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Does your grade point average really give prospective employers an accurate picture of your abilities and potential? You may want to shout, “NO!” and many people would agree with you. There is no point in debating whether employers should judge you by your GPA. Right or wrong, employers will judge you by it. So if your GPA is lower than you like, you have some strategizing to do before you begin your job or internship search.
There is no law that says you have to include your GPA on your resume or talk about it during interviews. So if you have a low GPA, and nobody outright asks you about it, let it go. Talk about your many strengths instead. Even if you don’t bring up the topic, however, be prepared to provide a rationale for or justification of the low GPA. Do not use excuses.
Suppose, for example, your grades were terrible the first phase of your education and you decided to get serious and began to perform much better academically at a later date of your education.
Your cumulative GPA reflects some issues, but it doesn’t tell the whole story. Consider calculating your GPA for the last phase, and sell that number to prospective employers. You might say to an employer, “Like many students, I struggled with the transition to attend school, but as you can see from my GPA during the later phase of my education, I have learned how to become a high-performing student.”
At most institutions, you have the option of retaking courses that didn’t go well for you the first time. If you do better the second time, only the second grade is used to calculate your GPA. However, the first grade does remain on your transcripts. Obviously, retaking a course impacts your finances, time, and energy. But if retaking a course helps you pull up your GPA to a point where employers will give it more respect, then it is probably worth the investment in the long run.
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Many employers, when reading through recent college graduates’ resumés, use the GPA to weed people out. You have probably even seen job or internship listings that note a required GPA of at least 3.25. If your GPA does not meet the standards employers are seeking, you will have difficulty making a case for yourself on paper alone. So it will be critical for you to find ways to talk to employers in person. Join a professional organization in your field and start attending its meetings. Do some informational interviewing so you can meet people in your field and they can get to know you as a real person, not just a GPA number. The more you can sell your whole self in person, the less impact a low GPA will have on your internship and job prospects.
Visit: http://hotjobs.yahoo.com/ (click on “Hotjobs” in the Yahoo! Menu bar) for additional career search topics.
Here are the steps to take in calculating your grade point average.
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