Can you imagine how this would work at a high school the size of mine? (Over 6k students…)
There would likely be well over a dozen Vals. That’s why our district did away with “top” GPA.
I agree with a poster above that multiple valedictorians are likely if GPA is not weighted and everyone with a 4.0, regardless of whether or not they took AP classes, are named valedictorian. You can have 5, 10, 15 valedictorians or more in those cases. I’m puzzled why rigor is disregarded.
It’s interesting that this is opposite what you hear when you go on college tours. Admission officers, especially in STEM departments, say they would rather admit a student with an occasional B if they took the hardest classes (AP and honors) their high school offered over a student with straight A’s that coasted through high school with easy classes. That’s because college is hard and they want students who they know can do the workload. So obviously, rigor is important to them.
You also will find as your tour that most admissions officers at highly selective schools mention valedictory status only to comment on how many valedictorians they rejected last year. It’s an honor of intense interest to many parents, some of the kids, and virtually none of the colleges because they understand that methodologies vary and differences among the top cohort of students are more likely statistical anomoalies than predictors of future success.
At my kid’s school, GPA is weighted, and the val and sal are those with the highest GPA. When D1was in school, there was a limit to the number of AP courses that you could take without special permission from the principal. The girl who was the Val was the one who took 1extra AP course. The difference in GPA of the top 5 in her class was extremely small.
Our children’s school doesn’t do them. They don’t rank students either.
Anyone who wishes to speak or perform at graduation simply signs up to do so.
^ I hope there are limits on how many students are actually allowed to do that!
Val and Sal are chosen using weighted GPA to the ten-thousandths place. In the event of a tie there would be two Val’s or Sals, but that has never happened ( it can be very close). The Val and Sal give a speech, and the school president presents their gift to the junior class.
Our school caps the weighted GPA at 5.0. 29 our of 500+ students were in the “top 10”. They all had weighted GPAs of 5.0. Anyone who wants to speak at graduation auditions in front of the principal and he picks the speakers.
With 250 graduates in our school district, the High School Valedictorian is the person who has the best academic record as measured by unweighted GPA.
As far back as I can see, this has been a 4.0. Occasionally, there are Co-Vals when two students qualify.
A few years back an interesting situation arose in which two students had 4.0. One was headed to HYPSM and the other to Cosmetology School. Obviously as a result of using unweighted measures.
This year, there were only two in this class that held a 4.0 after Freshman year, but a Senior from California transferred in and it appeared there would be three. However, the transfer student did not maintain GPA and we are back to two.
My kids’ school has about 350 graduates and calculates to the thousandth. As I mentioned there were 5 kids tied with the top 2 calculated GPA’s when my son graduated. I assume all had straight A’s and the sals had one less honors/AP class. This year there was only one Val but 3 sals I think.
Our district (with about 400 per high school class) does it like this: top 10 students are announced somewhere toward the end of the ceremony (stand and be recognized). Speakers/performers audition and are chosen by committee of teachers/admin. Class president might introduce other speakers. They don’t recognize a val/sal–not sure why, but I think it is to reduce competition for these spots. These are determined, essentially, in middle school–with some students taking advanced/high school classes during middle school, and then strategically taking only the minimum possible of required unweighted courses (like PE/Health), and getting special permission to take AP classes as freshmen, which is usually not allowed. I think the school recognizes that this “competition” comes mostly from certain parents and they are trying to de-emphasize the hunt for the highest possible GPA. There is a separate awards ceremony for all academic awards/scholarships, so none of these are announced at graduation. Kids/families who are not getting awards do not attend that one.
It’s easy to get a valedictorian if you use a 0-100 scale. As I recall the weighted GPA of my older son’s val was 106.xxxx. The highest in the history of the school.
“how does your child’s school pick their valedictorian”
- No Sal’s, no Val’s, no ranking was used at D’s HS. No weighted GPA either. However, HS has to provide a class profile, otherwise colleges cannot determine the student’s standing. So, the percentage that was listed in my D’s class profile for the unweighted GPA = 4.0 corresponded to exactly 1 person.
College does not care about all these Sal’s Val’s game. All they care is the kid’s standing in the class. They use the student GPA and the class profile to detemine that. We were also told several times that colleges strip down the weighted grades and reculculate it themselves. So, at the end, D’s HS was absolutely right, why to do all this things if colleges more or less ignore it.
So, our family gave our D unofficial title of Valedictorian as she happened to be the only student in her class with the unweiughted GPA = 4.0. Also it happened that D. received 2 parents awards at graduation for overall academic achievement in HS and the senior year academic achievement…just for additional proof of her status… And, no, D. was not even a speaker at graduation, the kids who did were not the top academic or other type of achievers. Again, nobody cared about this fact.
However, colleges care about student GPA, the standardized test scores, numerous un-related ECs and the fact that D. graduated from the second best private HS in our state made the difference. As a result she attended college on full tuition Merit scholarship. The fact that she was not called valedictorian and did not speak at graduation did not have any effect.
At my school, the class president spoke. The top GPA did not get publicly recognized, and I’m not even sure who it is. A friend of mine had a decent chance at it, but didn’t really care, so never asked.
In Texas, there is a law that each school issues a tuition waiver for the highest ranking graduate of the graduating class. The tuition waiver is good for the first two semesters of college at any public university in Texas. Whether they call it the valedictorian or not, each school must determine the highest ranking graduate.
Because of the law requiring public universities to auto admit the top 10 percent of graduates (except UT where it is the top 7 or 8 depending on year) most public schools rank at least the top 10 percent of graduates. Some schools recognize this group at the ceremony or at awards night. Because of this law, I think most schools weight the GPAs to give credit for rigor.
I think Texas high schools are right to give credit for rigor. I believe it takes visiting colleges or becoming familiar with college expectations to truly appreciate the importance of AP and honors classes. It’s disheartening that in our school, GPA is not weighted and the administrator insists that all classes are rigorous, thereby devaluing the school’s AP classes and discounting the hard work put in by the AP students in what are essentially college level courses.
Top student on a 100 point scale (i.e: their actual average grade). AP Classes have 5 points added to their final grade making the highest grade 105 in an AP, and 100 in a regular. It works out well for the most part, but there are always a couple of people that slip into being Junior Marshals while taking cupcake classes, and one year it was the Sal. For the most part, it works
No valedictorian or salutatorian anymore, but they do class rank based on weighted GPA. 4.0 scale, AP and dual credit courses are weighted with 1 extra quality point. Honors courses are not weighted. Approximately 400 kids in senior class. Top ten do receive recognition. Read short article last night in local paper for each top ten student discussing their accomplishments and future plans. Not sure how they do recognition and speakers at graduation itself.
No val or sal here, though there is a class ranking for when it comes to college apps. Everyone with a 4.0+ is put on a ballot, and the senior class picks 5-10 students to speak at graduation.
Our local high school defines valedictorian as the top 2% of the class (typically 6-8 students). The GPA is weighted but I don’t know if they count PE, student assistant, ASB, etc… Usually it works out fine. But occasionally, in a particularly strong year, a kid who has taken the max number of APs, and gotten straight As, doesn’t get included because he also took production drama, music and/or journalism which diluted the GPA. Although those kids tend to do very well with college admissions. They do not make a speech, but they sit in front, are announced during graduation and have a special sash or collar or something and I think a medallion. They also list them on the “valedictorian wall” on campus.