"Best in class: students suing their way to the top" (news item)

<p>A long, facinating story in the New Yorker, about the bruising battles to be valedictorian in competitive school districts, and how the schools caught in the middle are dealing with the situation.</p>

<p><a href="http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/050606fa_fact%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/050606fa_fact&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>as long as the scholarship $ and college admission forms rely on absolutes, such things will continue.</p>

<p>Haven't most applications been submitted (and, indeed, acted upon) before valedictorian honors are awarded?</p>

<p>Yes, but not necessarily the $$. Our local Val was waiting until the bitter end before Texas A&M confirmed her full ride for being val. It was the only way she could go.</p>

<p>Thanks for posting this link. I've got lots of material for the next meeting at my ds school when we decide on the Val/sal issue.</p>

<p>Thanks for the link! Being from NJ, I thought the Blair Hornstine case was fairly unique. It was refreshing (OK, let's call it "eye opening") to see how common the valedictorian lawsuit has become. In the Hornstine case, it is conceivable that she gamed the system to the point of manufacturing a disability that let her take AP classes at home with a private tutor. But the only aspect of her case that I thought was truly unfair was that she was not required to take gym, which lowered the GPA of her competitors.</p>

<p>I have an idea for a compromise: Continue the valedictorian tradition while students sit back, relax, and be content to be in the top 10% of the class.</p>

<p>Increasingly, high schools are refusing to report class standing (except in Texas, Florida and Cali, where it is required to comply with the Affirmative Action work-around.)</p>

<p>Really. Check USNews and see the declining fraction of total matriculants relied upon by colleges reporting the portion of their matriculants who were in "the top 10% of their graduating class." Its an eye-opener.</p>

<p>^ Then why do you think colleges ask as a line item to report exact class rank?</p>

<p>Our public HS policy:</p>

<p>
[quote]
The Board of Education adopted a new policy in 2002 eliminating the calculation of class rank on any individual student basis and precluding its inclusion on student transcripts.</p>

<p>

[/quote]
</p>

<p>lots of private schools (including my own) don't report rank, their logic being that some parents may object to their child having a lower standing in a competitive private school than at a not as competitive public school, which would also be free.</p>

<p>Byerly, my d's hs in CA does not have class rank. It has summa cum laude for students with GPA above 4.4 and magna cum laude for students with GPA above 4.0. Not all CA has class rank. However they do rank per individual class so parents can see where their kids stand in regard to other kids.</p>

<p>I have been thinking about this issue myself. My son's public school does not
weight grades and at least half of the kids in the top 10% do not take the
most challenging courses available. Interestingly, the student who was one of
the 4.0 students, was a wonderful young man with down's syndrome. I think
that they made a change to the rules which made him disqualified to be
valedictorian, but I think the ranking system is still a joke.<br>
I know the private school in our area does not rank and their kids do immensely
better in admissions.<br>
How important is it to be in the top 10% of the class?
Do college adcom's look to see how rank is calculated or do they just throw
out the applications of those below that 10% mark?</p>

<p>I am looking forward to your information and responses.</p>

<p>What have high school students grown into? Monster that are obsessed with the nature to be the best and that's it.</p>

<p>Students, it seems, have lost passion for subjects and are only interested in the thought of going to some prestigious college and being better than everyone else, hoping it will add some validity to their existence. Please. I personally only used to go to class for the grade and to keep that smile on my parents' faces, but now I actually want to learn in school for the sake of learning.</p>

<p>It's too bad that mankind's obsession with superiority has manifest itself in highschool. an institution originally created to spread knowledge about the world.</p>

<p>oh well</p>

<p>What can you possibly say about this? After I read the article this evening, I picked up tonights "Inquirer" (Phila) and read a page 1 story:"Too young for tests--but not for tutors" about the boom in pre-school academic tutoring. Wait til they go for valedictorian. My resisted father and feared father in law, both Harvardians, would have said that in their days people like that would have never been accepted at Harvard, and would have never even thought of applying. (They're both deceased, now it can be told)></p>

<p>Maybe I am idealistic, but I still think that no one can make a kid become a student who is the type who will be accepted to Harvard etc. The kids who are ultimately accepted are usually extremely self motivated as well as gifted in both academic and non-academic areas. If you happen to have a kid like this, I guess you can increase the possibility of their acceptance to such a school by providing them with appropriate opportunities, but the vast majority of kids would not apply themselves to their studies and other pursuits to the extent needed to be considered for such a school no matter how much pressure their parents put on them. At least this is what I have seen in the kids I have observed.</p>

<p>On the subject of ranking, a lot of private schools claim they don't rank, but of course, they have the statistics and they KNOW the rankings. Colleges have found out in some cases I know of. Either their recruiters were told when they visited (I've watched the counselors speaking earnestly with the reps before they went to the auditorium to make their presentations), or the high school let them know in other ways. One mother called a college about something or other, and the admissions officer mentionned that her daughter was ranked number 3 in her high school class. Hmm. Do the colleges have other ways of figuring it all out? I know that the counselors are very aware of class ranking, whether they divulge it or not. However, presumably they can make judgements about whether the ranking is justified, so as long as they are fair, it's OK in my opinion.</p>

<p>My d's GC told us that colleges will routinely call the counseling office to ask for more details about GPA distribution (what's the highest GPA in the class? How many students have that GPA? What's the second-highest? etc.) I remember reading in "Admissions Confidential" that Duke receives a printout from many schools showing the exact GPA distribution for the entire class. It seems that an adcom can pinpoint rank fairly accurately, even for schools that don't rank.</p>

<p>There is also a practice that appears somewhat widespread among some other high schools in this area that has every student earning a GPA >=4 being named a valdictorian. </p>

<p>Personally I favor the latinate designations based on "cum laude".</p>

<p>To further stir up this brew, our state awards three levels of high school diploma, based upon the curriculum taken, number of AP's, etc.</p>

<p>As far as I am concerned, the rules should be put in place and then just kept unless there is board agreement to change them, and the change should always occur in the future, not for the benefit or detriment of the current year graduates. Then the lawyers should just weather any storm to come. If someone wants the designation so badly to sue for it, there really is not much anyone can do about it. They may win, if they do, so be it. There is really no fair way to come up with these designations which is why I don't even think there should be class ranks. Too easy to game the system, too many inherent flaws in the system, and the adcoms at some schools just do not always view the data the way they should.</p>