The Eagle's Nest

Dear Babs,

My high school is of­fer­ing us the op­tion to not list our class rank on our tran­script. My school is very com­pet­i­tive, and I am prob­a­bly only in the top 25 per­cent of my class, with a 3.3 av­er­age in all-​​honors and AP classes. Should I let col­leges see my rank?

—Judged in Jersey

Dear Judged,

Since you have the op­tion, my rec­om­men­da­tion would be to leave it out. Un­less you are in the top 10 per­cent, your class rank could hurt your stand­ing with ad­mis­sions of­fi­cers. You see, col­leges rank­ings re­port the num­ber of at­tend­ing stu­dents at a given col­lege who are in the top 10 per­cent of their high school class. That means that if you are not in the top 10 per­cent, your sta­tis­tics could be hurt­ing the college’s own rankings.

In every ap­pli­ca­tion you send out, your guid­ance coun­selor will have to pro­vide a pro­file of your high school. In this pro­file, she or he will doc­u­ment how com­pet­i­tive your class is and how most stu­dents are high achiev­ing. Your GPA is not bad, so if you have the op­tion, don’t put your less-​​than-​​stellar class rank. I’m sure you can find an­other way to make your­self look good.

Good luck,
—Babs

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