While weighted grades have worked for us for years, are we in need of a reform? Weighted classes account for class difficulty, which raises your max GPA. Baldwin High School uses this form of grading, along with hundreds of other schools.

Weighted grades are classes that can lower or raise your max GPA depending on how difficult a class is. This caters to the students with higher grades and more advanced classes, but it puts kids in less difficult classes to not succeed as well as their classmates, thus making them not succeed as well after high school.

“I feel that though weighted grades can give students a chance to redeem themselves with bad grades, it gives students a false hope, and most colleges use unweighted grades anyways. Overall, I feel they’re misleading,” freshman Lucas Hafer said.

So what’s the alternative? The alternative is unweighted grades, where all students have the max GPA as each other, no matter how difficult the class is. This means students in advanced classes will be seen as good as the kids who are not, but kids with lower grades have a chance to be compared to high grade students.

“I feel like it’s not fair because everyone should have the same amount of potential to achieve a certain GPA without having advantages,” freshman Maddox Shorb said. “I definitely think BHS should have unweighted grades instead.”

Weighted grades and GPA are not seen super serious issues by many, but are very controversial nonetheless. Most colleges even look at your grades and GPA both weighted and unweighted. Weighted grades help talented students but put the less gifted students at a disadvantage for getting accepted into jobs or college.

“I feel like weighted grades makes sense, but it’s not fair to people that have a lot of learning potential but are still stuck in less advanced classes,” freshman Vince Evans said. “I feel like the less difficult classes should not lower your GPA.”

“I think they can be a good thing, and used as an incentive or reward for taking more difficult classes. I think we should keep weighted grades,” Teacher Randi Canterbury said.