A-Levels vs. the GPA Having relocated to the United States from the Netherlands just prior to international

orientation; I was caught off guard by an onslaught of rather drastic changes, which challenged me to establish an appropriate balance. I was able to utilize my interpersonal skills to quickly make friends within the international group, the football team and the local incoming freshman. I also found that I was ill prepared for the time commitment associated with playing sport at a collegiate level, despite having played professional youth level in Europe. Another challenge I faced was that of the academics themselves. The academics in the British school system focused on fast tracking each student to their desired career goals through the A-level system. This meant that by age 16 we had already selected 3 subjects for our final two years of high school. I had chosen to pursue Economics, Advanced Mathematics and Spanish. The A-level courses allowed me to test out of entrylevel economics and languages. This was beneficial in that I was able to focus on electives however it was detrimental in that it did not benefit my G`PA as it otherwise would have. My decision to come to the United States was to garner a more global education and expand my subject knowledge, however this came with its own set of hurdles. A primary difficulty was enrolling in religion, English Literature, American history and psychology courses that I had no previous exposure to. Despite a rough transition for the first year of university I was able to overcome and find the appropriate balance needed to excel in both school and extra curricular activities.

I accomplished this by joining study groups for difficult courses and committing more time to my academics. This can be seen through my grade progression in courses such as religion where I began by earning grades lower than what I