@carachel2 - yes, we are instate for PA - we are considering contacting the AO to discuss. Every little thing adds up and even a $2-$3K scholarship helps. To know that she would not be considered qualified because of our school policy when many other schools have dropped rankings and those kids are exempt from that requirement is what makes it tough to swallow.
@mommdc - D did receive invitation to apply for Stamps from Pitt and the AO encouraged her to take the route. She knows how competetive that is and many students at her school have applied in the past - amazing kids who ended up receiving top honors at schools all over the country. Only one in recent history has been awarded the Stamps – her GC is encouraging her to try but also cautioned her to not count on it knowing the past results.
We also decided not to play the game and those electives are what have kept my daughter engaged and sane during the rat race of high school. She has had a blast. We also didn’t play the game because we didn’t know about it… Now that we have another in the high school following we did know – and next child is also signing up for electives without worrying about the GPA. I have to admit, we did have the discussion about the trade offs since we did know the penalty and wanted them to go in with eyes wide open.
No one outside of the top 3 kids has A+ in all of their APs and DE - but the next 40-50 kids or so have all As (some A-) in their APs - and between 9-10 AP courses) Their GPAs are nearly indistinguishable – They provided the committee the data (no names/identifying info) and we were shocked at the clump of kids who had basically identical GPAs — all of the kids who took extra courses were at the bottom of that cluster and the district was concerned about that. I am guessing that they decided to change it for this years class (we were proposing phasing it in) and removing the rank – we were just surprised to find out while submitting applications and not through some parent communication or meetings.
D’s ranking and GPA took a major hit when she decided she wanted to start a second language as a sophomore, where there was no honor’s class, only regular due to the late start. I told her not to do it, but she really wanted to. She did not get 100 (got an A, however), hated the class because the students were not engaged, and her rank has never recovered since. I’m not sure all what people do here to attain a top rank, but because of our grading system, honors classes, where its easier to get a 99 or 100 and max out on GPA points, results in a higher rank than taking a lot of AP courses, as my D has done. She’s had a well-balanced college-prep program with 4 years of all five core subjects, music, art, and sports (graded PE substitute). The only class I wanted her to take that she ended up not taking was computer science, because she tried it during a summer program and didn’t like it, so dropped it before starting. I suppose if she’d taken fewer AP courses she would have a higher rank, but then she wouldn’t be able to pursue her plan of study in college because there wouldn’t be enough time.
@novicemom23kids, yes the Stamps is competitive, but so is the full tuition. Only 2% of applicants received it in 2014, when my D applied. But the Nordenberg scholarship is new as of last year, and specifically for instate students as well.
We have 5 paces behind everyone on this board. But S17 is finally really filling in college apps. He’s trying to get in two of his apps in EA this weekend. He has a very busy Marching Band schedule starting Wed & so he will have no time to do this after today. We got the SAT’s sent last week, and I ordered the transcripts send the other night.
But for reasons I don’t know S17 was working on the common app last night. (Neither EA school is common app.) It asked those questions about colleges & degree’s the parents attended. I know this was discussed a few months ago. But I agree they really shouldn’t need to know the level of detail S17 was filling in.
I think he’s procrastinating writing the OSU Insight Essay. (6 short answer questions.) OSU (Oregon) is school we agreed that he apply EA, it’s a school that a high match & at the top of his list. It would be really nice to get an acceptance in December. The insight essay is the hardest part of the whole application. So instead of working on it he was filling out random detail about Common App which is only used by one of his school & the last one he plans to submit.
I don’t have the energy to supervise him in detail. I’m trying to trust him, he keeps asking me to. It’s not the end of the world if he misses this deadline, if he missed the Cal State & UC deadline he would be toast. I have stuff that MUST be done for work today. (Although I got far enough yesterday it’s should only be around 2 hours of work behind my computer. Some of it is letting things run for a while.) And while he does theoretically have another week to get the EA applications in… he honestly will have no time with next weeks schedule.
