The ranking for our kids’ high school just came out and it’s ranked around 500 in the US, putting it in the top 1.5-1.9% of US public high schools.
How much does this matter to colleges? My husband and I have been having “what if” discussions, mostly centered around our sophomore daughter who is a B/C student in honors, AP and regular classes, and is in the bottom 25% ranking of the school (3.0 weighted gpa)
We’re trying to figure out if being in the bottom 25% class rank at a top 1% school is better than being in the top 25% of an average school, and what that means for her for college. H thinks it means starting out the first two years at a community college because no school we can afford will take her with that class rank, and I think he’s being too negative (but I’m a bit of a Pollyana).
it was a big factor for my D. She graduated from the private HS that happens to be #2 among privates in our state. I do not know any others and I have no idea about national ranking of D’s HS.
Community College is not the cheapest way to obtain the college education. CCs do not have much resources and do not offer Merit scholarships. The cheapest way is to obtain the full tuition / free ride at 4 year college based on Merit scholarships.
Geez, I don’t really know but my daughter attended the #1 school in Massachusetts (and was in the top 3 of her class, they don’t rank) and #33 in the country and it didn’t seem to make any difference in her acceptances which were primarily in the 25-40% acceptance rate ~ she was waitlisted at nearly every school with lower acceptance rates.
I keep hearing how prep schools feed into certain colleges and that is something I had never considered when choosing a high school.
I’m not sure anyone can answer this question. Do you have access to Naviance through your school? That will let you see the stats of applicants and accepted students from your daughter’s specific HS. You will probably find in-state options that she could be admitted with her current GPA and class rank, but they might not be the schools she wants to attend.
My D16 is not a top student (3.45 weighted GPA, not the most rigorous course load, a few Cs on the transcript), and I think coming from a HS that is highly ranked (just below 100 nationwide), may have helped her with OOS applications, but there is now way to know for sure. Her school doesn’t rank, though. Her ACT scores were about 4 points higher than her HS’s average and she only applied to colleges where her score put her in the Top 25%. She’s attending an OOS public with a merit scholarship (but only a small one)
She ended up not applying in-state at all although she could have gotten into one of the so-called “lesser” VA publics. She knew she wouldn’t compare well to her classmates at the more selective in-state options, but she got into two OOS publics that are ranked higher than VA Tech. (For some reason, VA Tech seems to want a 4.0 from kids at her HS).
You may be able to find colleges that don’t report or care that much about class rank. If she raises her GPA by even a few tenths of a point and gets strong scores, there is no reason to assume that your daughter won’t get into a decent four-year university. If she’s struggling in the AP classes, then she might just want to take fewer, especially if she’s not aiming for top tier schools.
JMO based on no real data but a bottom 25% rank and 3.0 WGPA at a “top HS” will not be considered better than an average schooled top 25% rank with a better GPA. I think the feeder effect will only get you so far. But a GC at a school like that should have a good idea of where students in your D’s rank have gone before, and I’m sure it’s more than just a CC. What state are you a resident of?
She still has time for improvement in junior year. I also suggest taking her on a few college trips this summer, sometimes that will spark improvement when kids her age realize that college is close. I’d also supplement her schoolwork with tutoring if affordable to your family.
Sometimes there are underlying problems that are not diagnosed. My sister’s family has a child who was diagnosed with a learning disability just as she entered HS. She was spending a lot of time on homework - especially reading- but did very well in math classes. She was a B/C student and her grades improved markedly after treatment.
good lord…a b/c student is a solidly average one—not everyone is a 2400/6.0 student. its hardly cause for concern unless there are other red flags.
to answer the question–my random guess is that either way, it probably matters way less than you think. plenty of schools dont rank at all and plenty more cant wait to do away with it. so exactly how much COULD it matter?
i’ll go with there is a college a for every type of student–even the average ones.
but thats my opinion. i cant say for sure if its a fact or not.
I would think it would have far more impact on in-state public universities and local/regional privates, since these schools are most familiar with her HS.
My gut instinct would be to put her in a context where she can really bolster her GPA. It does seem like that matters. I might not go to a tiny private where she suddenly jumps in overall grades/ranking, but I might consider a less competitive (but still solid) public.
As suggested above, it also matters where she is thinking of going for college/university.
I think your husband is being too negative. A sophomore who is taking AP and honors classes isn’t going to be shut out from 4 year colleges. If she is getting C’s in certain subjects, why not put her in regular level classes? At a school like you describe, I’m sure the kids in regular level classes are getting accepted to decent colleges.
I don’t know much about those high school rankings, but unless this is some kind of competitive magnet school, I wouldn’t read too much into them. I would talk to the GC for an assessment, not worry about rankings. Getting good test scores will probably also help, did she take the PSAT?
“My question is about how much of a factor HS ranking is when college admissions counselors are looking at class rank”
I cannot answer that because we felt that D’s school was simply known in our state and we thought that it was one factor that resulted in her Merit scholarships. She did not apply to any Elite colleges, so we do not know where she would be accepted. We felt that colleges are aware of HSs, they know what kind of students are coming from certain HSs.
