Tennessee legislators love to bestow honors and find no shortage of excuses for doing so. Whether for retirements, deaths, significant anniversaries and birthdays, professional achievements, sporting accomplishments, pageant winners, Eagle Scouts – they hand out kudos like strings of beads flung at a Mardi Gras parade.
Among the most reliable categories for recognition are high school valedictorians, the annual cream of the graduating crop.
“Whereas, it is fitting that we should pause to pay tribute to those students who, through their natural talents and unflagging commitment to academic excellence, have distinguished themselves in the classroom,” etc. etc., as one recent resolution reads.
The state has 703 high schools, according to high-schools.com – 485 public, 218 private – with, in theory, an equal number of students eligible for such legislative congratulations each year.
So it caught my eye when one school recently showed up on the list of resolutions with 12 such honorees. It seemed to stretch credulity that 12 people could finish atop a single academic peak.
Shows how much I know, or knew, about the class ranking process for high schools of today.
The school that prompted my education is Providence Christian Academy in Murfreesboro, founded in 1996 and offering instruction from prekindergarten through the 12th grade.
“PCA’s mission is to teach students to seek God’s truth and equip them with the tools for a lifetime of learning,” its website states. Curious as to how PCA managed to have 12 valedictorians, I asked questions. Krystle Horton, college counselor at PCA, provided answers.
“In order to be awarded valedictorian, a student must have a cumulative unweighted GPA of 4.0,” she said via email. “The 12 students who have been awarded valedictorian all earned a cumulative unweighted GPA of 4.0.”
So, 12 PCA students managed perfect scores for their high school careers. Out of the 2022 graduating class of 49, that’s darn near 25%, which is … a miracle? Impressive, in any event.
Not every school calculates class rankings the same way as PCA. Some use “weighted” GPAs, offering extra credit for Advanced Placement or dual enrollment courses – ones that offer both high school and college credit. It’s the kind of approach that can provide GPAs of higher than 4.0 – even better than perfect.
It’s built on the notion that an A made in AP chemistry, say, is more valuable than an A made in shop class. Though I get the sense that shop class is not an offering at PCA.
“Students read the great works of Western literature and philosophy,” the website says. “Instruction in Classical languages (specifically Latin) helps students understand and think with greater depth about the world around them. In the later stages of Classical education, instruction in formal logic and rhetoric helps students become great leaders and communicators.”
Prospective career welders and auto mechanics are perhaps not best-served at PCA. Which is fine.
I gather that multiple valedictorians is a result of the increasingly competitive world of college admissions, with high school students angling for every possible advantage on their resumes and high schools endeavoring to assist. In that vein, valedictorian (and its lone runner-up, salutatorian) is not the only distinction PCA awards at graduation, Horton said.
“Students who have made certain accomplishments during their four years of high school will be presented with honors cords that are worn during the graduation ceremony,” she wrote. Those cords include:
Gold, for a cumulative grade-point average of 3.8 or greater. Blue, for four years of participation in Student Council, National Honor Society office or such. Green, for 150 hours or more of community service. Purple, for four years of participation in the fine and performing arts program. White, for four years of participation in varsity sports.
You can see how a particularly active student could present a very colorful spectacle at commencement. Which is May 15, the academic calendar shows. I hope all 12 valedictorians are not expected to make speeches, since that could make for a very long evening.
By the way, my graduating class, Moss Point High, Mississippi, 1971 (Go, Tigers!) had the traditional one valedictorian, a guy named Jeff. His selection was based on a different method of ranking: We got the actual numerical value of our test scores in each class. Jeff’s average score was probably pretty close to the normal body temperature of human beings. Mine was closer to that of a human who had been dead for several hours.
And though I was not valedictorian, I married one: Dupont High 1981. (Go, Bulldogs!) Unlike the 12 from PCA, and many others from high schools across the state this year, she did not receive any recognition from the legislature for her accomplishment.
It’s not too late.
Joe Rogers is a former writer for The Tennessean and editor for The New York Times. He is retired and living in Nashville. He can be reached at jrogink@gmail.com