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[Piecake]

Looking at the info about the schools...

One middle school was 99.9% African American and the other middle school was 51% African American and 43% white. The high schools... one is 100% African American, and the other high school is 45% white and 47% African American.

Trying my best to find the racism here. Someone help me with this. This seems like a consolidation battle, not a desegregation issue. Am I wrong?

“Prior to 2016, all of Cleveland High School’s valedictorians were white,” the suit says. “As a result of the school official’s unprecedented action of making an African-American student share the valedictorian award with a white student, the defendants discriminated against.”

The lawsuit is claiming the motivation behind this is racism.

I am not quite sure why you are quoting demographic figures either

 

[Mik2121]

For someone not from the US, help me.
What does "co-valedictorian" mean, and does it in some way affect anyone after that ceremony?

 

[F34R]

The lawsuit is claiming the motivation behind this is racism.

I am not quite sure why you are quoting demographic figures either

Ahh.. I see. I misfired (neurons so to speak) I was "on the wrong page" basically. I get it now.
Mentioning the demographic numbers was simply because you said they didn't desegregate until a year ago. A year before they consolidated, those were the numbers I posted. It's not like a year before, it was all white, all black. Unless I read the reports wrong.

For someone not from the US, help me.
What does "co-valedictorian" mean, and does it in some way affect anyone after that ceremony?

Means you were "tied" with someone else at the top of your class. Mentally, maybe, otherwise, no.

 

[Syriel]

For someone not from the US, help me.
What does "co-valedictorian" mean, and does it in some way affect anyone after that ceremony?

1. It means that more that one person got the top spot. In short, they tied.
2. No.

 

[pelicansurf]

For someone not from the US, help me.
What does "co-valedictorian" mean, and does it in some way affect anyone after that ceremony?

I think you can toss it on college applications? Usually these kids know where they're going by then.

 

[Dyle]

For someone not from the US, help me.
What does "co-valedictorian" mean, and does it in some way affect anyone after that ceremony?

Valedictorian is usually awarded to the student with the highest grade point average in a class. Some schools will have a male/female valedictorian and others will honor a larger group of top performing students. Usually all it involves is speaking at graduation, getting an extra long round of applause when you walk across the stage, and then you can say you were valedictorian on your resume. It doesn't really mean anything, since students who are do that well are more likely than most to be accepted to college anyway.

A couple lawsuits like this show up pretty much every year and with them, more schools stop awarding the honor each year.

 

[OrangeGrayBlue]

I still don't see how this means they were able to calculate the exact GPA of the other student, which they would have to do to claim it's lower.

Hypothetically, if they knew the other student wasn't taking AP classes/as many AP classes while their daughter was taking them, it would be impossible for the other student to have as high of a GPA even if she had all A's, because as far as I'm aware AP classes still allow a student to go beyond a "perfect" 4.0 score, just as they did when I was in high school.

 

[p2535748]

My school had a valedictorian, which was GPA based and didn't really take into account course difficulty, and then faculty from each department voted on individual department awards for outstanding students. This led to some interesting situations where one person won valedictorian and another person won every single departmental award. Of course, this was private school, so it's probably not typical.

I'm really surprised so many people here knew other people's GPA. I had no idea, and no one else I knew did either. We knew in general who the top students were, but not specifically.

Hypothetically, if they knew the other student wasn't taking AP classes/as many AP classes while their daughter was taking them, it would be impossible for the other student to have as high of a GPA even if she had all A's, because as far as I'm aware AP classes still allow a student to go beyond a "perfect" 4.0 score, just as they did when I was in high school.

It didn't work this way at my school. I have no idea if that's actually a rule, or just something some schools do.

To be clear, I'm not defending the school here, given the history of the district I'm very suspicious. I'm more discussing some general claims made in this thread.

