<p>I downloaded DS's school profile for this year today. He's a junior, so it's not what's going with his apps, but I was quite surprised at a couple of changes in the profile, particularly this addition to the usual line of "DS School does not rank.":</p>
<p>"School policy also prohibits the rating of a students course selection or any other rating scales."</p>
<p>Wow. I should add that there has never been any info as to grade distribution other than a graph showing junior grades only, and this school has almost no AP and no honors classes (they say that all classes are essentially honors). </p>
<p>Sure makes junior grades important if DS will be applying to any schools that are unusual (ie, that don't get lots of apps from the school or have any other source of info about the school). They'll have nothing else to go on. </p>
<p>Anyone else have this line in the school profile?</p>
<p>“Every one of our students is above average…and our teachers grade harder than any other high school.”</p>
<p>I read a book by an admissions officer who said everything she visited a private school, the counselor tried to convince her they were the only school without any grade inflation.</p>
<p>If I was an admissions officer, that profile would definitely turn me off.</p>
<p>I think you will need to rely on the overall reputation of that school. If it is a really top, highly prestigious prep school… then the school’s reputation will serve as a proxy for a profile, and the elite colleges are probably well aware of typical grade distribution from other applications they receive from the same school. (With or without a profile, if 30 kids from the same high school apply to a given college, the ad com has the information needed to compare GPA’s… keep in mind that colleges have their own computers and can easily enter in data from applications and then create their own Naviance-style graphs for particular schools if they so choose. I don’t know whether or not they do that – but it seem like a logical response to a school that chooses not to share that sort of information.)</p>
<p>If the school doesn’t fall into that category – if it is relatively unknown or doesn’t have much of a history with elite admissions – then I guess that’s a downside of the choice of that school. That doesn’t mean it will hurt your son’s admissions chances – but it may function to hide some of his greatest strengths. Although, the policy can also work in his favor – for example, your son may be a pretty good student but not at the top of his class, and his courseload could be less than the most rigorous offered by his school, but still compare favorably to applicants from other schools. Class ranking really helps students in the top 5-10%, but it can be frustrating to kids in the 2nd decile at a challenging school – and the whole focus on having the “most rigorous” curriculum can put a lot of stress on high school students at schools with extensive offerings, who feel pressured to sign on for too much just for the sake of looking good to colleges.</p>
<p>This is probably to take care of the question that GCs are often called upon to answer–whether the applicant took the “most rigorous” courses available, etc.</p>
<p>The disciplinary questions (unless the school has decided that they won’t answer those questions either!) and the content of the actual letter from the GC then becomes the focus of the Secondary School Report then.</p>
<p>ellemenope, there is also a new paragraph that they will no longer answer the disciplinary questions either! I think there must have been some “incidents” last year with parents unhappy that one or the other of those questions disadvantaged their kids. </p>
<p>As others have noted, many colleges do have enough experience with the school to make their own judgments. The school is reasonably well known, but within the region rather than nationally, and sends several kids every year to Ivies and quite a few others to UChicago and the like. But there are a few schools on DS’ initial interest list - not Ivies, but strong LACs outside the Northeast - that (surprisingly, to me) have no data in Naviance, so those are the schools where I guess it will be up to DS and his GC to make sure he’s well-presented.</p>
<p>Parents get a one-on-one with their child’s assigned GC this spring, so this topic will be on my list.</p>