@wis75 , you also live in your world but life is different elsewhere. I’m fully aware that not all HS weight, that not all weight the same, that not all offer APs, that many colleges recalculate GPA for admissions or look at unweighted GPA only, and I’m also fully aware that most colleges look at schedule rigor in addition to GPA regardless of whether they consider weighted or unweighted GPA. In your district it may be possible for a special ed kid to make the honor roll but admissions officers will have no trouble differentiating between that student and one who takes five or six AP classes. My district makes that distinction between course loads more obvious but the end result is the same. In this particular case the OP’s student can be directly compared to his peers in his own school. If they are able to handle the AP course requirements successfully and he is not, his GPA can and should reflect that difference. Colleges will look at his course rigor, his grades (weighted or unweighted), his class rank, and his school profile to determine whether he’s admissions material. OP seems to think S is being specifically penalized, when everything described has been completely normal AP course expectations. The fact is that top schools are looking for unweighted As in maximum rigor courses, so it doesn’t matter whether a study hall/easy class kid can get a high rank or a student carries a 6.5 weighted GPA.