not kill your chances, it's somewhat inappropriate to round up. just put your actual gpa.
Why would they think an even gpa is rounded? I know my gpa came out to a perfect 2 digit number when taken out even taken out 3 decimal places.

(sorry about anonymous post, logged in but won't let me post on my registered name Snwboarder78)

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 2:10 am
by Dick Whitman
My opinion is yes. But every career person I've talked to continues to adhere to the 'you can't round' conventional wisdom. They also don't like exact numbers, but given the options, I'll extend out my gpa as far as necessary.

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 2:15 am
by Kohinoor
It's ok but only for firms where they ballpark the numbers whenever filing things with the court. The firms that don't frown on it.

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 2:18 am
by gollymolly
.

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 2:23 am
by joshikousei
OCS: do not round. report exactly what's shown on your transcript.

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 2:49 am
by Anonymous User
My school's guidelines say to TRUNCATE ONLY, never round. They make a lot of noise about it like it's a big ethical problem if you round at all.

E.g. 3.299 --> 3.29, NOT 3.3

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 3:12 am
by Corsair
..

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 3:23 am
by ben1185
im_blue wrote:Many law schools post official rules for listing GPAs on your resume, such as allowing truncation but not rounding, e.g. 3.497 becomes 3.49 instead of 3.50.
This.

I've always been told to truncate, not to round.

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 10:26 am
by gglr24
betasteve wrote:
Lxw wrote:
Anonymous User wrote:Say you have a 2.7846 -- could you round to 2.79 or is that going too far?
That's not rounding.

hth
That actually is rounding, and is the correct way in that case (if rounding to hundredths).
betasteve wrote:
Lxw wrote:
Anonymous User wrote:Say you have a 2.7846 -- could you round to 2.79 or is that going too far?
That's not rounding.

hth
That actually is rounding, and is the correct way in that case (if rounding to hundredths).
Actually thats incorrect. It is 2.78

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 10:45 am
by helfer snooterbagon
I rounded my 3.6 to a 4.

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 1:36 pm
by ben1185
gglr24 wrote:
betasteve wrote:
Lxw wrote:
Anonymous User wrote:Say you have a 2.7846 -- could you round to 2.79 or is that going too far?
That's not rounding.

hth
That actually is rounding, and is the correct way in that case (if rounding to hundredths).
betasteve wrote:
Lxw wrote:
Anonymous User wrote:Say you have a 2.7846 -- could you round to 2.79 or is that going too far?
That's not rounding.

hth
That actually is rounding, and is the correct way in that case (if rounding to hundredths).
Actually thats incorrect. It is 2.78
+1

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 4:30 pm
by Lawl Shcool
2.7846

rounds to 2.785

2.785

rounds to 2.79

right? or did I miss something in 5th grade

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 6:15 pm
by Dick Whitman
JPU wrote:2.7846

rounds to 2.785

2.785

rounds to 2.79

right? or did I miss something in 5th grade
You don't round at each decimal place, just the first one not shown. So 2.785 would round up to 2.79. 2.7849 does not.

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 6:41 pm
by wiseowl
this is all academic unless the interviewer knows your curve, really.

I would not round to 3.6.

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 6:48 pm
by cake
JPU wrote:2.7846

rounds to 2.785

2.785

rounds to 2.79

right? or did I miss something in 5th grade
No, you're correct.
Then 2.79 rounds to 2.8, which rounds to 3, which is now almost a third of a letter grade higher. OP, just put 5 as your GPA, with a note that it's rounded to the nearest 5, and that you got a B.A. in English, not math, and will be able to bill 2000 hours your first week (with some rounding).

Re: Grade rounding on resume

Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 6:53 pm
by Lawl Shcool
cake wrote:
JPU wrote:2.7846

rounds to 2.785

2.785

rounds to 2.79

right? or did I miss something in 5th grade
No, you're correct.
Then 2.79 rounds to 2.8, which rounds to 3, which is now almost a third of a letter grade higher. OP, just put 5 as your GPA, with a note that it's rounded to the nearest 5, and that you got a B.A. in English, not math, and will be able to bill 2000 hours your first week (with some rounding).
+1