I'm not entirely sure how I feel about this. To be completely transparent I was ranked #53 out of over 400 students in my high school graduating class. I took pride in that ranking, in my number. Was I the top of the top? No. But that fact that my hard work allowed be to be ranked where I was gave me some sort of felling of accomplishment. It made me feel like my school, and the system, was recognizing my hard work.
Earlier this week the Virginia Beach school board decided, in a 7-3 vote, to do away with class rankings. Virginia Beach will become the first in South Hampton Roads to end two traditions: class rankings and the honoring of valedictorians.
Rankings will end with the class of 2022 and be replaced by a Latin honors system that recognizes more students. At that point, students with the best GPA will no longer be given the distinction of valedictorian.
According to the article the school board started debating this issue after students complained about inequities. Apparently anyone in an academy had a dramatically better chance at earning the best GPA due to those classes being weighted.
I didn't attend school in Virginia Beach, I graduated from Newport News and in Newport News honor classes weighed an extra .5 and AP classes were an extra 1.0. These classes were open to anyone and everyone.
The school system will switch to the Latin system, the system that they have in college: honors graduates, cum laude, magna cum laude or summa cum laude.
I want to know what YOU think about this whole thing? Do you think the new system will be more fair? Do you believe that not honoring the top two students is unfair? Let me know!