Taking PE pass/fail in high school?

[Anonymous]

My kid is athletic but takes mostly honors and AP classes (usually getting A's). It seems like the PE class would bring down his average. Is there anything I'm not considering? Someone suggested switching it to pass/fail.

[Anonymous]

No more valedictorians so no reason to care about it “bringing down” a gpa and the schools likely looking at if taking AP courses do unweighted GPA anyway so no benefit to GPA to take P/F and just if want to not do less work in the health parts of the class can do P/F but it won’t be any help to take P/F for colleges

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No more valedictorians so no reason to care about it “bringing down” a gpa and the schools likely looking at if taking AP courses do unweighted GPA anyway so no benefit to GPA to take P/F and just if want to not do less work in the health parts of the class can do P/F but it won’t be any help to take P/F for colleges

Answer above about no valedictorians is for FCPS which assume your kid is in as saw same question posted in FCPS forum

[Anonymous]

OP here and yes, I did post on the FCPS forum. That page is focused on the new high school with more than 300 comments. Though I typically think of this page as more helpful when kids are trying to get into AAP, I thought I would try here.
Not concerned about valedictorian. Just wasn't sure what the thoughts were and if there was a benefit. He's our eldest and the college process is a bit different a couple decades ago. It was actually a teacher that recommended it.
I wasn't sure if there was a potential negative impact.

[Anonymous]

There is no reason to worry about PE effect on GPA, colleges unweight the GPA. They see the number of AP/IB classes, that is what matters.

[Anonymous]

Not sure if you are still checking your first post on the FCPS page, but the 1 reply there is short, sweet, accurate and consistent with comments here. My guess is teacher still thinking in olden days where 0.0001 could matter to be valedictorian for HS but since that’s no longer done and colleges do unweighted, only who would know the 0.0001 is student.

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/1289289.page

[Anonymous]

Well if it doesn't really matter one way or another, then why not just do P/F . seems like it just takes the burden off. I would do P/F just for that reason alone (that it doesn't matter anyway) and also this may be why the teacher suggested it.

[Anonymous]

When I was applying to Yale in 1967, the admissions officer told me it was my A+ in PE that really put me over the top. He said he throws P/F apps in the trash.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:When I was applying to Yale in 1967, the admissions officer told me it was my A+ in PE that really put me over the top. He said he throws P/F apps in the trash.

[Anonymous]

Good thing that now you don't have to clutter the trash with paper waste since every application is digital.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Well if it doesn't really matter one way or another, then why not just do P/F . seems like it just takes the burden off. I would do P/F just for that reason alone (that it doesn't matter anyway) and also this may be why the teacher suggested it.

Because an all A student doesn’t usually know how to coast and do bare passing minimum and so if will do all the work that would get them an A anyway should just take for grade.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well if it doesn't really matter one way or another, then why not just do P/F . seems like it just takes the burden off. I would do P/F just for that reason alone (that it doesn't matter anyway) and also this may be why the teacher suggested it.

Because an all A student doesn’t usually know how to coast and do bare passing minimum and so if will do all the work that would get them an A anyway should just take for grade.

+1 yep this is what my son is doing now as a sophomore. He doesn’t know how to coast or do bare minimum - he works too hard even in PE. PE is an easy A - not much work.

[Anonymous]

For the parents whose kids don't know how to coast and get by with a "P"... an important skill to learn in life is how to differentiate priorities and scale level of effort based on prioritization. It's an expected "college skill". Good luck!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well if it doesn't really matter one way or another, then why not just do P/F . seems like it just takes the burden off. I would do P/F just for that reason alone (that it doesn't matter anyway) and also this may be why the teacher suggested it.

Because an all A student doesn’t usually know how to coast and do bare passing minimum and so if will do all the work that would get them an A anyway should just take for grade.

It is PE, there is not that much work. They show up to class, play the sports, do whatever limited classroom work there is, and they are done.

I know that there is homework this year but I suspect that it is going to be a joke, at least, the PE teacher thought it was ridiculous to give homework in PE.

[Anonymous]

More than one AO at T20 mentioned that it does not matter, but that taking PE as P/F gives an indication of the level of "gaming" in the application. The idea being, if a family is going to pay such attention to minutiae, they probably have a lot of support in the application process either via a knowledgeable parent or a private counselor. So they are going to be a bit more skeptical.