<p>OpieofMaybery2: I shall spend my day pondering your elliptical prose. :)</p>
<p>I have to say that the system here is basically clear as mud. There is no designated written rule (that I know of) that explains this and it is certainly not publicized or talked about by the administration. Basically it got confusing last year when the girl I’ve been tlaking about was val, because she did get some B’s, but had taken almost twice as many AP classes as anyone else in the senior class, and everyone (including the administration) knew that she deserved it. Thus, there were obviously loopholes or footnotes in the policy (perhaps the highest weighted GPA is also val?), but that was never communicated. The only reason we (the students) know the policy is changing is because of a small article in the school paper, other than that there was no communication of the school’s policy. </p>
<p>What I was trying to highlight was not the problem with multiple vals, but multiple unweighted vals. If two people have the highest weighted GPA because they had the same classes and got the same grades, I have no problem with that. But when the 7 or 15 or 28 vals have taken widely different courseloads and maintained all A’s, I do hve a problem with that because many times the ones who took the regular or honors classes were fully capable of taking AP, but decided not to because they knew they couldn’t or at the least feared they couldn’t make an A in the AP class. </p>
<p>Thank you, hereshoping</p>
<p>I like GPA, weighted. When I found out who was Val at our school, it made perfect sense. She’s done the best in the hardest classes. My son, no slouch (he’s going to the same college as the Val), has been raving about how smart she is for years and would often tell me, I got the best grade on this test…after [her]. A week ago their history class had the students exchange papers they’d written, and guess who’s paper my son thought was the best?</p>
<p>"I have to say that the system here is basically clear as mud. "</p>
<p>My point has always been a policy (written) is established and more importantly followed. After that no worries… If only one makes it fine, if 20 make it fine. And even if none make it fine. Have a good policy, stick to it, let people know what it is and follow it. </p>
<p>Why no worries? because you either make the mark or you don’t. </p>
<p>The problem you have is there is no clear rationale behind anything, so people are left to wonder and we tend to wonder in the worst ways. We don’t think happy thoughts in these situations about other people. </p>
<p>My point there was why waste your energy on it beyond a few seconds. You’ll have a healthier life long term. </p>
<p>There’s two ways to view life as you can probably tell HH and I are polar opposites. Good luck on your decision.</p>
<p>Interesting some think kids should make the decisions as to what goes in their yearbook (including pregnancies, drugs, criminal activity, etc.), but are ready to admonish high achieving kids for not thinking “happy thoughts” if they spend more than “a few seconds” thinking about their school’s val/sal policy. Hmmm…</p>
<p>HH,</p>
<p>You still just don’t get it do ya? ;)</p>
<p>I think you should ponder some more. </p>
<p>When your done taking pot shots, maybe you’ll ask me to explain my pov in a way you’ll understand. I think the person you accuse me of admonishing already gets it… just waiting for you to catch on love.</p>
<p>I don’t get this whole topic. Outside of Texas, why does anyone really care? My son and his classmates care a little, but that’s because they compete at everything, and they don’t take it seriously at all. The school uses weighted GPA, and it changed how it calculated weighted GPA last year, with much grumbling among the students, but little discernible effect. </p>
<p>Sometimes the most impressive student is the valedictorian, and sometimes he or she isn’t. The former was true in my daughter’s class, the latter in my son’s. There isn’t any one formula that is going to capture everything perfectly year after year. The valedictorian usually has something on the ball, and that’s fine. The method of selecting the valedictorian says something about what the school values, and that’s important, too. But it would be a pretty awful school if everything it valued could be reduced to a single, administrable formula, so I doubt anyone expects the valedictorian selection method to communicate everything the school values.</p>
<p>And, even though this school values excellence, and challenging oneself, and competition all very highly, it would not value any student distorting his or her educational program to get a better shot at being valedictorian, and honestly I haven’t heard of any student doing that.</p>
<p>I get it too–very much so. You came down hard on this girl because she had a different view from yours. Why? No need. No one asked for your critique of her. A different view, is all. Best to be honest if one strongly prefers one method of calculating val/sal over the other, and not resort to philosophical personal insults. I’m used to it from you; others not so much perhaps.</p>
<p>
I just googled “valedictorian + scholarship” and received 303,000 hits. I assume there aren’t 303,000 different scholarships but I also assume there is not just one scholarship mentioned 303,000 times. </p>
