Today Hot Report

GRAPEVINE, Texas –
A 2008 graduate who has the highest grade-point-average in Grapevine High School history will not be named class valedictorian, NBC 5 reported.

Anjali Datta said she was encouraged to graduate early because by her senior year she would run out of classes to take, but she never thought she would be jeopardizing her chances of being recognized at the top of her class.

The 16-year-old Grapevine High School senior is an accomplished piano player, and a chess prodigy who is graduating in just three years with a 5.898 GPA.

However she will not get the 2008 class valedictorian title because of a Grapevine-Colleyville Independent School District policy.

“Our policy states that the valedictorian will be the student with the highest rate of grade point average who has completed four years of high school,” said Megan Overman with GCISD.

Instead the school named Datta the valedictorian of those graduating in three years, which is only a hand full of students.

“I wish I had been told this beforehand, especially since I had asked the year before I had decided to graduate early,” Datta said. “TEA encourages early graduation but this seems to be doing the opposite.”

Datta said she is no longer being considered for a state college scholarship that is supposed to go to graduating seniors with the highest class rank.

“I wanted to end remembering all the teachers and how much I appreciate them and I love their classes and remembering those and not the one thing that is so disappointing,” she said.

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