The official ranking of all high school class presidents
It’s President’s Day 2018 and there’s no better time — that’s right, not even President’s Day 2017 or President’s Day 2013 — to rank all the class, or student body, presidents your high school had.
7. The one who’s really into I Am Number Four
Truthfully, this is a pretty rare archetype for high school class presidents. I’ll admit I haven’t even seen it, or the film. This Alex Pettyfer-starring flick tanked with critics and struggled at the box office. But 57 percent of users on Rotten Tomatoes liked it! In 145,356 reviews (as of publishing), that means there were approximately 82,853 fans. The chances that at least one of those people was a mega fan who ran their student body is probably (hopefully) about 84 percent.
Why does that person finish last on this list? If they like it for any reason other than Pettyfer’s desperate attempt to be a mix of Chad Michael Murray and Robert Pattinson, this is enough reason:
Wait. This doesn’t look that bad. Uh, let’s just move on
The new number 7. The jock
That clip brings us to a more common archetype for high school class presidents: the jock. The Freddie Prinze Jr. in She’s All That. This could be the football star, the basketball star or maybe even a hockey star in some parts of the country. This person could easily overlap with numbers six, four, two, and one on the list.
In some cases, the jock can unite the class behind school spirit and actually come in with some handy leadership experience. That seems like enough qualification to organize prom or give a speech at graduation.
But in many other cases. the jock class president actually got roped into running because they’re so popular and probably ran the classic “I’ll get us In-n-Out for lunch” campaign. Of course that won’t actually happen, but name recognition and false promises typically win elections.
Hmm. This is getting too real. On to number six.
6. The person school administration specifically tries to stop
Look, high school class presidents have almost no power. They might speak at graduation and have the power to use their tiny budgets to organize events for the school. They’ll probably be present for meetings with adults as a voice but not be given a vote. If they’re lucky, they can pick themes for prom and homecoming. Basically though, they have no power. Despite that, school administrators will go out of their way to stop someone from getting elected. Not because they’re scared the student will mess up their few responsibilities or be bad at the job, but because they literally don’t like the kid and don’t want to spend time with them. Brutal.
That’s what makes it all the more exciting when that person actually wins. High schoolers love middle fingers to the administration. Plus, overcoming administrative opposition to win sets this class president up for a great “us against them” speech at graduation that makes all the parents just a little uncomfortable.
5. The one who “totally ran as a joke”
“No seriously, I never thought I’d win! I just wanted to see what would happen if I ran. Yeah, of course I printed posters and made buttons, but it was all part of the joke. This was basically a social experiment and you all lost.”
Look, this kid kind of sucks. But we all know this kid. Some of us were this kid. Hell, some of us even lost to this kid, who can also be confused with numbers 3, 2, and 1 on the list.
The only reason this president is so high on the list is because this full ranking is a lazy story device they’re pretty likely to take the job seriously and try to implement a really quirky, random change and that’s always fun. Imagine if they could push morning announcements to the end of first period! That’d be cool? I guess.
4. The actually qualified one
In an upset, this president falls in the middle of the pack. This is the high schooler who’s already in four other clubs and does community service on the side. They have proven leadership experience and have been in student government before.
Plus, Reese Witherspoon played this archetype so well in Election that it has shaped her public reputation for the next 20 years.
The only strike against them is how busy they’ll already be succeeding elsewhere, but in a competition this tight, that’s just enough to push them back a spot. They’re also at risk of literally killing someone fitting number five on this list.
3. The one who wants to go into politics but ends up in real estate
This person is passionate about politics and thinks being high school class president will somehow propel them into the White House. Surely, they’ve heard one too many stories about current politicians who started young.
Of course, it’d be more effective to work with a political party or do activism early, but you know, maybe bringing stuffed crust pizza back is just as good. This person strays further from the correct political path when they dive right into Greek life in college, stop going to class and end up a surprisingly wealthy real estate agent. Think the person advertising on bus benches mixed with Peter Gallagher in American Beauty.
2. The one with a pun or slogan good enough to necessitate a full campaign
Are you “Down with Ms. Brown” and do you “Give a damn about Adam”? Maybe you can “throw hella behind Ella” and “Quite FRANKly, go vote.”
These presidents offered literally nothing to the campaign but a joke and that shows when they’re in office and just looking for puns as prom themes. The reason they rank so high on this list is because they probably have the best handle of how silly the whole thing is.
1. The only one who ran
Let’s be honest, this is usually how it went down and these presidents were always fine at it because faculty handled everything anyways.
