Soapbox

A+ for stupidity

There’s an editorial in the paper today about the teacher in Tennessee who was trying to have a pep rally for the honor roll kids, and found out that she couldn’t. Under Tennessee law, all parents must give their permission before any academic information, good or bad is published. Without signed consent from all the parents, she couldn’t even post the honor roll in the hallway, put a congratulatory mention in school newsletters or even have a spelling bee. Why? because children who weren’t being honored, or who didn’t win would feel left out.

Well… yeah. I don’t think that everything should be a competition, particularly for kids, but in those cases, isn’t it supposed to be an incentive, to make one work harder? Don’t the honor roll and the well-behaved kids get to have the trip to Wyandot Lake so that the kids that have to stay behind at school will think, “Man, I wish I was going too!” and try harder?

What amazing silliness! Whose head is so far up their backside that they thought up this idea? There’s a difference between posting the honor roll and posting the F’s, or making kids wear a dunce cap. Only a person just crippled by political correctness couldn’t recognize that difference. The sense of entitlement some people feel, (“I deserve not to be not-honored!”) is just amazing.

I think the academic pep rally was a good idea. The teacher’s thinking was that the goal of school is sort of supposed to be academics, isn’t it? So it makes sense to honor the outstanding students as much as we honor the outstanding athletes. (Someone tell that to OSU)

If they can’t have the academic pep rally, the schools had better not have any sports pep rallies either! Because then wouldn’t the fat kids and the ones cut from the team will feel left out of the recognition? I mean, under this rule, you couldn’t have national honor society, or Quiz Bowl team, could you? And no pictures in the yearbook of any team or club that a kid could be rejected from. My kids’ school couldn’t have had the Writer of the Month and Student of the Month awards, which meant so much to the kids at their elementary school.

I am all for reducing the competition among kids. I like the idea of having an emphasis on achieving a personal best. But in all those soccer matches where there’s no score kept “cause its just for fun” you could ask any kid there and they could tell you who has the most points! Kids know that life has competitions. Judgements are made, grades are given. Sometimes it seems unfair, but that’s how life works. Trying to somehow shield them from this is wrong-headed, and probably unnecessary.

My kid’s basketball team has lost every game this year, and some by spectatular scores. They know that, and they’d dearly love to win a game. But they play anyway, to have a personal best, and because they love the game. I think that is the best life-lesson any parent can hope for for their child- even better than a winning season.