 

[Piecake]

Ahh.. I see. I misfired (neurons so to speak) I was "on the wrong page" basically. I get it now.
Mentioning the demographic numbers was simply because you said they didn't desegregate until a year ago. A year before they consolidated, those were the numbers I posted. It's not like a year before, it was all white, all black. Unless I read the reports wrong.

A US District Court Judge said they failed to desegregate a year ago and ordered them to do so.

 

[Mik2121]

1. It means that more that one person got the top spot. In short, they tied.
2. No.

I think you can toss it on college applications? Usually these kids know where they're going by then.

A couple lawsuits like this show up pretty much every year and with them, more schools stop awarding the honor each year.

Thanks for the info. I thought it was something that could directly affect the girl. I know they still want fairness and I hope things resolve properly, but at least it's not something that should affect her in the future directly in a way she can't help.

 

[F34R]

A US District Court Judge said they failed to desegregate a year ago and ordered them to do so.

The order was signed in May of 2016. Those numbers I posted were from the 2015 school year.

 

[Piecake]

The order was signed in May of 2016. Those numbers I posted were from the 2015 school year.

I'd imagine that the judge has more information than simple demographics that you can find online with a quick search

 

[F34R]

I'd imagine that the judge has more information than simple demographics that you can find online with a quick search

I'm reading them from the judges order.. so...

 

[Emperor_Uriel]

On the one hand, I hope the truth comes to light if this was indeed a decision made for race-related reasons.

On the other, the whole GPA rat race is awful (coming from someone who graduated with and has maintained a 4.0 from HS through Masters) and should be ended. Honor Roll/Dean's List is a better system, fighting for ranks is a disaster that replaces compassion and unity with bitter competition.

 

[g11]

It's presumptuous of the girl's mother at best at this point.

 

[TheMan]

I shared the title back in the day, ain't no thang. I was told our GPAs were the same down to the thousandths place, so they made us co-Vals for the first time ever...although come to think of it, I'm nonwhite...

 

[kamineko]

Well obviously it needs to be proven out, but

Considering this school district's racist fuckery goes back nearly 50 years, I can believe it

 

[Snowman Prophet of Doom]

There's not much to discuss here, prior to the lawsuit actually being presented in court. Either the parent is wrong (and, let's be clear, "everyone knows who got the better grades" is a pretty sketchy heuristic), or she's right. Won't know until the school makes their case in court.

 

[Spike Spiegel]

I find determining valedictorian based on grades odd. Lots of people get all As in high school. For me, valedictorian spoke for the class so they needed to be the best all round, good grades and representative of the class as a whole.

At my high school it came down to extracurriculars and campaigning. The valedictorian of my class was in the band, played sports, joined and led clubs, did community outreach, was on the yearbook staff, in addition to earning a 4.0. And, she pushed for being valedictorian.

All I had was the same GPA and membership in a couple of clubs, so I got salutatorian. I didn't care about it either way.

 

[soundscream]

I like how people are questioning how the plaintiffs know that there's a GPA difference.

The valedictorian (ie someone smart) is suing in a court of law, you don't think that they've thought about this little detail already?

Meanwhile, you're a random internet person who only knows about the broad strokes of this story through a news article.

1st I am simply reacting to what is being presented as their "proof" in the article which if thats it, it's not a strong claim.

2nd if they have actual proof there is no reason to keep it secret.

On a side note when I graduated H.S. our school newspaper posted the GPA's for everyone in the graduating class along with their rank.

 

[hohoXD123]

Means you were "tied" with someone else at the top of your class. Mentally, maybe, otherwise, no.

So basically...

I like how people are questioning how the plaintiffs know that there's a GPA difference.

The valedictorian (ie someone smart) is suing in a court of law, you don't think that they've thought about this little detail already?

Meanwhile, you're a random internet person who only knows about the broad strokes of this story through a news article.

You're making as many baseless assumptions as the people questioning the parents' claim.

 

[blakep267]

My graduating class was 600 students. We were ranked by our gpa so we knew who was number 1 etc. I think we had 4 people tied for Valedictorian. But only 1 or 2 spoke at graduation .