I share same pain with GPA game. S17 went to three high schools (2 states and 3 school districts) with different course selection and grading systems. He didn’t get extra credit for honors courses he took in freshman year, as his current high school don’t offer them and we were told that it will be disadvantage to his classmates!!! His second high school (sophomore) didn’t not offer honors courses as there was no extra credit in their system and there was a limit on AP courses. He is still top 8%, but should have been in top 5 (very important for UT). As a parent, I feel guilty that I’ve to move him around schools due to job changes!!!
This whole thing makes me sad. Kids not taking what they want to take, gaming the system, multiple types of weighting and ranking.
I am grateful that we don’t have that issue at our school. No weighing, no ranking, no deciles provided to schools or to kids/parents. And thile that has meant a less than stellar gpa for my child, he’s taken what he wanted to and had the rigor that goes with it that worked for him. Would an extra AP look better on his schedule this year versus Theater Tech? I am sure it would. Do I care? No, not really. I care that he is happy and engaged, and he is. No deciles may help or hurt him, but what will be will be and we both are at peace with that.
S17 has had a busy week with 3 AO meetings and a college fair and has expressed his displeasure with the whole process more than once. Outside of the gaming that can happen at the HS regarding rank and gpa, the admissions process is its own game. If you don’t know how to play, have parents with resources, a GC who engages or the internal motivation to google away, understanding what a NPC or CDS is…kids don’t know how to play the game. To expect them to…unilaterally…is unfair. Even with his average GPA and test scores he feels to some extent he already has an unfair advantage, over many many kids and that really bothers him.
He is right. Even if he does fall into that full pay, who can’t pay full pay, but doesn’t have stats that earn big $$ bucket, he is still in a position to have choices because he has the resources he does outside of school. He is playing the game, and engaged in it as he recognizes that he has to but I can’t blame him for not liking it.
That said I am still super annoyed that our online school profile is still showing last years when I know the new one is ready and has been uploaded to the common app with his transcript. LOL!
@novicemom23kids I am so glad our school stopped ranking. My kid has a 4.5 weighted and is nowhere near the top of her class because she didn’t play that game. I think her transcript speaks for itself.
The school used to report decile ranks with the requisite GPA ranges, I used to call that pseudo-ranking, but they’ve stopped doing that too. From that information, you could infer the valedictorian. S '14 got straight A’s but didn’t take some non-honors classes pass/fail so he was a few hundredths short of highest GPA in the 95-99 percentile range. Didn’t seem to make a bit of difference in admissions as far as we could tell.
From the high school profile: “Effective January 2015, … High School does not report class rank of any kind.”
Although, I’ve just looked again and you can still infer the val:
The inconsistent platform of weighting and ranking is frustrating. S’s HS doesn’t weight or rank, so I’m left wondering if he’ll be left out of consideration for merit scholarships if he’s superficially compared to a student who’s school does weight the GPA. Same with ranking - S is most likely in the top 10%, but he can’t say that in an application.
It’s been a couple of years since we did the UC app with D15, but I recall that the GPA is recalculated such that everyone ends up being evaluated on a consistent basis. I think that the Common App should do something similar. Things like orchestra, band, and non-core electives should be weeded out of the GPA. If you don’t agree please don’t bite my head off - this is just IMO! I like a level playing field.
I am soooo happy that S’s school doesn’t rank. His graduating class is very small (<50). The school profile is very well done. He has not had to play the ranking game because of that. Grading also does not go higher than an A and very few classes are weighted. He has taken classes he had to and others that he wanted to, with no worries. There is no Val or Sal and for graduation, the school lets kids volunteer and submit speeches to present and pick about the top 5. S has had a great HS experience because of that, plus has gotten to take off beat classes like Eastern Philosophy and Flash Programming.
Interesting reading about the ability of students to take courses during the summer and have those courses appear on transcript OR take courses to avoid having those courses appear on transcript.
