Is it fair for the valedictorian to take less advanced classes?

Pre-College Issues High School Life
21

I think it sounds as fair as this kind of thing could be. The school ranks based on weighted GPA. That means that the kids taking more advanced classes do have a bit of leeway to not have to be perfect but still place higher than those taking less advanced classes.

Whether this is the parent or the child (confusing as it seems two people are using the same account) there seems to be no reasonable proposition to take to the school to change anything. I mean, should rank be determined by sheer number of advanced classes taken regardless of grades? Should valedictorians have to take a minimum number of AP or other advanced classes? What objective criteria are the OPs proposing for administration to use? Because “I worked harder and want to be co-valedictorian” just isn’t reasonable.

22

Life is not Fair. Not in high school, not in Real Life. In the future, the co-worker you know is a lazy bum might take the promotion you have worked your donkey off for, and might take credit for ideas and projects that he didn’t generate. It is a great life skill to learn to be confident in your own abilities without being recognized for them.

The system of awarding ribbons and medals is fading away. Look forward to a life well lived for its own merit, and not for any publicly acknowledged glory. Coming in Second will always sting a bit, and it is okay to privately shed some tears. Character comes in being able to congratulate the winner when you know you were just inches behind him at the finish line.

23

Questions like this make me happy I attended a school that didn’t name a val or sal. Honestly not sure if my kid’s school does or not, but I hope not. Just seems to create trouble.

24

First, I absolutely agree with this statement:

However, if this was really important to you or your son it is an issue that should have been addressed back in 9th grade, it is far too late now.

Nothing can be done and holding onto it is only creating stress during a time that should happy and exciting. He is salutatorian-instead of showing pride you are showing bitterness and disappointment and that cannot be having a positive impact on your son’s final weeks of high school.

Congratulations to you and your son. These moments are fleeting…do you really want to spend them filing complaints?

25

I expect the school for the OP doesn’t weight for class rank. My D’s school is the same way.

So the real question is “is it fair” that the valedictorian took a pass on the AP class with the teacher that is notorious for grading very hard for the non-AP class they could ace. As long as these rules were published, well known, and not changed partway through, you should be just be happy with the result and move on.

26

Unless the ranking system was changed late in the game, you need to let it go. Even if it was changed, I’d probably still let it go. Focusing on the negative steals your joy. It is an amazing accomplishment to graduate at the top of your class, Val or Sal.

27

my son’s school district changed their val/sal & class rank policy after last year when the 36/2400/MIT kid with a perfect GPA wasn’t first in the class.

We have a little drama In my daughter’s graduating class this year (different district). The class speaker doesn’t have the highest GPA/Test scores; but is a kid who’s done very well and is musical and athletic. The valedictorian (who’s not speaking) does not have the highest ACT/SAT scores but a higher GPA (by hundredths of a point) than the four kids who have higher ACT/SAT test scores.

as parents of a kid who’s sort of in the mix of this all, we’ve heard all about this. It’s not fun when you feel your kid has been slighted, but we are letting it all go and just feeling proud of them all.

28

Please don’t let your resentment over this spoil your son’s day and achievement. Being sal is great. Make sure he knows that.

29

Actually it sounds like this student comes from a school which does not use weighted GPA.

I think the student needs to understand that while this isn’t “fair” to those students who take harder classes, that most weighting systems are extremely unfair also. Most weighting systems add a bonus to honors and AP classes, and the bonus varies, it could be 1 for both or .5 for honors and 1 for AP, or some schools even add more than 1 for AP. Then the grades are averaged together. If you think about it though, what this system does mathematically is award more of a bonus to students who take study halls and less of a bonus to those who take electives. Consider two students who get straight As. Student 1 took 4 honors classes and 2 electives. Student 2 took 4 honors classes and 2 study halls. Student 1 has a GPA of ((45) + (24))/6 = 4.67 Student 2 has a GPA of 4*5/4 = 5.0. So, taking electives reduces the bonus students receive from their course weightings. The system is saying that somehow those honors classes were harder for the student who took study halls than for the student who took elective classes. This is obviously completely unfair, but it seems to be by far the most widely used system.

Then there is the issue of deciding what courses deserve to be weighted and how. If you give .5 for honors and 1 for AP, you’re saying that honors precalc is easier than AP human geography? I can tell you that Art, which isn’t weighted at our school, is a lot harder than some of those easy APs. Then there are other issues. For instance, our kids in band get elective credit for marching band whereas the kids in chorus don’t get credit for the small choral ensembles. This makes it near impossible for a kid in band to be valedictorian.

I read stories on here of kids doing all kinds of counterproductive things to puff up their GPA. Even in our relatively non-competitive area, I’ve heard that school counselors from a private school are advising their students entering high school to arrange to hide the middle school credits for languages etc because those are non-weighted classes and if they keep them off the transcript they will have a higher GPA.

