How Alberta's Diploma Exam Weighting Changes Your Admission Average
By Muntasir • Published Apr 11, 2026 • Updated Sep 20, 2026 • Admissions & Applications, Canadian Universities & Colleges
Your Alberta Grade 12 diploma exam counts for 30% of your final course mark and your school-awarded mark counts for 70%, a split in place since September 1, 2023. Universities never see the two pieces separately, they see the single blended mark, and that blended mark is what builds your admission average.
🎓 Blended mark = 70% school-awarded mark + 30% diploma exam mark
The split has applied since September 1, 2023
You need a combined mark of at least 50% to pass the course
Diploma exams run in November, January, April, June and August each school year
⏱️ A weak exam sitting still moves your final mark, since it is a real 30% of it
The 70/30 split that decides your final course mark
Alberta courses that end in a diploma exam do not report your school mark alone to postsecondary institutions. Alberta Education blends two numbers into one final mark: 70% comes from the mark your school awards you across the semester, and 30% comes from your result on the provincial diploma exam. This weighting has applied since September 1, 2023, according to Alberta.ca , after a period during the pandemic when the province adjusted how much the exam counted.
You need a combined mark of at least 50% to pass the course. Below that, the course does not count toward your diploma or your admission average, regardless of how the two components split individually.
What each component measures
Your school-awarded mark reflects your performance across the whole semester: assignments, unit tests, projects and any in-class evaluations your teacher sets. Your diploma exam mark reflects a single standardized exam written on one day, set and marked by the province rather than your own teacher, using the same questions for every Alberta student in that course. The province blends the two so your final mark reflects both your ongoing classroom performance and a common, external standard applied the same way across every Alberta high school.
Why the blend matters for your admission average
When an Alberta university calculates your admission average, it works from the blended final mark on your transcript, not your raw school mark. That means a strong term in class does not fully protect you from a weak exam sitting, and a weak term does not fully sink you if your exam mark comes in high. Both numbers move the same final figure, at different weights.
Alberta postsecondary institutions typically build your admission average from a set number of Grade 12 level courses rather than every course on your transcript. Mount Royal University, for example, states plainly that it uses five Grade 12 level courses for admission. Whichever Alberta university you apply to, the same 70/30 math applies to every diploma course feeding into that average.
Example calculation
| School-awarded mark | Diploma exam mark | Blended final mark |
|---|---|---|
| 80% | 65% | 75.5% |
| 72% | 85% | 76.9% |
| 90% | 55% | 79.5% |
In each row, multiply the school mark by 0.7, multiply the exam mark by 0.3, then add the two. A gap between your two numbers pulls the final mark toward the larger 70% component, but never erases the smaller one.
Before September 2023
The 30% exam weighting restored on September 1, 2023 replaced a temporary arrangement the province used during the COVID-19 pandemic, when it reduced how much diploma exams counted and cancelled some sittings outright. If you are comparing your own results against marks earned in 2020, 2021 or 2022, remember the blend behind those older marks does not match the 70/30 split in place from the 2023-24 school year onward.
Which courses carry a diploma exam
Not every Grade 12 course has a diploma exam attached. Alberta Education sets one for English Language Arts 30-1 and 30-2, Social Studies 30-1 and 30-2, Mathematics 30-1 and 30-2, Science 30, Biology 30, Chemistry 30 and Physics 30. Courses outside this list, including most electives, are marked entirely by your school with no exam component.
The blend is the same wherever you apply
The 70/30 weighting is set by Alberta Education, not by any individual university, so it applies the same way regardless of which Alberta postsecondary institution reads your transcript. Whether you are aiming for the University of Alberta, the University of Calgary, MacEwan, Mount Royal or elsewhere, your blended final mark is calculated identically before it reaches an admissions office. What differs between institutions is how they use that blended mark, including which courses they pull into your admission average and what minimum they set for your program.
Timing matters as much as the split
Diploma exams sit in November, January, April, June and August each school year. A course you finish in the fall semester is typically examined in January, and a course you finish in the winter or spring semester in April or June, with August available mainly for rewrites and upgrading. Your blended final mark is not complete, and cannot be sent to a university, until your exam for that course has been written and marked.
This is exactly why Alberta universities lean on conditional offers built from your in-progress school marks while your diploma exam results are still pending, then confirm the offer once your real blended mark arrives.
If your blended mark lands lower than you expected
Because the exam is a genuine 30% of the final mark, a rough sitting pulls a strong school mark down further than students expect. Alberta Education allows you to rewrite a diploma exam at a later sitting if you are not happy with the result, and the new mark recalculates into your blended final mark the same way. Talk to your school counsellor about the rewrite process and to any university where you already have an application or offer on file, since a changed blended mark still affects that file after you submit.