<p>I would appreciate people's thoughts/input on the following since I personally am not sure what to make of it.</p>
<p>A friend of mine who lives in another school district has a son who just started HS. She has described the following to me. The school weighs honors and ap courses more heavily in calculating gpa. OK, no surprise there, our district also has weighted gpa's. Once you include all the required subjects and lunch, a typical student has two periods each semester for electives. My friend tells me that parents in her district have told her that the "wise" thing to do is for her son to take his orchestra elective Pass/Fail - so it won't count in his gpa, and to take study hall instead of another elective. The rationale is that since the electives would not be weighted, as the honors the kids is otherwise taking, even a great grade, could end of lowering his weighted gpa. She claims parents and even the guidance counselor acknowledge that this is done and that since designation of the valedictorian can turn on hundredths of a point, this practice is appropriate.</p>
<p>I found this description shocking. In my daughter's school it was common for kids to not even take lunch period to that they could fit MORE courses into their schedules!</p>
<p>Is this a common practice? Wouldn't colleges figure this out? Would an applicant who took study hall and has a higher weighted gpa really be better off than one who took a variety of electives and ended up with a slightly lower weighted gpa? Do those extra hundredths in the weighted gpa that make the difference for valedictorian really matter?</p>
<p>If that is the manner is which you become val, val is way overrated. I'm sorry but I'd rather have my kid have electives and opportunities than become the valedictorian of the class.</p>
<p>I don't know how it is at other schools but all the kids in the top 10% of my S's class have great opportunities as far as college choices go. There are kids who were not val or sal and still went to a top tier college.</p>
<p>My feeling is that, although gaming the system in this way may make it easier for the student to become valedictorian, it will only hurt in the college application process. A selective college wants to see that the student challenged himself/herself. Seeing one pass/fail credit and one study hall every year does NOT indicate a student who loves learning and is trying to learn as much as possible.</p>
<p>I believe a college looks at the whole picture, not the fine differences in weighted GPA's. In addition, some colleges unweight the GPA's so they can compare them between different high schools. So whatever small advantage that student may have obtained would be totally lost.</p>
<p>I think it is really sad the lengths people will go to just to try to get some small advantage in applying to selective name colleges. If my son attended that high school, I would tell him to take what he wanted and let the chips fall where they may.</p>
<p>It saddens me to think that this whole process has become so focused on nothing but admission to the next step. High School is and should be a time of great growth for most kids, both academically and socially. Unfortunately, many kids spend their whole 4 years figuring out the best way to get into the "best" colleges and lose sight of what they should be learning along the way. Our HS neither weights grades, nor ranks kids. Some feel that it is unfair to the kids who take the most challenging courses..their GPAs may suffer in comparison, because the grades are not weighted for honors and AP, and the courses are actually harder and more rigorous. However, our guidance department has taken great care to describe this in our school's profile. If kids (or their parents) are most concerned with gaming the system then they are losing sight of what they could be learning in those 4 years. I have learned (my third child is a HS junior) that they can't get these years back. College, no matter where they choose to go, is a different ballgame with a different set of rules. I would hope that kids who have a chance to explore electives in HS do so without regard to the potential impact on their GPA. Otherwise we are raising a generation of kids who may never take risks in their learning.</p>
<p>Ditto to the above. Adcoms aren't idiots. If the college says they look for challenging courseloads, then I take them at their word -- and pass/fail courses and study halls aren't going to pass their muster. That doesn't mean I'm in favor of a student taking an insanely difficult schedule just to impress a college (at the risk of sanity). A good, solid, challenging middle ground should be available. </p>
<p>My son, who is taking a full complement of AP and Advanced classes this year is considering dropping Spanish III at mid-term. The last year of Spanish was bad, and this year it's worse. Will not having 3 full years of foreign language (let alone 4 years) hurt his chances as some schools? Maybe. Is ther a chance that colleges will think he's trying to "game" his GPA by dropping a course that he's not doing as well in? I hope not, but I guess they might. Am I going to pull out my hair and insist that he continue with a course that is making him miserable instead of exploring another (not necessarily less challenging) course? Nope.</p>
<p>At our school, the weighted GPA includes ONLY the core academic classes so that no matter what grade, good or bad, you get on PE, band, etc. etc. it will not affect your weighted GPA. This, as far as I can see, avoids gaming the system and I like it. Our school system is a very good and receptive one; they recently changed the courses included in the weighting when they realized that, inadvertently, kids taking such courses as Latin were being penalized as Latin does not have Honors level as an option. </p>
<p>Can you work with your system to adjust/"correct" how they do the weighting? In the year our school changed the formula, they reported both "old" and "new" weighting for any student who requested such on the college transcripts.</p>
<p>I wish the parents would be worried less about college admissions and more concerned about the depth of their students education. I have loved all of the electives I've taken (Chorus, sculpture, anatomy, genetics, discrete math and forensics) and they have taught me a lot of interesting things. These students are missing out if they are electing to use one of their periods as a study hall...</p>
<p>unbelievablem, I personally agree with people in this cc not playing the weighted gpa system. However, you have to give your kids the same edge as all other kids no more and no less. Your kids can always do other activities of their interests outside school system.</p>
<p>wzzzz, I have to respectfully disagree with you if you are saying that kids should forego orchestra, chorus, etc,. if the purpose of that decision is based on what you think an admissions committee wants to see. As noted above, I think it's possible to take a challenging courseload that is also balanced with elective courses that engage a person's non-academic interests. At a certain point this becomes the kid's decision one way or another, because he/she is not going to apply themselves to courses that they intensely dislike (particularly if they resent the fact that they could be taking chorus, orchestra, studio art, etc. instead).</p>
