BY GUNNAR NIXON
As applications this month pile high, admissions officers will pour over thousands of files searching for the students that they believe will better their college or university. Students of the class of 2016 who have applied regular decision, many Mariemont seniors among them, will wait with heavy anticipation over the next two weeks as letters of admittance, or otherwise, slowly trickle out from universities and colleges around the country. However, as admissions officers scour the pages of each application in these final days, there is something missing from many student resumes: class rank.
Over the past decade, use of the class ranking system has experienced a remarkable decline leaving less than half of America’s high school still to report it. Principals and headmaster’s across the nation have deemed the data skewed as some students with 4.0’s fail to make even the top 20% of their classes. As schools continue to deem the label of class rank a thing of the past, Mariemont High School’s still active class rank system continues to grow as a topic of conflict.
But while Mariemont class ranking remains stably in place, students have share mixed responses and thoughts about the what the statistic’s future should hold.
“It’s very much a dog eat dog world here at Mariemont. It’s sort of become ingrained in students’ minds that if they don’t make the high rankings of their class they aren’t good students” says sophomore Jack Ballard.
Ryan Fields, a junior at Mariemont High School, believes the education system has placed far too much on the class ranking system. “While the class ranking system does serve its purpose, it causes other talents such as social skills to be overshadowed,” says Fields, who admits he has placed little emphasis on class rank in his 3 years and never looked back.
Additionally, as Mariemont offers more and more online and flexible courses, students are replacing those class slots with weighted coursed they can find and aim their sights on even higher grade point averages, many hoping to attain GPA’s far beyond a 4.0. “Instead of taking classes of interest, kids are trying to jam their schedules with as many AP’s as possible, allowing students to play the system to their benefit,” says Ben Phelan, who has recorded 4.5 during his 3 years at Mariemont.
However, while the system may have been overemphasized, it’s direct correlation to a strong work ethic is definitely a positive thing explains senior Mac Nelson. “I think the top 20% of every class at Mariemont would agree that hard work goes along way. Very few students who have attained a high ranking are able to just coast their ways through their 4 years,” says Nelson, who will attend the University of Virginia next year.
The College Board, a non-profit organization, defines class rank as a mathematical summary of a student’s academic record compared to those of other students in the class. However, this definition is often misinterpreted as an indication of high school success, explains James Renner, principal of Mariemont High School.
At a highly competitive school such as Mariemont, many kids can have a very successful four years without even breaching the top 10% of their class,” says Renner, who’s been with the district since 1997.
Many of the most competitive Colleges and Universities wish to report that a majority of their students were in the top 10% of their class in highschool. Therefore, class rank can become a factor on many applications which could lead admissions officers to ignore a student’s other qualities. Consequently, Mariemont treats class rank differently than many schools making reporting rank optional, a system that Renner believes is the best of both worlds.
“By making reporting optional, it does not hurt the student’s chances of being admitted nor does it affect the college’s statistics,” says Renner. However, while Renner believes this is the best possible scenario when it comes to class rank, he admits the system is yet to be perfected.