FARMINGTON – SAD 9 directors voted 10-2 Tuesday to increase weighted grades for advanced placement and honor courses at the high school.

School Principal Joe Moore presented a slight modification to the proposal he made to the board two weeks ago.

Instead of students gaining an additional five or eight points on their final grades, for class-rank purposes only, for honors and AP courses, respectively, the grades would be multiplied by factors slightly greater than one.

Students taking an AP course would have their final grade multiplied by 1.08, he said. Under this formula, a student getting a grade of 90 in an AP course would end up with a 97.2 for class rank.

A student taking an honors course would have the grade multiplied by 1.05, Moore said. A student getting a 90 in an honors course would receive a 94.5 for class rank.

It provides for a fairer and consistent weight increase, Moore said, because a student getting a 70 and gaining eight or five points, depending on the course level, would receive a higher weight percentage increase than a student receiving a 90.

Students taking AP and honors courses currently have five points and three points, respectively, added to their final grade.

Under the new proposal, a student earning a 90 will benefit more, he said.

The staff is 100 percent behind the change and for the most part students are in favor of it, he said.

There are 50 students in each of the freshman, sophomore, junior and senior classes of about 200 students taking honors classes, he said.

There are an average of 12 students enrolled in each of the six AP courses out of about 400 students eligible to take the more challenging courses.

“I would like it if we could average 30,” Moore said, and have 11 or 12 AP courses.

Moore said previously he was hoping to increase the number of students taking the more challenging courses.

Of the 50 students in honor classes at each grade level, many of them are taking multiple honor courses, Superintendent Mike Cormier said.

Colleges receive the students’ actual grades on the report card, but do look at class standing, Moore said.

Several directors spoke in favor of the increase with directors Bob Flick and Joyce Morton, both of Farmington, opposed to it.

Flick said he opposed the increase because, in his opinion, it was misleading since students taking those courses already have a point value.

Some parents spoke in favor of the increase, with some saying the increase was not enough. They said students putting in the extra effort and taking more challenging courses are not seeing the benefit for doing so when students taking mainstream courses and not working as hard are getting higher grades.

That affects scholarships and college tuition, they said.

High school junior Serach Ramu said she is taking three honors classes and had to drop down to a mainstream course in another and was “blown away” by the differences between the two in the course work.

“I think the classes should be weighted more,” she said, and she would like to see it retroactive.

Morton said she feels they are cutting out the students who are not in AP or honors courses, but are doing a lot of work at their own level.

Her children took the harder courses and made it into college without a problem and never came home saying they were unhappy with the grading system.

There is already an increase for those taking the honors and advanced placement courses, she said.