<p>I think that the OP’s letter was a reasonable, factual account of his school’s ranking system and his place in it. I’m assuming that other language and music classes at his school do receive weighting, and that some of the 30 students officially ranked ahead of him have had the benefit of this. It’s hard to see how explaining the situation could be contstrued as whining. The fact that his teachers supported his pov would suggest that his position has merit in the eyes of a number of adults familiar with the school’s weighting system. Obviously, it would be better if the OP’s GC had taken care of this for him, but given that that didn’t happen, it’s hard to see a downside to direct, straightforward self-advocacy. If the student hadn’t explained to Stanford, they might very well see him as less outstanding in the context of his school’s population. Now, with the additional info, the Stanford admissions committee can make its own decision as to how his rank should be interpreted. I say, good job, and maybe think about taking some courses in law.</p>
<p>ellemenope–I think the point was that the Spanish and Jazz lowered the ranking because they were unweighted. His high school included them in the ranking is how I read it, and it affected his ranking adversely, because they were lower weight. His ranking would be higher if they were not included at all–maybe an argument can be made that he should have recalculated the ranking based on not including them, instead of weighting them more heavily–but his rank would still jump up significantly if he simply eliminated them from consideration, yes? Or am I misreading this?</p>
<p>Not sure about your argument that high level music and language classes are “not academic.” Guess I would disagree with that. Colleges, including Stanford, offer majors in these “non-academic” subjects, after all.</p>
<p>Those courses were included in his class rank, but were not considered to be honors level classes, which is what hurt him. My hunch is that other students didn’t take these classes, and instead took other classes that the schools allowed to be more heavily weighted, thus hurting the OP and giving the other kids a better rank. Basically, the OP was hurt for pursuing his interests in spanish and music to the detriment in his rank. Other kids didn’t do this - either because they werent interested in spanish/music or because they took classes just to help their rank.</p>
<p>Many of these things are true at our school too. Rankings are skewed because of our unweighted system. Our D is thus ranked lower than some. By the way we have jazz band at 06:30 every day too, and if I remember right, I was in the audience at Lionel Hampton three years ago when our school won the Class A ensemble.</p>
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<p>We are not talking about what is or is not “academic” in the bigger scheme of things, but what college admissions committees consider “academic” subjects for purposes of GPA calculation. Colleges have PE majors but surely PE is not considered an academic subject in the context of GPA.</p>
<p>Our local high school calculates an overall GPA, an total academic GPA (which doesn’t include music, PE classes, etc.) and an academic GPA from grades 10-12. They do this because different colleges ask for different GPA formulations.</p>
<p>With luck, the Stanford admissions people will recalculate OP’s original GPA taking out the music classes.</p>
<p>Stanford does calculate it’s own (unweighted) GPA using grades in academic classes only (or at least they did two years ago). This helps them to compare GPAs from different schools, but it will not help OPs class rank.</p>
<p>I think OPs letter was very appropriate and important, since schools do pride themselves in having >90% of their admitted students from the top 10% of their graduating class.</p>
<p>ellemenope ,
the point is that OP not just does not get a boost from taking jazz class, but taking this extra class actually lowers his GPA, because the grade is not weighted. So another student taking the same classes as OP minus the jazz class (and getting identical grades) will end up with higher average grade, and thus higher rank. Which is ridiculous, regardless of whether or not you think of music classes as academic subjects.</p>
<p>It probably won’t hurt to have sent this.</p>
<p>I admit that it drives me nuts to see GPA’s calculated to 4 significant figures past the decimal. That seems obsessive-compulsive to me. How much would be lost if you just reported 4.60 and 4.35?</p>
<p>I think you did the right thing. You pointed out the problem with the ranking system. I hope that the admissions folks look at the explanation the right way. Ranking has many problems. Best if the GC has done this, but if you are like many a student, you can’t get this type of attention from a GC. Good luck to you!</p>
<p>The op asked specifically about Stanford. It is well known that Stanford only looks at grades in academic subjects after freshman year and computes a GPA for admission purposes. It also likes to see ECs and other interests for which the applicant has shown continuing involvement and, preferably, passion. I can’t say that, beyond that, it wouldn’t hurt to be ranked highly in your class, by whatever eclectic method you HS might calculate it, but the school report and mid-year report should provide amply opportunity to make everything clear. After all that, his letter is not going to help or hurt his chances to a measurable degree, if at all.</p>
<p>No ranking system is perfect. Ranks calculated with all grades unweighted fail to account for differences in strength of the curriculum. Ranks based on weighted grades are always going to be subject to the kind of problem noted by the OP. My D, now a college sophomore, took four semesters of an afterschool drama class in high school that each counted as an unweighted “A”; in her huge public school, these four extra unweighted A’s dragged her GPA down enough to drop her from first to fifth (she knew that her GPA would have been higher than the valedictorian’s without those four extra classes). This was the case, even though the school calculated an academic vs. overall rank; the reason was that the drama classes were considered college prep (since satisfying the University of California’s a-g requirement) and hence part of academic rank! My S, currently a junior, knows several students this year who purposely are taking only 5 classes (in a six-period) day just to avoid taking any non-honors classes, since no honors or AP classes are offered at the school sixth period. I would think that admissions officers at elite schools are well aware of the vagaries of rank, and are sensitve both to the impact extra enrichment courses have on class rank and to the games some students play in order to keep their ranks high (remember Blair Hornstine?) My daughter would certainly not have written a note explaining why she was not number one in the class, though I can see the OP doing such a thing for as radical an impact as those extra classes apparently had on his/her rank.</p>
<p>In my son’s school, honors sections of Latin and French are not offered. However, honors Spanish is available. Therefore, kids who opt to take Latin or French have a built-in disadvantage as far as ranking is concerned. </p>
<p>However, consider those students who will lose out on the scholarships offered to only vals/sals, if they come from schools that choose vals/sals based soley on GPA. I have read on CC that University of Texas has a 10% rule. If you are in the top 10% of your high school and a Texas resident, you are an auto-admit to U of T. Think of the students who might have lost out on that deal because they were victims of the honors/nonhonors system. </p>
<p>As far as the OP is concerned, he/she did the correct thing by contacting Stanford. Many posters have said that the GC should have written the letter. Well, sometimes, over-worked GCs don’t send out those letters in a timely manner. The OP was right in taking matters in his/her own hands.</p>
<p>Are there any Spanish classes at your school that are considered honors or AP? If not, isn’t everyone else in your Spanish class in the same boat as you are? I assume that what you are saying is that there are many students NOT in that class who are ranking higher, having substituted another honors or AP class for that one. Maybe your school will consider weighting this class differently in the future. </p>
<p>As for the music classes, our school district (known nationally for its music program) does not factor any honors or AP music or art classes, and only a very few academic electives, such as economics or psychology, into the GPA, although they are on the transcript of course. I’ve heard that many colleges recalculate GPAs in a very similar way to our HS, in any case. Still, if I understand you correctly, you are saying that others in your school are getting an advantage from other weighted electives comparable to your jazz band. Your school should consider this year to be a trial run of their weighting system and make some changes in the future, if that’s the case.</p>
<p>Because your school is one that ranks I think your letter was necessary and yours made a good case. IMO, your letter was well-written, to the point and not whiny. I don’t believe it will matter in the least that you drafted the letter, as long as it had the signatures of the crucial administrators. Stanford will likely assume that they asked you to do that. Good luck!</p>
<p>I don’t think it was whining. It was a logical explanation for a weakness in your school/district’s system.</p>