There is a better way to weight honors classes, but it seems to be rarely used, I suspect because most school administrators don’t understand how their weighting system is flawed and/or don’t know how to fix this. That is to average the unweighted grades and then add a small bonus for each honors/AP class taken. In this case, everyone gets the same bonus for the same class; the bonus received does not depend on whether they also took electives. It’s still rather unfair because now instead of regarding study halls as harder than electives, it regards them as the same, but at least students in electives aren’t being penalized. Perhaps it would also make sense to add a small bonus for each elective taken.

No matter what you do, life is not fair. It concerns me that your son is so stressed by this. This label doesn’t change anything about his GPA or what he accomplished in high school.

But if you want to improve the system for future students, I suggest at least don’t replace one unfair system with another. Really the best option is to do what our school now does. They don’t announce numerical class ranks. There is none of this I’m number 2 and they are number 1 and it’s not fair. None of this back stabbing kind of school culture. Just do away with it. The kids know who the best students are. And so do the teachers. No one needs that label and no one needs to know that they are .001 behind the next guy. I don’t know who our valedictorian was, and I don’t know what number my kid was, and none of this bothers me in the least. I do know that my kid could have been assured to be the valedictorian if she had chosen a course schedule that wasn’t the best for her, but that’s not what she chose, and it wasn’t something we considered.

Our graduation address is given by the student body president, who was elected by the students and unlike the valedictorian, has passed some qualifying test of being reasonably well liked by their fellow students.

30

“f you knew the “rules” of the “game” at the beginning, then you don’t have an argument at this point. If you thought the rules were unjust at the beginning (i.e. freshman year), then you should have said something then.”

Nahhhh. This is a well known problem with the entire valedictorian game and why the tippy top colleges and universities will often forego the valedictorian in favor of students with lower grades but who show intellectual curiosity and motivation to learn–not to get A’s. In fact, it is fair to say that the act of choosing to enroll in classes that reflect your intellectual interests in light of the fact that taking more classes will take you out of the running for Valedictorian is clear evidence that of the two, you are the stronger scholar.

If two students have identical grades and scores but one has taken music and art in addition to the courses taken by the other student, the one without the art and music will be rated higher. How does that make sense? Higher in what? Grade grubbing? Many (but not all) valedictorians in competitive schools carefully select their classes on the basis of ensuring that they have as few nonhonors/AP classes as possible rather than striving to take as comprehensive curriculum as possible. But the very top schools know this. Lack of music and art (in the context of a record that has few or no compensatory activities demonstrating unusual scholarship side from grades) is telling. I know many college instructors who would rather have a C student struggling in their class than the A+ grade grubber whose only motivator is being first.

So my message is not to worry about whether your child is 1 or 2 or…10. The tippy top colleges know what this is all about and don’t value the strategizing that is often involved with the Valedictorian gamesmanship. You have reason to be proud if your child chose classes with an eye on becoming as educated as possible…not with an eye on grabbing the best GPA. At graduation, smile and congratulate the valedictorian…smile!

My examples are about schools that weight honors and AP classes but not “specials” but the same principle applies when they don’t. In that case it often means taking less rigorous classes to nail the top grade-same issue. The issue is what drives selection of classes-interest and intellectual value or desire to be recognized?

31

I agree with mathyone. I understand why a student would feel the system was unfair. For kid mentality, it is a disappointment to lose out. The system could be made more fair by including scores from a set number of classes-that would be identical for all students at each grade ignoring other classes completely-or it can be a GPA that weights “advanced” classes more but also considers credits taken.

But even a “fair system” won’t identify the “best student”. That is because being “best” is a subjective judgement and because grades often have little to do with the extent to which a student is a genuine scholar (yes, even a 7 year old can be a scholar). Many genuine scholars opt out of the grade chasing game in favor of chasing interests and pursuing what fires their intellectual curiosity. So the best the valedictorian system can do is identify the best at complying with what the adults want. The kid who gets closest to the carrot gets the reward.

32

Weighing in on the Valedictorian controversy on this thread. It’s clear that there is not a universal way to determine Valedictorian. In my past experience , the student with the highest GPA has been awarded Valedictorian and only when students have exactly the same GPA are there CoValedictorians. It doesn’t matter how they achieved their GPA, it doesn’t matter what their ACT/SAT scores are, it doesn’t matter what ECs they participated in and it certainly doesn’t matter what college they choose to matriculate to. If the goal is to achieve Val status there are many ways to game a system . If the goal is to get a great education and take a variety of courses, there’s a way to achieve that as well. Too much emphasis placed on to titles IMO.

33

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Is it fair for the valedictorian to take less advanced classes?<<

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Maybe, maybe not, but it’s absolutely unfair to raise a stink about this after they have been announced, and after you have known for 4 years what the selection criteria would be.

34

There is nothing wrong with getting A’s, nothing that says it’s grubbing or chasing or superficial. And nothing so noble about claiming that it’s only about what “interests” you.

35

@lostaccount

True, true, and unrelated.

My statement is true. If OP knew thought the method of selecting the val/sal was unfair 4 years ago, then something should have been said then. It’s all about expectation management on the part of the school and OP.

Your statements are true also.

But saying “nahhhh” to my statement has NOTHING to do with advancing your treatis…NOTHING!