Better Living Through Blogging!: Comment on Head Of The Class

Comments On: Head Of The Class

Here's $.02.

In Montana, (at least 15 years ago) the top x% of the graduating class gets a state scholarship that basically waives a whole bunch of fees. Back in the day, it was worth about $1800 a year -- pretty substantial.

So, in that sense, it does matter.

When I graduated, there were two of us who were in the running for almost all of our HS careers. Our senior year, we had a transfer student come in from California. She had taken tons of AP classes, where an A was worth 5 points, and so on down the line. The best we could hope for was an A+, which was a 4.33 on our scale, and there were damn few teachers who would give those out.

Long story short (too late!), her 5's brought her into a tie for valedictorian, and our school was such a size that we only got two honors scholarships.

We felt it was a little unfair that my friend attended the school for 13 years, and neither of us had a chance to earn 5 points for AP classes, and he was getting hosed out of a pretty big scholarship.

Long story short, we bitched about it enough that Dept. of Education relented, since we were technically borderline on the percentage where we could get 3 scholarships, instead of 2. (IIRC, we were one student shy of being eligible for 3 scholarships.) The transplant and I were co-valedictorians, and my friend was salutatorian, and we all got the money.

But, you ask, what has it done for me lately?

The answer, of course, is nothing.

Posted by mtpolitics at May 5, 2003 09:06 PM

Someone else in my school was valedictorian, and I didn't mind at all. I beat him for a full four-year scholarship to the college of my choice.

Titles and GPAs and SAT scores are fleeting, but cash is forever. =)

Posted by David at May 6, 2003 03:02 AM

It's a pride thing.

Given that I went to four high schools I was happy with my B-average and class rank of 323/520. I never did homework and rarely studied, so who knows how I would have done if I had done those things.

My next door neighbor was valedictorian of our class - she shared the honor with another student, although she benefitted most - full scholarship to Duke. Not too shabby.

Posted by jen at May 6, 2003 04:15 AM

Is it the child, or a pushy parent-type behind all this?

Posted by geo at May 6, 2003 08:43 PM

Geo, I'd wager it's both -- and bear in mind that Papa is a judge.

Posted by DavidMSC at May 6, 2003 09:08 PM

At our State College (The BIG BAD University of Maine at Orono) the valedictorian and the salutatorian of any high school in Maine (I know I spelled those wrong---as you can see, I graduated 11th), get a free ride. Completely free college for 4 years. That says something doesn't it?

Posted by Amytart at May 13, 2003 11:11 AM