Extra grade point should be removed from honors and AP classes

Honors credit is a magical thing. Got a B in an honors class? It’s now an A. Got an A? It’ll turn into something beyond an A+.

With this “magic,” an honors class is far more appealing than a regular class, despite the faster movement through subjects and the increased difficulty. 

To combat the tendency of students to be their own worst enemy and take classes solely to inflate their GPAs, it would be smart for the school to remove the extra grade point from honors and A.P. classes.

Take, for example, Chemistry Honors and regular Chemistry. Chemistry takes around three hours per week for homework and studying.By contrast, Chemistry Honors takes an average of seven, more than double the time commitment.

One would think that a tiny fraction of the school would take Chemistry Honors. However, due to the extra grade point, about half of the sophomore class takes Chem Honors.

What if the point boost was taken out of the class? Would everybody take the easier way and switch to regular Chemistry, or would they accept the challenge? 

The removal of the extra grade point would ensure that mostly motivated students would take the classes. Those who think that the regular class is too easy could take the honors option, while others could stick to a regular class.

Having no honors point in honors or A.P. classes would also eliminate the equally ridiculous “highest GPA race.” Instead of having the inflated over 5.0 GPA, the maximum would be 4.33.

 While colleges do care about the rigor of the classes a particular student is taking, they also care about whether that student is willing to take classes appropriate to their skill level. In that case, having an A in a regular class might be more beneficial than having a B inflated by an honors class grade boost.

Not having that grade boost would help students see their grades as colleges would and encourage those in honors classes to either have better performance or to drop to its regular counterpart. 

Some people might say that honors courses require more time and energy and it would be grossly unfair to weight equally an honors class that takes almost double the time as a standard course with a regular class. 

Honors classes should give students a sense of accomplishment in having conquered such a daunting task,. Taking out the honors point would restore that sense of accomplishment and victory.

With this change, students will instead be motivated to take classes not for the grade, but for their intellectual curiosity.

If anything, this would be learning with honor.