<p>I have the same hatred for the other people competing with me for valedictorian in my class of 600. Entering my junior year there are about 10 of us vying for the top position and i’ll have to put great effort to end up triumphant. At the moment I have a 4.69 and the highest ranked at the moment has a 4.8+ because he maximized his schedule sophomore year and got a 5.0 (unless he got a B in something which is what I’m hoping for) by taking fewer classes then I the rest of us but only having honors or Ap classes. Next year I’m taking all IB so it will count as a honors credit for me to get a possible 5.0 for the next two years (of course with all A’s). Hopefully this will close the gap I’m at right now and land me back in the top position. </p>
<p>In addition the same guy and me basically had a tense encounter when we took the ACT’s in June. I didn’t know he was taking it and he didn’t know I was and halfway through the test we saw each other and it psyched be me out. Gotta strengthen those nerves for the playful yet serious competition for supremacy for the next two years!</p>
<p>It isn’t. My school doesn’t offer Valedictorian because it would “single a kid out from everyone else and we want everyone to be equal”… My school is run by a bunch of Communists…</p>
<p>I go to one of the best small public schools in New England. At my school it’s very competitive to become the valedictorian. There are about 5 students who try extremely hard to get perfect grades and try so hard to get leadership positions. It’ll be a battle senior year for sure.</p>
<p>pretty competitive in my opinion. i go to a really small private school, where it should be easier, but all the kids in my grade are very smart. there are currently 13 people tied for valedictorian… lolol. and i’m the fourteenth person :(</p>
<p>@azpandaman
“It isn’t. My school doesn’t offer Valedictorian because it would “single a kid out from everyone else and we want everyone to be equal”… My school is run by a bunch of Communists…”</p>
<p>Shoot… I know people who would kill to go to a school like yours (assuming what you mean is that there is no class ranking). I’d probably just maim or disfigure, though.</p>
<p>If you have a cumulative gpa of 4.0 by third quarter of your senior year, you are a valedictorian. We usually have 2 valedictorians by that time but two years ago we had about 8 valedictorians. Its quite difficult to maintain the number one spot your senior year because a B will definitely ruin your chances. The catch is, the school requires you to take amounts of APs to be a valedictorian and pass a state test to get honors (cum laude, magna cum laude, or suma cum laude) during your senior year. But other than numbers, there’s no other qualifications to be a valedictorian in our school.</p>
<p>Our val and sal this past year were twins, and it was pretty obvious from freshman year that they would be. They were fiercely competitive with each other, swapping places each semester, but no one besides maybe #3 had any aspirations of surpassing them. The rest of the top 10 just basically wanted to stay in the top 10, maybe hoping to move up a spot or two. Aside from that, most students at our suburban public high school (class of 623) didn’t care much about rank.</p>
<p>Our GPA is based on a 100 point scale, with 5 pts added for honors and 10 for AP. So determining the valedictorian is pretty simple. Our val/sal twins had GPAs of like 107.65 and 107.60; number 10 was around 103.</p>
<p>At my school the race was really tight, but being that we were a class of about 500, only those involved really had an idea of who stood where – and even some of us didn’t know any positions but our own for certain, so we went off of ‘gut’ feelings until the last months of school. I ended up nosing out two great friends of mine for #1 rank, and the three of us shared the honor of Val, but even the operative word “nosing” – I feel – gives me too much credit. There was a spread of less than .020 grade points between the three of us (4.854 and 4.835 being the bookends), and we were each named National AP Scholars in a school where that honor means taking every single AP exam offered and passing nearly every single one with a 5. One of the three (not I) ended up at a prestigious Ivy while the other two of us find ourselves at UC campuses on maximum merit aid with the promise of early research (I’m starting mine this summer as a pre-frosh) and fellowships.</p>
<p>At our school, anyone with a 4.0 unweighted and 10 Honors/AP classes immediately gets valedictorian. We have like 5-15 each year, which honestly ruins the “magic.”</p>
<p>There are three of us tied at number one going into senior year. None of us have ever gotten less than an A in anything, and we all took the same number of AP courses, so it should be interesting to see what happens in the end.</p>
<p>My class has over 700 kids, so not too many people even know who the top 10 are. It’s mostly a race to see who can take the most APs (since my school offers more than you could take by the time you complete senior year.) Mostly, the people in the top 20 slots compete with each other to get into the top 10. As far as I know, the top 10 usually compete to get to #2 not #1. I don’t even know who is currently ranked as #1…
I do know that the race seems pretty grueling, and I know of a few kids who take pretty drastic measures to keep their grades up (cheating, etc.)
There are probably other kids just as smart as the top 10; they just don’t care that much about taking 8 or 9 AP classes a year (like me haha.) I was altogether surprised to have squeezed into the top 10% of my class, though!</p>
<p>well to be honest, at my school, many honor roll students get very competitive for valedictorian right from the start of high school. my friends try to take as many honors as possible to prep them for the incoming ap courses in order to boost their GPAs. sometimes, the competition can make ppl do anything to win so it pretty much shows how competitive at my school are.</p>
<p>I come from a Nigerian high school, and there is this Asian (Taiwanese) and he’s in my class. Most of the heat is between the both of us, and it kinda just alternated between the both of us until the final year. I don’t know, a combination of luck and hard work and I was valedictorian ultimately. I just didn’t realize how important for colleges that was until much later. Anyway, he wants to go to McGill in Canada, and I hope I will be lucky enough to get into UW Madison. But generally, at any given point in time through our high school years, one of us was the leading student.</p>
<p>It is insanely competitive at my school, it usually comes down to what you to in your half credit of PE freshman year. Usually there are decent guess for the top ten, any of whom could be Val. The most frequent guess for 2012 ended up being third because of a being one marking period freshman year, the VAL ended up being a girl no one had guessed because she kept her grades quite and no one really knew she had strait 'A’s or took a a bunch of AP classes. But, in general, like the top 25% is all people who have a 4.7 weighted average, so, I’ll be in the top 50% with my 4.3 weighted…</p>
<p>As a mom, this question made me chuckle a little bit…but probably for an unexpected reason.</p>
<p>My son goes to a school that is a combined MYP/IB program. All students attending the school are required to complete the MYProgram and the IB diploma, depending on when they attend (ie, there is NO non-IB option for juniors and seniors). </p>
<p>Despite my son being first in his class after 10th grade, he does not qualify to be valedictorian b/c he will not be completing “all 4 years of high school” at the school. He requested a waiver, but apparently they said no. It bothered him at first, but I don’t think he even pays attention to any of it anymore. Thank goodness! :)</p>
<p>He attends an excellent school and all of his classmates are bright, but I don’t hear about the overwhelming competition and “in-fighting” I’ve witnessed at other schools…</p>