If your D makes NMF, she will qualify for some great scholarships that include room and board. From what you said, though, I assume that her scores may be too close to call at this point?
Our schools rank on transcripts, but do not name a valedictorian. Top 10 are announced at graduation, in alphabetical order, and that’s it. No prizes or speeches. (Graduation speeches are by audition–anyone can try out.) "Valedictorians"are determined in middle school here. Some students are taking honors math classes at the high school in 8th grade. Then their parents push for special permission for their kids to take AP classes as freshman which are usually available to sophomores and up. Non-honors classes are avoided. Required non-honors classes are taken during summer or on-line so the schedule can be packed with more weighted classes. If you don’t have your schedule/strategy mapped out by 7th grade, it’s too late. It got to be a sickness (mostly among certain parents), and I think that’s why the school got rid of the award.
Sounds like this the beginning of a very interesting common app essay 
Also, as suggested, definitely ask the GC to write about this in the school report.
Thank you all for your comments again. I emailed the counselor in charge and she just called me to say that school DOES rank and there was no explanation for the change in the profile page. She said DD could write school does NOT rank or she could write in #1 on her college applications but her ranking WILL show on her transcript. The whole thing is so odd and I asked her directly why the profile was changed and she didn’t respond. She sounded very confused about the whole thing, why we would even ask and didn’t know who changed the academic profile so I’m not sure what is going on there. We talked about Val and Sal and I mentioned that the high school didn’t inform students early enough to make a difference on their college applications and she said it was because they needed the senior fall grades to do the computation but again, other factors come into play, not just academic ranking.
I never dreamed that my post would get so many replies. Thanks for those sympathetic replies and thanks for those who feel that ranking is wrong. If we had to go through high school again, my wish would be for a school that does NOT rank but as long as colleges want those numbers, I would want to give them. I am just so grateful for all the replies with such good information!
I know that there is NO golden ticket to the highly competitive schools but this is certainly one piece that can be checked off in dd’s favor coming from a large public school that rarely sends kids to top colleges. In fact, only about 30% of kids each year go on to four year colleges. I want DD to be able to present the best college application that she can and while subjective things can’t be predicted or assured, certainly the hard stats are there to be checked off. I’ve seen the form the counselor sends with the common application and know what boxes they have to check like “most rigorous course load” and if DD could do it, she had to try. Thanks to this board, we knew well in advance that the SAT was changing and the advice here was to take the old SAT which she did. She stands at a 2400 super score so that is another hard stat in her favor along with her unweighted 4.0. Her AP scores are 5s so far to back up those As. Her PSAT SI is 222/1480 so we are pretty sure she will qualify for National Merit but the predictions are all over the place and we don’t know enough to count on it.
sax, thank you for such a great supportive post! That is exactly how I felt and while I would have encouraged dd to follow through. I don’t know if she was as upset as I was or even really understood the implications. With so many other fish to fry it just seemed like one more bump in the road to her. I will be curious to see when she gets home if she gave it another thought and will let her know that although the counselor said her rank will be on the transcript, she has to check and double check everything now. She never wants to be seen as a “grade grubber” so she doesn’t always stand up for herself. Last year, in her required PE class, she had an A+ all year and on the final the teacher made a mistake and ended up giving her an A. He caught the mistake himself and emailed DD to let her know he fixed it but he didn’t inform the registrar so that grade is still an A on her transcript. It irks me to no end, she earned the A+ but won’t fix it because it’s still an A and it’s PE so it doesn’t matter. Almost all her other grades are A+ so it gets to me but not her.
jym626, the 529 was not in the kids’ or my name other than they were listed as the beneficiary. I hope by now anyone on this board knows how important it is to NOT have 529s in the grandparents’ names. I tried to convince my dad to put them in the kids’ names, showing him that any withdraw would count as untaxed income to the kids and ding their financial aid but by the time he understood, he was too sick to deal with it. She literally stole their college fund and had to pay additional taxes for taking the money but to her, she got something, that was better than nothing. He set it up when they were under 10 years old and assured us that they would be covered for at least the state school costs but in the end, we lost it all. The story of our own 529s “catastrophic losses” is here: http://www.santafenewmexican.com/news/local_news/judge-oks-m-deal-in-college-savings-case/article_8361e941-c6e5-538f-a40e-c5bb5208cf8f.html The article says there was a settlement, we got $300 and there are still ongoing class action cases but we won’t see a dime before DD heads off to college.
momofmusician, I understand what you are saying. We faced some of the same choices and took the different path. DD was just one of 13 kids advanced from 7th grade in math. Most of her current classes in science and math are with seniors and the handful of the 13 kids because of needing certain prerequisites to move to the next level. Some of the pack chose to drop out of the running by taking drama or other “fun” classes and some took college classes at the local cc but those are not given a bump so dd didn’t take that route. Her brother took many of those and his rank dropped to #4 in senior year for that reason although he was still Sal.
Yes, ucbalumnus, we are in California and no, we can not afford a UC unless dd wins regents at UCB, UCLA or UCSD. Without that scholarship, it’s not affordable but we will be crossing fingers for regents as only those UCs will meet our full need with no loans. CalGrant helps at the UCs but CSUs are off the list as they are more expensive since the CalGrant is so much smaller.
