Co-Valedictorians a stupid idea.

myway
Sun, 17 Oct 2004 18:38:42 +0000

Co-valedictorian is definitely a dumb idea. I say this because I was valedictorian of my class and I feel I was forced to share it with another student who had not worked nearly as hard as I did. I was ranked #1 for a significant amount of time, and because there’s a limit to how high GPAs can go, the second valedictorian was able to reach #1 status only at the very last semester of our senior year. I thought it unfair, but what can you do…

Competition annoys me. Especially in the realm of academics. I go for good grades because I want to do well. Not because I want to get the highest grade in the class or anything superficial like that. Unweighted GPAs would definitely cut back on cut throat competition, but I don’t agree with that. Competition propels us forward. It makes people strive harder to do better.

I see unweighted GPAs as a sort of altruistic way of equalizing students so that nobody’s feelings are hurt. But that’s completely wrong, because we are NOT all equal. The nerdy girl who stays up all night to ace her Physics test definitely deserves to be put on a different level than the boy who slacked the night away chatting on AIM. Probably a bad example, but I hope you get the point.