<p>Quote from Digmedia: "As the father of a now-turning sophomore in college, all of the HS achievements are a distant memory."</p>
<p>I agree. It would be interesting to note how parents of first-born graduating seniors view this issue versus parents of second or more children. I know I was more concerned with these types of issues with my first. After moving him on to college, I realized how trivial many of my worries about high school really were and yes, I probably thought about these things much more than he did. IMO most of the vals we have had from our high school were not the most accomplished, well-rounded students, nor were they the ones who received the most prestigious scholarships for precisely that reason.</p>
<p>Our local hs publishes the graduation edition which lists everybody's future school or other plans. Come to think of it, so did mine back in the olden days....</p>
<p>I don't think there could ever be an absolute fair way. There are WAY too many factors. </p>
<p>We used to recognize all 4.0 students as ranked first at graduation. Now we weight AP and honors classes. The pressure is CRAZY!! I liked the old way better. Keep all A's and you were guaranteed recognition. Now, you can get all A's and not be in the top 20%. </p>
<p>My son is taking golf and 7 AP's his senior year. I would never want to do that. I can't get him to lighten up, because he wants to keep his ranking. In reality, it doesn't mean much, but it matters to him. (There is a small scholarship to a state school for those first and second in their class here.)</p>
<p>Flatxca: You are right. There is no fair way. My only hope is there is some school administrator somewhere reading this and realizing some of the inequities in the system my son's school uses. If you are going to do away with ranking, then don't in the last month of senior year decide to rank the top two, especially when the spread is so tight. Perhaps have a faculty vote and choose two graduation speakers or alternatively go with something like the valedictory circle mentioned above where students over some very high threshhold are recognized. This is a situation where you have three kids with nearly identical, exemplary records over 4 years and two are recognized and the other not. The school my son attends is private, so they rely heavily on alumni and former parent contributions. They are being very short-sided because when money is tight, they will likely end up the losers in who we choose to donate money to.</p>
<p>It is just plain sd to make up the rules in the middle, or in this case, at the end. At least my son has known the rule all along. As for colleges, I don't think they care. They seem to be recalculating GPA's on their scales more and more and many don't really look at class rank, maybe percentiles, but not actual rank.</p>
<p>I'm a high school senior who is about to go on to college. Trust me, if your kids doesn't already NOT care about this issue, he certainly won't by the time he goes to college. There is always a time when somebody makes the cut and others don't even when everybody is very close. I've been on both sides. </p>
<p>This is going to sound harsh but I hope not everybody is as spiteful as you are threatening to cut off donations for one little thing. It sounds as if your son worked hard and got a good education at this schoolt. The four year record is what got him admitted to a good college not the fact that his name isn't read at graduation. </p>
<p>What about if the school read the 3rd ranked student but not the 4th place? Then someone else would be upset that THEIR kid wasn't acknowledged. In schools we have val and sal not win, place, and show.</p>
<p>Amazingly, at Stuyvesant (my alma mater), averages are out of 100 and calculated to two decimal places and the battle for valedictorian and saluditorian is always extremely tight (cause 3 people might have 98.3's or something ridiculous like that)</p>
<p>why does it matter? valedictorian and salutatorian is not something that is that prestigious in the eyes of colleges anyway. fyi my school takes everyone tied for rank 1 at the end of first semester of senior year and then averages their grades for their core classes (math, english, history, science). highest average grade comes out victorious. gpa is weighted.</p>
<p>everyone with 4.0+ is a valedictorian... this year we have 45 valedictorians. hahaha...gay....</p>
<p>and of course the #1 valedictorian (like highest gpa_ gives the speech
except at our school our #1 valedictorian is the biggest cheater ever~ had a tutor for each class and had answers passed down from past students</p>
<p>Do we really need valedictorians...or rankings for that matter... A #1 at a competitive schools is vastly different from a #1 at a rural public school. It just isn't a valid comparison to make. As well as factoring things such as difficulty of subjects, subjective grading from teachers etc. I'd think using things like SATs and APs or AP style exams would be a far better way of actually telling someone's abilities. I.e. a 5 in English AP really does show that someone's capable, whereas an A in English could mean something totally different in one school as compared to another.</p>
<p>Think about that student that has worked his or her butt off all their school years....whether they are in a high competitive school, or a rural school, they've done the work to achieve the best grades possible. Proud mom of a valedictorian!</p>
<p>If they have worked their butts off then they'll be able to achieve the 5's on the APs or any nationwide exams as well. Just it'll stop someone who has also worked just as hard through all the school years not recieving the same recognition just because s/he had the mis/fortune to attend a large competitive high school, or who just happened to have many other over-achievers in the same class, rather than attending a less competitive high school with lower achieving peers. It would create a more even ground.</p>