Midwestdad, she is open to any school that she can get into and we can afford although she has said she is not too fond of the south for some reason and of course many of the full ride schools ARE in the south. So many schools give merit aid but it simply isn’t enough so she will be targeting the most generous schools that are, of course, the most difficult to get into. My son was in the same position and it seemed like he hit the lottery and is attending a school that gives him over $60K in grant aid, we pay around $6k and it’s a struggle for us but he knows how lucky he is. If he can’t come home for holidays, well, that is just another sacrifice along the way.
I will hop over to the financial aid and scholarships page now to get help. With the new prior prior year rules, I can’t even figure out how exactly to run the net price calculators. Son graduates college spring of 2017 and DD will enter college fall of 2017 so the taxes will not present the correct picture for our finances. If any of you can help me with that, I would really appreciate more feedback and help.
Thank you all again!
^^^And this would be another example of something changing without notice. It might help some students who wouldn’t have qualified in the past, and it may hurt some applicants who now have to compete in a bigger pool of qualifers for something that used to be automatic. Thinges change, sometimes without notice. The high school may have decided more students would benefit from going to ‘no ranking’ than would be hurt by it. My daughter was hurt by the ranking sytem, so I would have been happy to see it dropped with no notice.
What if despite all the planning and 6 am classes, OP’S daughter had dropped from #1 to (gasp) #2? What if someone else had also taken only the perfect schedule, had taken a 5 am class, had taken one more AP class? Should she then immediately be deemed unworthy of college? No, she would have just looked at all the other opportunities available for top ranked kids.
Maybe this is a blessing in disguise. Maybe OPs daughter will now look at other schools, not just Long Beach. Maybe there is plenty of money at other California schools.
A student can only be considered to be a valedictorian AFTER final grades for their senior year are released. So, how can scholarships be given to Vals? Students have made their school decisions long before May of their senior year. Ask your guidance counselor if they are willing to state that you are in the top 1-5%? That’s how my high school did it. Don’t worry about this.
I understand that your DD has worked hard, you feel like she deserves the recognition, and you are correct. However, I have never seen a situation where the precise order of the handful of students at the very top of the class was important for admission or a scholarship.
At our school, they only announce students in the top 2%, and top 10%. D1 graduating class had 15 students who were admitted to Ivy League colleges, but the student with the technically highest gpa was not admitted to any of them. That student is very smart and hard working, but his grades had come at the cost of extracurriculars.
It is true that gpa is the single most important thing, but I don’t know any school that cares about small differences in gpa.
This is the last year that our HS is ranking. Val and Sal are officially determined after the second quarter senior year ( around January). The GC told my daughter unofficially of her ranking and gave her permission to put it down if asked.
I know one school that tossed around the idea of offering scholarships to valedictorians until it was pointed out to them that every home-schooled kid is typically valedictorian of their class :))
I know we researched merit scholarships extensively and most were looking at whether you fell in the top 5 or 10%, not whether you were first.
It isn’t clear to me that the OP’s D should be looking ONLY for merit money. When one is in the position of having a very low EFC and a student with excellent stats, casting a wide net is the way to go. There is no reason not to take a shot at the schools that really meet need with minimal student loans, including the Ivies and similar schools, and some elite LACs.
A $30K merit scholarship–which is huge–off a $50 or 60K COA doesn’t do any good when you can afford at most $5K per year.
It would be a good idea for her to look at some schools with guaranteed full ride scholarships for her stats. It would be a good idea for her to figure out if there are any school-specific competitive scholarships she has a shot at, although they are usually incredibly competitive. It would also be a good idea for you to run the NPCs at the schools with deep pockets.
Luckily, the OP came here before her D made up a final list.
@fidoprincess, your daughter sounds like a wonderful girl. From what you say, it sounds to be that the best thing right now would be to concentrate on getting the best ACT or SAT scores she can. Wen you have those in hand, you will have a better idea of which schools should be on her list.
I understand how you feel. We experienced financial reversals that meant S had to grab the brass ring FA-wise in order to go to a school he wanted to attend. Luckily, he got into schools that offered him close to a full ride based on need. He graduated from Dartmouth with only $14K of debt. It was less expensive than attending our state university would have been.
@Consolation - OP stated D already took SAT
@fidoprincess Great to hear your daughter is all set. One less thing for you to worry about.
For what its worth we never played the GPA game and I do think rankings and Val and Sal have gotten out of hand. I would be happy to see rankings, val and sal and even weighted classes fall to the side. I certainly agree with all of you that school would be better off without them.
@Marian Thanks for explaining your understanding of the “gaming the system” quote. I better understand what you are saying.
I just don’t totally agree with it.
UCs generally assume an $8,000 to $10,000 student contribution (work earnings plus federal direct loans); Regents’ or other scholarships can replace part of all of that. Do you mean to say that even if she takes the federal direct loans ($5,500) and earns some money in summer and part time jobs, the remaining amount shown by the net price calculator will not be affordable to you? I.e. you cannot afford to contribute the FAFSA EFC?
