Within the Greenville County School District, there’s a new grading system afoot, changing grades and GPAs. At the start of the academic year, the South Carolina Board of Education voted to start using a new grading scale where each letter grade now has a 10-point range instead of the usual 7-point range. When asked about the decision behind the change, Mr. Lavely said, “Travelers Rest High implemented the grading scale the same time as all other South Carolina high schools. So we did it as soon as we were allowed to.”

While the structure may be new to TRHS, most colleges already use the 10-point scale. This scale will then hopefully help students transition from high school to college as they will become comfortable with the new grading format. It will then even help student athletes as they compare themselves to other South Carolina athletes, which then in turn becomes a blessing for colleges too; scouts can now better align grades among the plethora of competitors.

But athletes aren’t the only ones benefitting. As South Carolina is known for being a known military state, this new grading system will help students of military families have smoother transitions in changing from school to school.

Of course on one hand, students will have a higher GPA; now South Carolina teachers are recording ‘A’s for 90s on assignments, rather than ‘B’s. However, on the other hand, the scale does bring student scores closer together rather than farther apart.  Usually, students are used to their fellow classmates’ grades being fairly below them, on average, or exceptionally higher to their own GPA. Yet now, students are more easily clumped together since the scale will boost everyone’s scores a good bit. So now the fight for college entries will be tougher for the academically elite. Whether you’ve been fighting for a full ride to Clemson, or you’ve already had your choice of colleges from across the country, students will now be dealing with competition they never had.