Who is correct in their claims

Question

Two students took the same courses last year. Each received the following final grades. In evaluating the grades, student 2 claims that it is a tie, while student 1 says he has a better grade. Who is correct in their claims? (Allow 4 points for A, 3 points for B, 2 points for C, 1 point for D, and 0 points for F). 

 

Course                                   Student 1                     Student 2

Statistics (4 credits)                     A                                   C

Biology(4 credits)                        A                                   C

Intro to public health (3 credits)   B                                    B

Psychology  (3 credits)                C                                   A

Tennis (1 credit)                          C                                  A

 

I believe they have the same sore, but I want to make sure that I am correct.

Answer 1

Quckly looking at the grade distribution (with weights/credits), Student 1 got A's on 4-credit courses while Student 2 got C's and Student 1 got the C's on 3- and 1-credit courses while Student 2 got A's.  That means that Student 1 got A's "where it counts most."

 

Let's compute the grade point average (GPA) --

 

Student 1:

  (4*4+4*4+3*3+2*3+2*1)/15 = 3.27 GPA

      [note: (sum of grade*credits) / (total credits) ]

 

Student 2:

  (2*4+2*4+3*3+4*3+4*1)/15 = 2.73 GPA

 

Student 1 has a better GPA.