Class Rank and Why Not

I think my role, aside from being a teacher at CHS, is serving as the chair of the committee that is in charge of ensuring that we are focused on the big goals that we have set as a school. Part of that role is, as a newspaper’s ombudsman might, to point out when stated goals and practice might be at odds with one another. It is someone else’s role, in case you are wondering, to determine how many parenthetical sentences is too many when beginning a piece.

A colleague came to me yesterday and asked me if I knew that class rank showed up when students logged in to Parent Connect. I did not. We went and looked at her son’s page and there it was as one of the five pieces of information that appear on the home screen. The colleague went on to tell me that her son and his friends were checking their rank many times per day to see if they could move it as high as possible. One parent even baked her child a pie when he rose to 45th.

At this point if you are thinking—this is not a big deal, it is just a harmless feature—let me try to explain why it is a big deal. In the goals that we have written we hope to teach students to write well, think critically and be well rounded, educated people. In our classes every day we are saying, “These are the competencies—everyone can attain these standards if you work towards them.” While it is unlikely, we are saying to students that they all have the opportunity to meet the competencies at a level 5—they all can get to the mountain top staying with the example I often use.

Class rank is directly at odds with this. In the classroom we are talking to them about a criterion-referenced system. “Students you can all meet the standards.” While in Parent Connect we are showing them where they are in a norm-referenced way. The class rank compares them, not to the standards or the competencies or the graduation expectations, but to each other. This is the very type of comparison that competencies are designed to work against.

In addition to that issue, displaying class rank as one of the five pieces of information most deserving to be on the login screen tacitly says to students—“We feel this is important.” It lets them know that this is something that we want them to look at every day. Why else would we put it so prominently on their home screens? And they are checking it every day or in some cases multiple times per day.

I bring this to your attention because it is something that we need to discuss immediately. Parent Connect is a great tool and students are making great use of it but does showing them class rank every time they log in really fit with the goals of our school?

One argument for keeping it is that students and parents like it. That may be true but students like iPods and cell phones and eating in class. We explain to them that those things are not good for their education and we forcefully stand behind those guidelines. We can do the same thing with class rank. We could say, “Yes, class rank is occasionally needed but it is not something we want you to look at every day. We want you to focus on meeting the competencies in each class and on meeting the graduation expectations and habits of mind.” The same conversation could be had with parents letting them know that class rank is still available it just is not something that students should be concerned with on a daily basis.[1]

Fitting more with our goals and deserving of much more conversation is a movement away from ranking altogether. I find it interesting that we already have such a system when it comes to the honor role. Anyone reaching a certain percentage can be on honor role. Theoretically everyone could be on honor role if they met the standards that we had set for them. And think how exciting it would be to track how the number of students on honor role keep increasing and increasing as we become better at teaching competencies.

Educational and grading expert Tom Guskey goes a step further. Why do you have to have just one valedictorian? What if we said that anyone meeting the prestigious place of maintaining a 98.5 or above for 4 years could be valedictorian. There are schools that do this while the students and parents remain content and colleges accept their method. Continuing the thought a Latin honors system would fit much better with the goals and the way we are trying to teach each student. Summa cum laude could be everyone over 95%, magna cum laude could be everyone over 90% and cum laude could be everyone over 85%. What this does is allow for any number of students to reach points that our community values. Since it is criterion referenced it also gives students more reassurance that they are not competing with each other—they are all working toward a goal of making it to the set standards.[2]

I hope that I have laid out clearly enough what I would do if it were my choice. But it is not my choice to make. I ask that you seriously consider at least these questions:

What is the purpose in having students look at class rank every day?
What is the purpose in terms of student morale?
How does it fit with our mission, graduation expectations and competencies?

Upon sober inspection I’m confident that you will come to the conclusion that there is a better way than class rank.




[1] Consider also the student who is ranked 326th but is trying very hard each day. What does the constant message that they are in the 300s do to their motivation to succeed?
[2] From Developing Grading and Reporting Systems for Student Learning by Tom Guskey and Jane Bailey, Corwin Press, 2001.