<p>Iderochi, you can take AP Music or AP Arts in our high school. What I am saying is that you have to be mindful on what courses to take. I only wish all high school can inform all students and parents about the ranking system. I learned it from this cc.</p>
<p>My S's HS does not weigh courses. They do provide two GPA's, one for Core (AP, Honors, & Grad Requirements) and an overall GPA that reflects all of the courses. He really enjoyed taking Photography, Drawing, Auto shop (a vocational course is a grad requirement), band etc. AP and Honors courses are indicated as such on the transcript, but no one gets over a 4.0. The school has no trouble placing students in top universities throughout the country.</p>
<p>idad, I guess your S's HS is either good private or public HS. For regular hs ranking is the best way for top universities to evaluate students.</p>
<p>I am somewhat glad to see my own feelings on this echoed by much of what has been said here. What I found a little sad was that in telling me about this, my friend seemed to think that she was letting me in on this great piece of wisdom she had acquired. I couldn't believe that the school guidance counselor apparently sanctioned this type of behavior (perhaps sanctioned is the wrong word, maybe he just accepted that it was what kids there did?)! And given that, I doubt I could convince my friend that she would not be doing her son a favor in following this "great" advise she has been given.</p>
<p>wzzz, while I agree that ranking is an important consideration I think we've gone off the rails here a bit. Going back to the original post, I think we both agree that adcoms will be able to see through the games people play to increase their rank. FWIW my S' HS is a fairly typical part suburban/part urban public HS. SAT averages under 1000. Only about 30 or 40 percent go on to 4-year colleges. While they rank, they don't weight so Honors and AP classes don't do anything. They've had success in getting students into the HYPSM world -- and not necessarily just the Vals and Sals.</p>
<p>Perhaps you could ask your friend why she thinks this is a good idea. Is it strictly to have the best chance for her son to become val? How does she know at this point that he'd be in the running anyway? It seems crazy to me. She (and the others at that school) are sabotaging the ability of the students to get a broad-based, elective-filled high school education, and for what? Some remote chance of being val? A position which, for most, will not mean a lot when it comes to college application time, and after that, will mean nothing. </p>
<p>As others have said, adcoms are not stupid. They'll look at that transcript and see study halls, pass/fail, and no electives, and they will understand what is going on. Good colleges want to see kids who have taken advantage of all that their high school has to offer, not kids who have filled their schedule with study halls. It surprises me because the schools which my children attended would not get a credit for study hall so that would have put them in a situation where they'd be scrambling to try to get the number of required credits, not that they would have ever wanted to do that anyway. Most kids have difficulty deciding between many classes to see what they're able to fit in, not looking for ways to eliminate taking anything. None of my kids' schools had an option to take anything pass/fail either.</p>
<p>Finally, you should tell your friend that the possibility of getting lower marks in these electives wouldn't likely hurt her son anyway. Most colleges will recalculate gpa when they get an application, with their own formula, usually only considering the core academic subjects when they do so. I just find this whole issue very sad. That parents are thinking like this about their freshman kids is so unnecessary, and really quite a shame.</p>
<p>I have certainly read of this, there are many articles about gaming the system to be Val- but how does being Val help at admissions? It does not happen until June! I suppse it is all about class rank as stated by the GC.</p>
<p>Our high school does not include anything other than solid academics in the ranking, no sports-based classes, no fine arts. No classes are weighted, at all, even though the brightest kids are generally taking the toughest schedule. It seems to work out. The only time I have seen an issue like this is a kid who took the "most difficult" schedule, but was not in the very tiptop group, because it was hard! If he had taken a slightly easier schedule, his rank would ahve been higher, but he would not have been in the "most difficult" schedule group on the GC counselor form.</p>
<p>I think the places where gaming has become a highly developed art is the places that feed into schools offering scholarships, etc. Like, Texas, top 10% guaranteed admittance vs Uof California, designed to take the top 12%, in the state, not in the school, so gaming is not so very important.</p>
<p>Kids should take the classes in which they have an interest and which will develop them the most, not the safe ones.</p>
<p>It reminds me of "Ithica", the beautiful poem recited by Maurice Templeston at Jackie Kennedy Onassis' funeral. It is not the journey's end, but the journey that is important. </p>
<p>I can't image a poor teen filling up on class after class, no lunch, no study hall, no electives.....for what? To get into a top school. How much of a life should a kid give up for that? These kids will never be 15, 16 or 17 years old again. Life is worth living.</p>
<p>also, the social skills that kids gain by being a regular teenager, will be far more important later on in life, than the As in five hundred APs.</p>
<p>My friend's son is very bright - I think he was sal from middle school (yes that predicts a lot doesn't it). Any way this family does already have Ivy in the eyes - and since my daughter did not apply to Ivies (no interest), I think they just think that I don't know what that "world" is like. I'm afraid if I try convincing the mom that the advise she's gotten is not necessarily in her son's best interests, she will just think I dont understand Ivy admissions and the need to give your kid any extra little boost. Sometimes its just really hard to convince someone they don't know what they really think they know - especially while trying not to come across as a know-it-all critical of their choices.</p>
<p>Tell her you've found this great little website called College Confidential that apparently is where "all" the kids and parents shooting for the Ivy League hang out and swap info. :) </p>
<p>Of course, that means she'll eventually see this thread . . .</p>
<p>The Val/Sal distinction is miniscule when it comes to college admissions, even in the HYP realm. If more parents believed that, then a lot of angst would be avoided.</p>