We also had AP classes so you could get higher than a 4.0. In a smaller school, it shouldn't be more than 1 most of the time

 

[blakep267]

I find determining valedictorian based on grades odd. Lots of people get all As in high school. For me, valedictorian spoke for the class so they needed to be the best all round, good grades and representative of the class as a whole.

THats what the class president is for

 

[Valhelm]

High school valedictorians are the most awful parts of a graduation ceremony, most of the time it just reinforces economic/social privilege while not recognizing and honoring students who struggled early in their schooling but managed to greatly improve over the years.

Cosigning this. My high school valedictorian cheated his way to the top yet never suffered any consequences thanks to family connections and a warm relationship with the school administration.

A couple years later he set a girl on fire.

 

[adamsappel]

The whole concept of GPA is sort of pointless for similar reasons since a 4.0 at one school is not necessarily the same as a 4.0 at another.

I graduated high school in 1984. Not only did our AP/Honors classes only count towards a 4.0, our grades were based on a 7-point scale (93-100 A, 85-92 B, 77-84 C, 70-76 D, below 70 was an E). And this was in West Virginia! I was in AP classes because I always scored really high on placement tests, but I was a lazy student and had terrible grades.

Cosigning this. My high school valedictorian cheated his way to the top yet never suffered any consequences thanks to family connections and a warm relationship with the school administration.

A couple years later he set a girl on fire.

Good lord! I hope this guy is in prison. I can't find anything on google about how the case ended.

 

[DarthWoo]

When my older brother graduated, there were three valedictorians. When I graduated, six years later, there were seven. The next year they changed something up so that the GPAs could not be so easily maxed out, though I've long forgotten exactly how the formula went. I believe it had something to do with weighting the GPAs with however many honors and/or AP courses you had.

 

[K.Jack]

Suing over it is kind of extreme but the school obviously shit on the black student

Re: GPAs, in my high school ours were printed on the report cards to two decimal places, and we definitely knew what everyone had

Yeah this secret GPA stuff is alien to me.

 

[Kin5290]

How legit is this? It seems that the only thing supporting the OP (and the lawsuit's) claims are the word of the mother.

Hell, there's not even a word from the student.

 

[Ecotic]

I know the feeling. I had to share the distinction of having 4 years of perfect attendance with someone else. They should have kept going until one of us gave out.

 

[n64coder]

On the other, the whole GPA rat race is awful (coming from someone who graduated with and has maintained a 4.0 from HS through Masters) and should be ended. Honor Roll/Dean's List is a better system, fighting for ranks is a disaster that replaces compassion and unity with bitter competition.

In my town, they stopped the publishing of class ranks, honor roll status, valedictorian/salutorian because of the rat race and putting undue pressure on kids to be on the top. At first I disagree with the approach but it's probably for the better.

 

[Cyframe]

I have no confidence in a school district that was just ordered to desegregate a year ago. I have plenty of feelings about the school system and how I've watched great classmates with potential get ruined by harassment and grades suffered for that while the school system did nothing. There are a ton of issues with the entire school environment.

 

[Flo_Evans]

I could see being pissed if there was an actual prize or something but valedictorian amounts to a yearbook footnote.

 

[Gnilres]

My high school graduation had like 20 valedictorians all with identical GPAs.

I wasn't one of them but yeah, idk.

 

[Future]

I find determining valedictorian based on grades odd. Lots of people get all As in high school. For me, valedictorian spoke for the class so they needed to be the best all round, good grades and representative of the class as a whole.

I dont know how many people actually get straight As all through high school

There is no way to really understand "best all around". Gotta go with the grades. Which makes this story so confusing because it should be a 5 minute thing to calculate these gpas why is there a debate between the family and the school?

 

[Mechanized]

I could see being pissed if there was an actual prize or something but valedictorian amounts to a yearbook footnote.

