<p>How much worse is 9/643 than 1/643? 25/643?</p>
<p>I believe that as long as you're in the top 10% you're fine.</p>
<p>Being valedictorian is a lot better than 9's. After 2 or 3, just being in the top 10% is fine, like he said. But those top 3 or so spots are more important.</p>
<p>If you go to an average high school and you're applying to top colleges, the difference between 1 and 9 is big. Being val or sal is important. At more competitive high schools that send many to ivies and such, the difference is less.</p>
<p>For my school at least class rank in a joke. First of all, I go to a huge public school, 1000 per graduating class and we do not weight AP, IB and honors classes. What that means is for us our "top 25" students are mostly made up of people who take all regular courses and do not challenge themselves which is why our school is abolishing class rank after we graduate in June. So I would not put that much emphasis on class rank as I really do not think it matters that much. Its your scores, grades, and ECs that should matter, not how you do compared to your peers because some may have all average peers while others have many outstanding ones.</p>