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In this video of Hillary Clinton, at 15s, the child said "I have straight A's.".

What does "straight A's" mean?

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1 Answer 1

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In the U.S., examinations are traditionally graded by letter of the alphabet, commonly A-F, with A being the highest pass grade.

A 'Straight A' student is one that has achieved an A Grade across all subjects taken

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    Grades A-F is typical in many English speaking countries. Not so much in the rest of thew world. We usually grade by number (0-10), 10 being a perfect score and 0 complete failure.
    – Tonny
    Commented Jul 9, 2015 at 8:57
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    Also, the letter E is normally skipped, so it's really A-D,F.
    – cjm
    Commented Jul 9, 2015 at 15:43
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    @cjm E is not normally skipped in the UK, FYI. Schools currently grade 16-year-olds on a scale thus: A* A B C D E F G (A*) being the best. The system is changing in2017 to a 1 to 9 scale with, bizarrely, 9 being best. The reason for this seems to be that, as standards drop, the govt can add a grade 10, 11, 12 etc. as needed, rather than adding more stars. Anyway, at the moment it is sometimes said that a UK student is "a straight A-star student". 18-year-olds are still to be graded from A* down to E.
    – Nagora
    Commented Jul 9, 2015 at 16:15
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    @DoubleDouble In the early grades in the U.S. (at least when and where I went to school,) 'E' actually did stand for 'Excellent.' It was basically the early-grade (i.e. K-2) equivalent of an 'A.' As for the normal U.S. grading scheme, it's not so much that 'E' is skipped, but rather than the grades are A-D or failing, with failing abbreviated as 'F.'
    – reirab
    Commented Jul 9, 2015 at 18:10
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    You are still a "straight A" student if you have grades like an A–. Commented Apr 21, 2017 at 18:12

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