I think the only summer courses considered at our HS are for those who fail a class during the school year, but I do not know how that is reported.
My son took honors geometry via CTY online the summer before 9th grade so that he could enroll in Alg 2 in 9th grade. (That took a lot of work to have approved.) I recall the head of guidance telling me that geometry would never appear on his transcript, even though he had to sit for our HS’s honors geometry final after completing the CTY course. It never bothered me as our school does not include HS level courses take in middle school on the transcript.
Students just start in Spanish 2 in 9th grade, but the middle school Spanish 1 is not referenced. Same for those who are in the ‘double accelerated’ math track. No reference to Alg 1 or Geometry on the HS transcript.
The school does weight for honors and AP courses and the reported GPA is a weighted GPA. No class rank, but school profile includes a chart that shows # of students in each 1/4 point GPA range, allowing one to get close enough with the rank calculation, if desired.
I have noticed more students at our HS playing the GPA game, enrolling in APs for electives instead of taking the independent science research class (unweighted), or selecting a language that offers honors as early as 9th grade. (The school does not weight the 9th grade honors classes other than Bio, so students’ GPAs are not impacted by honors vs non-honors in 9th.)
S’s school doesn’t rank, but the school profile breaks GPAs down to top 10% range, 25% range, etc. Colleges would get a good idea from that. There is a Val and Sal, but according to my son they are voted on by the students. I assured him that the school MUST guide the process or these nincompoops would pick the funniest goofball and not someone who deserved it. We’ll see how the process goes.
@jmek15 – will not bite your head off about the Orchestra comment b/c one of my pet peeves is that our HS added an honors level orchestra, band, and choral classes, while leaving independent science research as a non-honors and non-weighted class.
I am hard pressed to see how the two can compare, but assume that someone who was connected had an agenda…and pushed for the honors music classes.
D’s HS also does not rank, which I believe started 1-2 years before she was a freshmen. I don’t notice the grade-grubbing many of you described above. But then, I don’t really pay attention to what other kids are doing. Her HS also makes it impossible to infer any ranking using information from the school profile. It’s a pretty large, well know HS, so I think the AOs’ have lots of historical information to know what GPAs are ‘good’.
Sons small private high school doesn’t rank but because we are in Texas it does note top 7% and top 10%. Son took AP human geo in 9th grade and then decided not to take any more AP social studies. He didn’t love the material and didn’t think it was worth all the extra work. Unfortunately, that meant he didn’t make top 7% for auto admit at UT but was in top 10% and from what I can tell made top 8 or 9 %. It was worth it to him and us and are happy to go to Bama with the Presidential but I can say if that was not an option for him we would have pushed him to take those AP classes. His graduating class is only 112 kids so those few extra points at the top of the class make a big difference.
I won’t bite anyone’s head off because of the orchestra comment BUT…
I find it spectacularly unfair and all kinds of messed up that kids would feel forced to give up music or other fine arts or occupational electives to game the system. As to whether it should be included in the gpa? I think that’s debatable. It seems to me the schools that value those things often have them as a fine arts admission requirement or give bonus points for them in the process. Personally I would be quite happy if all colleges had a fine arts requirement in addition to core and in my mind…they really should be part of the core. Not perhaps weighted as heavily and certainly not at the same level of years required but I believe they are important. I also believe that colleges are not stupid and can easily see where the strong grades and performance lie and while the A’s in electives or fine arts might help a HS GPA and in some cases, rank…it will not have the same effect on admissions outside of perhaps auto admit scenarios.
Easy I suppose for me to say since I am not in an auto admit state and fine arts is required for our flagship.
@whataboutcollege – We have Naviance but I do not know how to see the numbers of students applying to various colleges from our high school - wonder how you do that?
@CA1543 – many high schools limit access to that info to GCs only. One year our HS accidentally revealed it mid-season, but then shut it down again once someone noticed. Our school updates during the summer after all data has been reported, so no info on current year applicants. This will vary by school…as so many things do.
We’ll see how the process goes.