<p>My daughter received our state tuition exemption for use at any of the Texas state schools and a very nice val only scholarship at a private OOS LAC. Both schools became our financial safeties. IMO, the most important schools to find. </p>
<p>Oh BTW, three of the first five hits were Texas. LOL.</p>
<p>“I get it too–very much so. You came down hard on this girl because she had a different view from yours. Why? No need. No one asked for your critique of her. A different view, is all. Best to be honest if one strongly prefers one method of calculating val/sal over the other, and not resort to philosophical personal insults. I’m used to it from you; others not so much perh”</p>
<p>NOPE YOUR STILL MISSING IT.</p>
<p>Go back and reread the post. Without using your anger at me as your personal filter. There was alot of “I was this, I was that, the other’s were boring, “I” was not”… She got my point, you still haven’t and probably won’t because next to the devil, you see me standing. That’s your loss, not mine.</p>
<p>"My daughter received our state tuition exemption for use at any of the Texas state schools and a very nice val only scholarship at a private OOS LAC. Both schools became our financial safeties. IMO, the most important schools to find. "</p>
<p>[not to you directly curm]</p>
<p>And that’s what’s great about it. But why would anyone care that someone else also was named at the same time? In our case of the 12 kids named vals in those two years ALL had full rides or near full rides for college. So 12 kids families got offers for a free education… What in the heck is WRONG with that? </p>
<p>That’s what I’m not getting by the grousing about an absolute #1 above and beyond the requirements set. Why should anybody be upset that somebody else’s kid gets a deal? T</p>
<p>hese were also my kids bf’s, they could celebrate together and now four years later some are entering med school together still friends. Able to attend med school because undergrad was picked up. I just don’t get some folks. When life craps gold in your lap, why ***** about what’s in somebody else’s?</p>
<p>Opie. As I have said before, if there was a tie - so be it. (In fact D broached the topic of a tie while she was in 1st to the boy in 2nd . Nothing ever came of it. I don’t know why. ) I have no problem with that. (But the way our school district, and really the whole state, does it that ain’t going to happen.) </p>
<p>And my post was in response to JHS’s “except in Texas why does anybody care”. As I said earlier-y’all had a system. Everybody played by the rules. Good for you. We had a system , everybody played by the rules, good for us.</p>
<p>Opie, about the speech thing. I had numerous, numerous people come up to me and tell me they loved my speech and made similar comments that I did about the others. Perhaps, the sal’s speech would have been better if his mother did not write almost the entire thing (which he said and I seriously believe) and if it did not COMPLETELY contradict his actual character (for instance, talking about character and quoting Bible verses to such end when his character is perhaps the most lacking of those on stage). Several of the speeches also started off with “I don’t really know what to write, so…blah blah blah.” I’m not making this up. If you want me to send you a copy of my speech I would be happy to, and you can judge for yourself how good) or bad) it is. I would add that I have had much more public speaking practice than any of the others, due to many of my summer activities where I’ve written and given speeches. So, if their delivery was less than superb some of it could be due to that. </p>
<p>I’m sorry I think my speech was good after having people I don’t even know coming up and saying they loved it and it made them cry. I already loved my speech because it was ME (in print form), I said what I wanted to the people who meant the most to me. </p>
<p>And as for the scholarship thing, none of our vals this year got a “special” scholarship for it. The only scholarship they received (we are in FL) was the Bright Future scholarship (full tuition at any state uni), but that is for having a certain GPA and SAT score and most of the honors/AP kids get at least 75% or 100%. I know they also didn’t get full rides to other more prestigious schools, especially because of their GPA alone.</p>
<p>I don’t think that there is a good way to choose a valedictorian.</p>
<p>Having a system and following it is a good idea, yes, but I think the school administration also has an obligation to create a system that does not encourage unwise course choices.</p>
<p>But how do you do that?</p>
<p>If you base the ranking on unweighted GPA, you discourage kids from taking rigorous courses.</p>
<p>If you base the ranking on weighted GPA, you discourage kids from including unweighted courses in their schedules, even if those courses have much to contribute to the kids’ education.</p>
<p>Neither choice encourages students to make the course selections that are truly best for them.</p>
<p>I think it depends on teh school
My D- is taking one AP class- her school doesn’t weight
Some of her friends, I m sure are taking more than one AP.
The colleges, are going to be looking at more than GPA and Val status.
They are going to be looking at test scores, SAT ll scores, AP test scores as well.
I am proud of D, and I don’t have a problem that her school has 28 valedictorians, perhaps some have never taken AP.