They did away with rank to discourage students from making silly and counterproductive educational choices in order to game the rank system and be number one. Good change in my opinion.
As you yourself noted, students who drop out of language can get a higher rank. That means the ranking system your school uses is garbage and no one should be using it to evaluate anyone. There are more fair and appropriate systems out there but the vast majority of school administrators seem to have neither the interest nor the mathematical understanding to implement them.
With stats like that plus substantial need, your daughter should apply widely, maybe even look into the more generous Ivies like Harvard/Yale/Princeton.
Here is a list of schools that offer substantial awards for stats like hers:
http://automaticfulltuition.yolasite.com/
Here is another list of substantial NMF awards, for which your daughter might qualify:
http://nmfscholarships.yolasite.com/
She sounds like a wonderful hardworking girl and I wish her and your family the best of luck!
It does sound as if need-based FA might be a possibility. As someone posted above, the Ivies and elite LACs are very generous with FA, and substantial numbers of kids are getting it, well over half in the schools we visited. I don’t know if there is any interest in coming to the east coast, but there are some great schools here with generous FA: Wesleyan, Vassar, Swarthmore, to name a few. From what you’ve posted, your daughter would have a good chance of admission at Swarthmore, a great chance at Wesleyan, and she would be a shoo-in at Vassar (a school I loved). There are also great schools here that would offer your daughter merit money - one that I really liked is University of Rochester. And in CA, USC offers an automatic half-tuition scholarship for NM finalists - maybe that combined with need-based FA would cover the COA? I think it would be a mistake to focus only on public CA schools.
The USC half tuition scholarship for National Merit Finalists now appears to be competitive, since “entering first year students are considered if they have been designated National Merit Finalists” (emphasis added):
https://www.usc.edu/admission/undergraduate/docs/uscScholarships1516.pdf
Wow, thank you all again for such informative and thoughtful comments. It’s encouraging to see many of your write that she will have some choice and get in somewhere that we can afford!
ucbalumnus, the UCs are coming in at over $15K so no, we could not afford that. IF she gets regents, then our share would be around $7K or more, not sure with the complicated finaid calculations. With summer earnings and loans, I think it would be out of reach without regents. Even if she could live at home, the finaid calculators just take away grant money so it would cost the same. That >$15K seems to be the “magic” number as many schools that give full tuition still have high room and board costs. Even Bama is out of reach. I also don’t want her saddled with a ton of loans. USC packages the max amount of loans so she would come out of there with $27K debt, not a good idea in my opinion. We learned a lot when my son was applying about things not included like health insurance, and other factors like only housing for freshman year, for example. That is a big problem because some schools don’t have affordable off campus housing.
Yes, her list will include all the meets full needs, no loans schools. She has to cast a wide net and she won’t have the luxury of looking for “fit.” She also won’t be able to visit schools on her list until she is accepted and then will have to depend on her researching the schools and the one visit on accepted students day to make her decisions. She has to interview (mandatory) for a school about 8 hours away over spring break and there is no choice but to spend one night in a hotel that will cost almost $200 the night before her interview! That is a big dent in our budget.
I know it will be really hard for her and the odds are so very slim of getting into one of those highly competitive schools which is why we NEED to find a few safety schools that she would be happy to attend and we can afford. That is the hard part. I am researching the links that ucbalumnus provided but oh boy, there are not many guaranteed full rides based on stats, are there?
Again, I feel so lucky that she has the natural talent to do extremely well in school but it is the other factors that will get her into those schools. Thankfully, she has so many outside interests and ecs that make her an interesting person so the stats become secondary. Maybe I am wrong but I envision colleges simply checking off boxes that meet their minimum stats threshold and then the ecs and her essays along with the teacher recommendations are what might get her in.
As much as I would love for her to stay close, I’m pretty sure she will end up on the East Coast where schools are much more generous. There are only 2 schools in all of California that meet full need with no loans, Stanford being one and she won’t stand a chance getting in there. Even with the high airfare prices, it’s was much cheaper for my son to attend school back east than it was here in Ca. The only less expensive offers in CA included maintaining a 3.6 gpa so that was too much pressure to realize that he wouldn’t be able to finish there if he couldn’t keep that gpa. In his case, we were advised here on this board to pick a good finaid package over merit with strings and that’s what we did. I hope she has some good choices as well but oh boy, the ride is hard, isn’t it? I guess I am more worried than I thought to let such a thing as “School no longer ranks” to throw me into a tizzy!
Your HS will send a class profile to each college. It will contain the range of GPAs from top to bottom. If your kid’s matches the top, it’s clear she is number one.
Ubcalumnus
I very recently spoke with someone" in the know"at USC about that very issue - national merit finalists – and he confirmed that the scholarship is still automatic, despite the wording on the pdf.
It has had that wording for the last couple of years, by the way.
I recently spoke with someone at USC who is “in the know” regarding the national merit scholarship. It’s still IS automatically awarded to NMF’s who enroll at USC and notify national merit that USC is their first choice school , despite the wording on that PDF