Racism is ok if the outcome isn't perceived as important enough?

Considering the circumstance this all seems too coincidental. You'd think this would be as straight-forward as making records public. Prolonging things puts a huge amount of suspicion on the school.

 

[7DollarHagane]

Shouldn't this be a very simple matter of if the gpas are equal or not equal?

We had co valedictorian in my graduating class too because there were two 4.0s I thunk.

 

[Cagey]

Racism is ok if the outcome isn't perceived as important enough?

Considering the circumstance this all seems too coincidental. You'd think this would be as straight-forward as making records public. Prolonging things puts a huge amount of suspicion on the school.

Google FERPA.

 

[Drkirby]

Weird, i knew zero other peoples GPA.

When I was in highschool, the few students really gunning for for the Valedictorian title knew where their competitors stood, and talked about it with their peers when it was time to enroll for classes the following year. I took a lot of the Honors and AP classes, so I overheard it in quite a few of them. It was also a pretty affluent area though.

My school district calculated the Valedictorian's GPA (Along with a ton of other stuff) using the the "weighted GPA", which gave Honors/AP classes higher weighting than normal classes. Normal classes used the 4.0 scale, but an A in an AP class was the equivalent of a 6.0, and an A in an honors classes was a 5.0. Getting an A in an honors class was worth more than a B in an AP class, and a C in an AP class was the equivalent to a B in a normal class, which all played into the game of students trying to get the highest GPA and the risk/reward of taking the AP classes over the honors classes.

 

[commedieu]

Considering this school district's racist fuckery goes back nearly 50 years, I can believe it

Yep. And it's the first tike doing it.

 

[B-Dubs]

This is going to take all of thirty seconds to sort out either way.

 

[KillLaCam]

I'd actually like proof of the GPAs In this situation. This sounds kinda weird . I thought a little more went into choosing the valedictorian than just GPA too.

 

[TAJ]

When I was in highschool, the few students really gunning for for the Valedictorian title knew where their competitors stood, and talked about it with their peers when it was time to enroll for classes the following year. I took a lot of the Honors and AP classes, so I overheard it in quite a few of them. It was also a pretty affluent area though.

My school district calculated the Valedictorian's GPA (Along with a ton of other stuff) using the the "weighted GPA", which gave Honors/AP classes higher weighting than normal classes. Normal classes used the 4.0 scale, but an A in an AP class was the equivalent of a 6.0, and an A in an honors classes was a 5.0. Getting an A in an honors class was worth more than a B in an AP class, and a C in an AP class was the equivalent to a B in a normal class, which all played into the game of students trying to get the highest GPA and the risk/reward of taking the AP classes over the honors classes.

At my high school honors didn't get any GPA boost but they were prerequisites for some AP classes.
I was put in honors English but I dropped it the first day when there was a big assignment due on day 2. There was only one boy in the class after that.
I did end up taking AP in a few subjects.

 

[Taramoor]

There's a lot of circumstantial evidence around this even if there's no proof.

The school being ordered to desegregate just last year, okay. A black kid set to be valedictorian and winds up having to share? Unfortunate optics, but what're you going to do? Oh, this is the first time, ever, that this school has had co-valedictorians? The ONLY time in history they haven't been able to narrow it down to one is when math said the One was going to be black? That's where things get a little too much.

Honestly if they were going to be racist about it they should've just given it to the white kid and never mentioned it. If the parents still sue, just say"We're not allowed to disclose GPA score."

 

[balohna]

This isn't the Homcoming King/Queen.

You don't vote on valedictorian. It's an honor granted based on final GPA.

But we did... ?

There were only 2 candidates and they were good students, not sure if they had the highest GPAs but it is possible. It was considered something where they represented the student body, both were involved in extra curriculars as well as having high GPAs.

