<p>Our High school recently discontinued issuing ranks to the high school students. I am one of the top students and I would like to go to the IVY league schools. I am concerned that not having a Rank may spoil my chances of getting admission in the IVY league schools.</p>
<p>Can anyone help me with an answer on what role Rank plays in admissions and what happens if a high school does not issue a Rank? </p>
<p>Thanks in advance.</p>
<p>Generally, high-caliber schools will not disclose rank because much of the class can be competitive at the Ivy level. Rank is not as important as it once was because there are gigantic disparities between high schools; rank #20 at no-name high school in Alaska (no offense to Alaska) is not the same as rank #20 at Exeter, Andover, TJ, Stuy, etc. Your teacher rec forms do ask them to mark your level as a student (top 50%, top 10%, one of the few I have met in my career, etc.).</p>
<p>Based on my son's experience, I think class rank has very little significance. He was in the top 2% for his class rank but had only about a 3.6 unweighted GPA (and an extremely challenging course load). There is no grade inflation at his school; as is typical for each grade, only the valedictorian had a 4.0 UW. The valedictorian got into every school she applied to except one, and was the only student in the school to receive "likely" letters. My son and several of his smart, high-achieving (but non-4.0) classmates were accepted to some wonderful schools, but waitlisted or rejected from many others that were somewhat surprising. Of course, it's possible they would have had the same results with a higher GPA and slightly lower class-rank, but there's no way to know for sure.</p>