Boothbay Region High School’s standard of honoring academic achievement has now officially changed. Last year, student Page Brown used teacher Mark Gorey’s AP language class project “Champions for Change” as an opportunity to address the Top Ten system.

“I was talking to faculty around our school and they were saying that they didn’t really feel like (Top Ten) fit our school anymore,” said Brown. “When I did some more research on it, I realized that it really was true.”

Brown found some truth to a rumor that the Top Ten standards have been causing anxiety among 15 of her peers, students earning a 90 percentile or better. Brown talked to fellow senior Lilly Sherburne – representative to the Boothbay-Boothbay Harbor CSD School Committee as student body president – about her Champions for Change project and the research she was finding. Sherburne agreed to take the issue to the committee with the help of Principal Dan Welch.

“It was almost shocking how easily it went through,” said Sherburne. “I think it was the span of a 10- to 15-minute conversation and they just kind of agreed and thought it was a pretty good idea.”

Brown said the new honors-based system will guarantee recognition to students earning a 90 percentile or greater, and as classes become smaller, it will also guarantee a standard that continues to give meaning to achieving academic excellence.

Brown acknowledged her class is somewhat of a rarity to have so many students achieving such high grades, but to disqualify a handful of students for achieving an A- is counter-intuitive.

“If you have a 93 GPA, then you’ve worked really, really hard for that. You should not be punished for being in a competitive group of peers,” said Brown.

Sherburne is on that fine line of not making the Top Ten highest grades despite hovering around the 93 percentile.

The new system defines what it means to be a top student, said Brown, who often used to wonder what it means to be in the Top Ten.

“Now that we have this benchmark, if you have a 90 or above GPA, you will be considered an honors student,” Brown said.

The new system will honor students earning a 90 to 94 percentile as Magna Cum Laude and students earning 95 percentile or better as Summa Cum Laude. Sherburne and Brown stressed, the new system does not eliminate the class salutatorian and valedictorian as those honorees stand to earn grants and scholarships for college.

Both said they were a little worried about the timing of bringing the issue to the board, but because the board showed support and accepted it with little discussion, the system will be in place for this year’s graduation – regalia and all.

“It’s super empowering to see so many of us be so passionate about issues in our community and then seeing them play out. I think it just kind of proves to our generation that we can actually do something and be effective.”

Brown pointed out this is the third Champions for Change project from her graduating class that has effectively changed aspects of Boothbay Region High School – the others being Sherburne’s appeal to the Board of Trustees to take action on lead levels in the water and Summer Chamberlin’s Title IX appeal to bring women’s soccer to the fields closer to the school.

“Congratulations to you both,” said Gorey. “I’m very confident that both of you will be advocates for the greater good.”

Said Brown, “I hope so, we just have to graduate first!”