Question written in Spanish

[laepelba]

In my exercise book is the following question for me to answer:

¿Quién era el/la segundo/a estudiante de tu clase en el grado 12?

I know that it means "Who was the second student in your class in the 12th grade?", but I don't understand second *what*? There is no context.

[aleCcowaN]

most probably "segundo mejor promedio" ---> second best grades

[laepelba]

That's kind of what I thought, but then I realized that a grand majority of the rest of the world doesn't think as "academically" as I do, so I didn't want to assume that the question referred to grades.....

[aleCcowaN]

Well, I would say that in the Spanish speaking world grades are the first thing -if not the only one- when education is involved, even up to consider more important grades than knowledge and skills themselves. Other things like sports, being popular, leadership, etcetera, are regarded as American culture -not at all that we don't care about them-.

[laepelba]

I was actually thinking that many high school students are mostly concerned with social things - proms and parties and so on.....