 

[Meier]

It sounds like the mother suing seems to think that due to the weighting of difficult classes, her daughter should have finished higher. They probably both got 4.0s but the one was tougher and should have finished higher due to it. I imagine there must be precedent at the school for this sort of thing (higher difficulty getting the award) for them to sue.

 

[SuperBowser]

To be honest, even if the school are in the wrong, they probably already altered the grades to hide it. There's no way for the family to win this case.

 

[Yoshi]

I have taken a look at the facebook page mentioned in the op and looking at texts (seemingly written by the mother) like these:

It is our hope that Jasmine's story will bring hope to many, many others that you can achieve your dreams and you can excel at high levels in spite of the obstacles set before you! God said in His word in Jeremiah 29:11 "For I know the plans I have for you, 'declares the Lord', plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."

Never give up on what God has ordained for you!!! Peace and Blessings!

We thank God for using us to bring hope to the generations to come that you can achieve your dreams and all can excel at high levels. Jasmine set this goal as a 7th grader, not knowing what God had planned for her! I am thankful that God is our vindicator and He will make the crooked places straight in this matter. Thanks so much for your concern. It's been a rough year, but we made it by the grace of God!

Gives me the feeling the mother might just be a lunatic. I cannot believe someone would write something like this in the civilised world in the year 2017.

 

[Yeoman]

There should be consequences either way.
If the school was indeed racist, but equally if this accusation turns out to be false.

 

[besada]

I didn't know anyone's GPA, but I did know all the kids who were in the running for valedictorian, and THEY all knew each other's GPAs. Particularly the top three, who are all aware that they are within striking range of Valedictorian and who their competitors are.

Suing's probably the only way to compel them to show the records, since they're legally bound not to divulge student information.

 

[Xenus]

High school valedictorians are the most awful parts of a graduation ceremony, most of the time it just reinforces economic/social privilege while not recognizing and honoring students who struggled early in their schooling but managed to greatly improve over the years. My high school got rid of valedictorians due to lawsuits like this one, albeit not over issues of race, a couple years before I came in and it was replaced with an honor society for the 5% percent of seniors with the highest cumulative gpa , no other criteria. This was super competitive and basically required straight A's and lots of APs which effectively shut out many poorer students who were exceptional in their own right, but unable to justify the extra cost and effort of taking the APs. I am sure that there are cases where valedictorian awards are not quite so regressive, but for the most part they reward students who coasted through high school while ignoring more deserving, albeit lower GPA students, who rose from lower beginnings.

Also fuck Cum, Summa, and Magna Cum Laude awards as well, because they operate on the same idea of rewarding students that were consistently strong students throughout their career while not recognizing how those who struggled at first or dealt with personal tragedy managed to overcome and succeed despite that. While I recognize that they did great work, it felt awful that we gave the Magna Cum Laude students an extra-long standing ovation at my college graduation, when knowing that so many other students had just as much of a challenge to overcome, if not more. These honors focus on the destination over the journey and trivialize the process of learning and growing as a person, as if the merit of their education could be determined by grades alone.

Hopefully she goes on to have a successful college career and can move forward with her life in spite of this grossness.

Not sure about where you went to school but in my small town AP classes weren't extra cost except maybe taking the AP test at the end of the quarter which in no way effected your grade. But along the whole point I agree, Halfway through my highschool we switched from 7 to 10 point scale and honors being on the 5.0 along with AP. No adjustments were made for kids already on the scale so it was fair except for a grade against grade comparison. However I know of a kid that was obsessed with grades being qa year ahead in math with me cheating by fixing his answers after the teacher graded it and claiming it they were grading wrong. The teacher quickly caught on cause while there were the occasional error brought to her attention over the year by the students. His was supposedly wrong every test. Someone more savvy could have gotten away with it once or twice in the year and effected their place in the standings. Plus the system encourages kids to play teachers pets to gain a few points in the more subjective subjects where essays and graded projects are a big deal. Plus finally it encourages those who don't need EC to grovel for it and get opportunists to gain a few points just for the sake of the prize.