While the school does encourage all students to take the most rigourous classes that are appropriate, I have also heard some parents say that they don’t want their kids to take AP, because they think it is alot of work.</p>
<p>I do agree with that.For some of the kids like my daughter, who faced a steep learning curve when entering this high school, compared to her middle school background, it was an awful lot of work, but she knew what she wanted and that was to get as much out of it as she could.</p>
<p>Kids who don’t have parents encouraging them to make the most of their “free” education, may have found a circle of peers who also want to be sure they don’t do “too much” work.</p>
<p>But for my D and her friends, who know that you get out of it what you put into it, take the classes that require a lot of papers and the classes that are vocational. They get a lot out of both</p>
<p>“And my post was in response to JHS’s “except in Texas why does anybody care”. As I said earlier-y’all had a system. Everybody played by the rules. Good for you. We had a system , everybody played by the rules, good for us.”</p>
<p>Curm, yea it wasn’t directed at you, but I used the point you made. Did I copywrite infringe? 
We agree, “y’all had a system. Everybody played by the rules. Good for you. We had a system , everybody played by the rules, good for us.” YES, we solidly agree.</p>
<p>"I’m sorry I think my speech was good after having people I don’t even know coming up and saying they loved it and it made them cry. I already loved my speech because it was ME (in print form), I said what I wanted to the people who meant the most to me. "</p>
<p>Aw dearheart, I feel like I’m the hunter in Bambi here. I’m not saying you were bad, but honestly how many people come up after commencement and tell a teenager they were bad or boring? What were people supposed to say to you? </p>
<p>You do not have to feel any need to justify anything to me. I don’t matter that much. I’m sure your speech was great. </p>
<p>Let me ask this How long was graduation? How hot was it? How was the seating? How many people spoke? How big was the class? </p>
<p>Ya know I really feel like I’m going to crush your feelings so I’ll stop. It’s one thing to lock horns with the gang of four, it’s another to hurt your feelings. You were great dear, I can’t make my point without hurting your feelings.</p>
<p>Marian, you base it on weighted courses, but you only count a certain number of courses, or you only count certain kinds of courses. I think that takes care of people overloading just to get the position, or being afraid to take art or band or whatever other unweighted courses might be offered.</p>
<p>mathmom, that’s the way my son’s school used to do it, for just that reason. They changed to taking into account everything, because there was a feeling that some kids were blowing off their unweighted courses, or taking the minimum, while other kids were challenging themselves accross the board. (Also, there’s no credit for orchestra or other EC-type things, so no problem with discouraging those, and some of the unweighted electives are actually the most challenging courses in the school.) The issue was whether a kid who takes four APs and an elective, and gets Cs in the elective and PE, should outrank a kid who takes five APs and an elective, gets almost the same grades in the four common APs B+s in his other two courses, and is diligent in PE.</p>
<p>OK, I am going to weigh in here. I have no dog in this debate because my local high school does not have a “valedictorian.” Rather, it has a senior student speaker (or more than one) voted upon, as I understand it, by a panel of students, parents and high school staff (after kids who are interested in being student speaker audition).</p>
<p>IMO this system both eliminates any coursework “gaming” for the honor (other than trying to audition with a good speech) and also gets a pretty good product at the commencement. There is no guarantee that a val who has top grades is the most effective speaker as well – although that certainly can be the case.</p>
<p>I spent several years as an education editor for a newspaper that covered several school districts as well as numerous private high schools. In that capacity I sat through many high school commencement ceremonies. Each school had its own system for choosing a student commencement speaker, and many were the traditional val (top grades, by whatever system). </p>
<p>While I do recall one speech by a traditional val that was memorable, most were not. </p>
<p>However, the speeches by the students who auditioned and were chosen by a committee were pretty consistently good products (by that I mean not a bore to listen to). I recall one in particular in which a student pair, male and female, did a cooperative/interactive speech in which they alternated speaking sections – all scripted, of course. The dynamics of the male and female voices and their different comments held my interest. </p>
<p>While the speakers for this high school do tend to be among the top students (and this is a school with 40+ National Merit recognized kids per class, so plenty of strong students), that was not always the case. One year the speaker was an average student who had also been the senior class president. </p>
<p>Anyhow, that’s the system that I prefer. There is NO ranking at this school, the academically strong kids do quite well with their college acceptances (including a bunch each year to top Ivies, etc.) and the commencement guests usually hear a pretty good speech.</p>