Saratoga High trying to ease grade pressure (Educrat dumbing-down education alert!)

San Jose Mercury News ^ | 5/4/05 | Maya Suryaraman

[ProtectOurFreedom]

Over the years, Saratoga High School has tried to curb its competitive culture. The school does not publish an honor roll. It has slashed homework over breaks. It releases grade-point averages to students only on request. Yet, teachers say, too many students remain obsessed with their grades.

So in another attempt to ease the pressure, Saratoga High announced it would change the way it chooses class valedictorians and salutatorians to allow more students to be honored. The announcement kicked off a furor in this affluent, well-educated community, with many fearful the school's highest achievers would be robbed of their due.

Anxiety in the Saratoga High community began rising when school officials proposed to relax the way GPAs are computed in choosing class valedictorians and salutatorians. Currently, an A in a regular class is worth 4.0 grade points, but one in an AP or honors class carries 5.0 points. A plus grade such as an A+ carries extra fractional points. Those fractions are crucial because the GPAs that determine the valedictorians and salutatorians are calculated to the thousandths.

Saratoga proposed to eliminate extra points for plus grades, and to treat an A in an AP class the same as one in a regular class, giving each four grade points. Eliminating the fractions would mean more students would tie for valedictorian and salutatorian because many students have a 4.0 grade-point average. "It's wonderful to recognize as many students as possible," said parent Anandi Krishnamurty.

However, Pope says she's concerned about Saratoga's middle students. "There are kids at Saratoga who are working very, very hard in regular-track classes, who will never, ever be valedictorian under the current system," Pope said. "What message does that send to those kids? I talk to these B students who feel like they've failed."/

[SiliconValleyGuy]

Thanks for the ping.

The red highlighted portion of this makes me sick. And it's people who think that way who are diluting the American education system so that we can't compete in the world anymore. Damn them.

[Serenissima Venezia]

In college, grad school, or later in the real world, no one cares who was valedictorian or prom king or whatever.

But putting that you were a valedictorian of your graduating class on a resume would have more of a kick that putting you were a prom king!

[Serenissima Venezia]

And I suppose that at Saratoga's football games, both teams win as well.

[Hillary's Lovely Legs]

I graduated from Saratoga High School. It was considered 'Stanford Prep'.

I don't even recognize this as something my old alma mater would condone let alone endorse. We had some very successful people come out of Saratoga who were able to catch the beginning of the Internet bubble.

[ChildOfThe60s]

"There are kids at Saratoga who are working very, very hard in regular-track classes, who will never, ever be valedictorian under the current system,"

And ya know something? Some of those kids will be failures in life & some will be successes. But no one will be a success because you gave them an unearned award.

"What message does that send to those kids? I talk to these B students who feel like they've failed."

What message indeed?

1) You aren't aways going win.

2) Winning awards doesn't always equate with success

3) Failure is in your mind, not the school's

4) Quit the game because you don't win everytime and you will never even score, much less win.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

Very nicely put.

This whole thing smacks of the "self-esteem" nonsense that plagues us. Self-esteem is earned through hard work and achievement, not leveling the playing field so everybody is mediocre and everybody can be a "champion." Our schools are run by idiots.