<p>I like how my school does its rankings system - it's completely based on your unweighted GPA. Therefore, the more AP classes you take (our Valedictorian's taking like about five this year) the higher your rank could potentially be - based on numerical grades in each class.</p>
<p>bluebayou as much as I would have agreed with you, I found out this year that some colleges (including top 5) actually did not really take into account
the number of APs or hardness of courses but just the plain GPA for
applicants from my school. This has not been the case in past years so
I am not sure what happened. :confused:</p>
<p>There are some schools that totally ignore class rank completely and only consider UW GPA; if you have grade deflation and a great rank, it means nothing.....Only schools my d was waitlisted to were those that could care less about class rank.....Kids on CC were admitted with lower class ranks but higher GPA's.....(or no class ranks at all which seems to be the most favorable situation IMO)</p>
<p>I think class rank is the best thing they have right now to compare you to your classmates.</p>
<p>It obviously has its flaws. I don't think my valedictorian deserves to be #1 and there are plenty of other people who couldn't get weighted GPAs because they couldn't afford dual enrollment classes (for a boosted GPA) or decided they wanted to take more art classes (dance, drama, etc) so that lowered their GPAs compared to people who just take weighted classes.</p>
<p>I think half of my class can do pretty well in top-tier schools, and it's unfair that they'll be considered to be less competitive because of their GPAs. (If you haven't guessed, my class rank is based on weighted GPA.)</p>
<p>I don't think rank is fair. For example, tons of kids at my (public) school pay to get private classes for credit. This of course costs a ton of money, but with small effort they get an A (we call it "pay for an A"). If I don't take any private classes to save money for college, why should I have a lower class rank. I don't think class ranks are fair at all, everyone has their own story and shouldn't be compared to other kids at their school.</p>
<p>I think that, in some cases, rank is unfair. Such as my own. A bunch of my honors classes weren't weighted (about 9 semesters' worth!) and thus my rank is lower. But I don't really care about my rank, and I don't see why colleges take it into such serious consideration.</p>
<p>Something else that I think is unfair is the fact that the same numbers used for grades vary by school. At my current school, letter grades are around five percentage points (pretty significant) lower than my previous one, and both schools are at roughly the same academic level.</p>
<p>I believe GPA should be averaged and reported, but rank should be calculated by adding GPA in each class, and weighed. If I make all A's in 7 APs and 1 Honors, I should have a higher rank than someone who has all A's in 6 AP Classes. That's what gets on my nerves. Thank goodness my school doesn't rank.</p>
<p>@bluebayou. Well it opens the possibility that some students get penalized for going to hard schools. Conversely, the adcomms can adjust by giving the lower ranked student at the harder school more slack. But I'm not sure if this is really the case though. But even if it is, then what would be the purpose of using the rankings in the first place if they're going to nullify its effect by adjusting? Sounds illogical to me. Either ways, the someone loses. A student is screwed over by attending a harder school, or the student doesn't and the adcomm wastes time and money. The only beneficiary is the student attending a easier school. </p>
<p>Of course, if gathering the data is for statistical purposes ONLY, then I wholeheartedly contend its fine.</p>
<p>
[quote]
adcomms can adjust by giving the lower ranked student at the harder school more slack.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>And, yes, they do.</p>
<p>Then whats the point in looking at class rank in the first place?</p>
<p>well they did. i'm an international (canada) so the committee doesn't know the level of competition, but basically the only ap course my school offers is ap calculus and the class avg. is less than 60% (keep in mind, only the brightest are allowed to enroll) and the teahcer doesn't know *****..and since gpa is unweighted, a 78 in junior physical ed. affect your gpa just as much as a 95 in senior math. my school only gives 86 in pe to jocks and the best you can get if you're not a jock is probably around 80. oh and english teachers never give above 80 to minorities. the only reason i had a 95 in senior english. so you get the point..</p>
<p>At my school, the difference between top 3% and top 1% is basically grade-grubbing and getting the right teachers. We have A+'s for 97 and above, and the three fighting for valedictorian at my school use this coop system to cut down the time they do work that doesn't directly affect their grade, and study a ridiculous amount of time for the tests. When they get points off on the tests, they fight with teachers to get a precious couple back. That pushes their grade from a 95 to a 97 (A to A+) and puts them on top of the class rank. All three are very smart people and deserving of top spots, but their GPAs are significantly higher because of dishonest or dishonorable behavior. I can't think that this is uncommon.</p>
<p>innervisions... the gang of three you describe above have exhibited more real world intelligence than you or your classmates have.... cooping is quite common in college, especially at schools where pooled knowledge is the only way to solve certain problem sets at MIT, Caltech, etc.</p>
<p>studentx re: your post #30....personally I am against ranking, (but that doesn't make them unfair). I'm against them for some of the practical reasons (see inversions #32) on this thread, but again, that doesn't make them unfair, IMO.</p>
<p>arwen: pls name names, or send me a pm.</p>
<p>ice.frap (love the sn, btw), nearly every college I know of ignores PE and non-academic classes. The UCs do not look at class rank, but they would look at your B+ gpa, which is low for Haas.</p>
<p>Does your HS provide colleges with a Profile, i.e., a summary of the curriculum, including AP/honors courses offered, average grades, average test scores, average AP scores and the like? Using such a profile, adcoms will place a student in context, at least at private colleges. Yes, you are right, however, that public colleges are more about the numbers.</p>