<p>My high school didn't weight grades (except in very rare occasions), didn't have class rankings, and had a valedictorian elected by the student body. I wouldn't worry about it--Harvard (like most other schools) has seen every grading and ranking system under the sun, and weighs transcripts accordingly.</p>
<p>Well, lazy 4.0 people . . . haha, yeah, lazy kids with perfect grades. Anyway, of course the schools look at the difficulty of classes in addition to the grades. A 4.0 in all honors, AP, and beyond classes looks much better than a 4.0 in all regular, lowest level classes. GPA and class rank mean little without the context the difficulty of the school and schedule.</p>
<p>I can honestly say that I was not in the top 10% of my class. I do not have any national awards or regional awards. I don't have all 700+ on my SAT IIs. I only have 1 AP (Environmental; partly because our school doesn't have many AP classes). I don't have a crazy leadership position either. To all out there: Harvard DOES take the supposed "normal" kid - you don't have to have a 1600 or 800s and Intel or an olympic swimming medal to gain admission. Just show passion for what you do.</p>
<p>(Agreed) .</p>
<p>my school had three kids get in harvard this year -- the ranks were #1, #4, #7 /180</p>