From what I read, adcoms want to see where do you stand among your school peers, not where your school stand among other schools as that doesn’t reflect on you.
It matters more for the kids, as rigorous classes and competitiveness pushes them to do better and up their game. Students from bigger and academically rigorous schools adjust better in colleges and have a higher graduation rate then low performing and smaller schools because they are already used to handle issues related to size and rigor.
Quality of the hs does matter, more so to some schools vs others. Most colleges will recalculate the gpa and may add or subtract pts based on the hs the kid is coming from. What is important is how the college perceives the school from the profile and their assessment, which may be different than a magazine ranking. I have heard some adcoms say 'we know an A from school xxx really means an A, so they can be aware of grade inflation/deflation.
How big is your D’s school? If it is small, don’t worry so much about being in the bottom 25%.
Also, rigor is very important, so the fact that she is challenging herself is good. A straight A kid at your school who is not taking any honors or APs is not going to get into a tippy/top school
Ask yourself: what’s my ultimate goal here? I assume it’s to put your D in an environment where she will succeed and that you can afford. My D1 was a high stats kid with excellent time management skills, who happily went off to a top LAC and seems to be having a very successful freshman year. D2 on the other hand, has had a very rocky freshman year in HS. Her issues include anxiety, depression, ADHD and more. She’s very smart but motivation, focus, and time management are big problems for her. Between her guidance counselor and therapist I’ve come to realize that she’ll be taking a different path, which doesn’t mean hers won’t be successful. But it will be different and probably will involve proceeding more slowly and seeking a lower pressure environment. For sophomore year, we’re not putting her in any honors classes and we may have her only take 5 classes instead of the usual 6. And I can see the possibility that starting in community college might turn out to be a good thing.
Our HS is very competitive and virtually all of the students go to 4 year colleges. Students with B averages found schools to attend that were good matches for their interests/aptitudes. I think she will be fine and will get into a 4 year college as long as she continues to work hard, studies for standardized tests etc.
It has been said 1000 times over on CC that a 4.0 gpa at StateU is vastly better than a 3.5 at HPY for med/law school admissions, so can the same be said about high schools? Wouldn’t it seem better to be the Val at an average school that to go to a prestige high school and get a 3.0?
Schools that don’t rank DO provide gpa distributions to colleges along with transcripts. It doesn’t take a detective to figure out what decile a student is in. A college won’t know if you are 412/600 vs 452/ 600 but they can discern if a student is in the bottom half of the class.
College adcoms want students that will make a positive impact on the other students, pull them to the higher academic level and we felt that this was recognized when D. applied as her HS tend to have this kind of kids. But colleges also look at each individual applicant, not only where she came from.
Why would she get Bs and Cs in regular, honors and AP classes or is there more of a pattern here ? Sometimes you need to really work on checking the boxes on rubrics and the syllabus to get As. Review those with her at the beginning of the semester. Encourage her to go to the teacher to discuss her progress. If she is having difficulty on just tests, maybe there is a reading issue or something going on. If she isn’t getting As on homework, make her spend more time at her desk checking her work and making sure she has done all the problems. Projects, review together before handing in. Is she keeping up with reading ? Whatever …
If the Cs are in AP classes, then maybe lighten up on that, but if any class gets a C, then there is another issue going on.
A 3.0 weighted isn’t great … but maybe this is a vigorous school that grades low … maybe there are just lots of really excellent kids heading off to top 20 schools every year.
Naviance and GC are your friends. Since she is only a sophomore, she can improve her grades, get involved in meaningful ECs, find good match schools that are affordable, get some tutoring, whatever … You can get good recommendations on strategies from GCs as well as individual teachers, maybe pick the ones she likes to talk to, since they may have more insight on her issues than someone she is hiding from or that gives her an A …
Also, she may be able to start working on taking more classes that use her strengths, writing, reading, research, math, science and less that are hard or uninteresting.
I wouldn’t lose sleep since there are lots of schools in the top 500 that will take her … probably in the top 200 too … but rather than fretting, i would try to make the most out of these years for her.
Any study habit improvements will help her tremendously in college too.
If this were me (and I know that talk is cheap) I’d be MUCH more concerned with my D’s actual education than I would be with all these metrics.
A kid getting a rigorous HS education is much better off- regardless of the GPA- than a kid breezing through HS ranked number 1 or number 2 in the class.
Kids with a solid work ethic and a solid HS education by and large do not flounder in college (assuming no substance issues or other factors). Kids with an inflated sense of their own worth (I’m the Val, how hard could Organic Chemistry be?) who haven’t had to struggle in HS have a tougher adjustment.
If your D is learning… actually learning… and stretching herself academically I wouldn’t worry. Things will sort themselves out by senior year. But if she’s struggling AND not making progress- that would call for a reassessment in my mind.
