Parents of stupid children want to ban honor rolls, spelling bees

The BBQ Pit
101

Wow. Reading these posts makes me realise that things aren’t good on either side of the Atlantic. I still hide my academic credentials. I still cringe when someone asks me where I did my degree. When I was at primary school (so up untill age 11), I was very academically capable, and like many many others in this thread, I was essentially bullied for it. It didn’t help that I was slightly overweight as well.

At high school, things got better. The school I went to was known for being one of the best in the area, both academically, and in extra-curricular activities. The trophies I won for public speaking and debating took pride of place in the trophy cabinets - they had higher priority than the sports trophies. I was encouraged and supported by the school to excel. My peers however, routinely made fun of me. It got to the point, where I wasn’t sure who were my real friends and who just wanted to take the piss, but hey, no sort of physical being beaten up.

However, this encouragement of bright students did take its toll. One girl from school, is still bitter, almost 8 years later, that despite the fact she could not have coped academically at Oxbridge, she wasn’t given the opportunity to try. Yeah, so the school decided, based on her past performance, and her only slightly above average grades, that she would be better off not wasting her time, since an Oxbridge application was time consuming. So even to this day, I hear “its not fair, I wasn’t encouraged, there was blatant favouritism going on”. Which I’m not convinced there was. Yes, academically gifted students were encouraged, and their achievements given equal, if not greater, status than sports achievements, but not at the expense of others.

We did have “honours boards” at my school. One for “Outstanding Achievement at A-Level” and one for “University Honours” - basically if you got into Oxbridge, or were awarded a prestigous scholarship. Again, created some bitterness (see above), but on my part, extreme embarrasment at having my name emblazoned up there for all of posterity.

The point I’m trying to make? That encouraging academic achievement is the best thing to do, but you will get the odd nutjob, who has an inflated sense of their own abilities, and will try and get any recognition that they’re not as good as they’d like to believe they are destroyed. It makes me fucking mad.

102

I’ll say hurrah for your school, Angua, in that it put academic achievement on a par with athletic prowess. Far too many schools, in my experience, elevate jockdom above scholarship. Even when it’s not an official policy, it often works out that way in practice.

I’ll say again that, judging from my experience and what others have said here, I believe an honor roll is a better idea than a single award for overall academic achievement. I feel that things like the public speaking and debating trophies you earned, which are won in competitions, are a good idea; but to me, education itself shouldn’t be treated like a contest. Nor should one area of study – say, math – be more highly valued than another – say, English. Just to take two subjects completely at random.

I also feel that those who don’t achieve well academically – BUT WHO WORK HARD – should get encouragement and realistic boosts to their feelings. No, not a humiliating “unsung hero” award, but help and “attaboy/attagirl” praise in some form. Dismissing them as hopeless dummies does no good.

103

You lost by the rules of the game, and then bitched and whined until you were given the award anyway, as if you had actually won it.

That’s exactly the kind of ‘My kid/I should too be in gifted!’ behavior that’s being bitched about in this thread, and exactly the same reason the girl who sued her former high school to be named valedictorian exhibited. That’s exactly the ‘give every kid a trophy’ mentality that is being bitched at in this thread.

Recall them? Nah. They’re on a sheet of paper in my scrapbook with all the other stuff my mother saved for me from kindergarten through grade 12. My elementary school report cards are still in there, if you’d like to know that I got Cs in handwriting for five straight years.

At least I am not the whiny child who begged for the award someone else won and wouldn’t shut up until they gave me one just like it.

104

Ah, but, what tells us that whatever hard time was given to the underachievers (and whatever bad self-image they got) was not at heart aimed at their status as “ignorant white trash”, rather at their not making HR (merely a symptom)? Besides, as many posters have mentioned, the stereotypical American school the Honor Roll are NOT the “popular” kids. The “popular” kids in most schools are the cute ones, the rich ones, the “hip” ones, the sports stars, the charismatic types. Now, then, YES it is real that those kids who start off from a better social standing or at the least a more stable home will tend to end up with better grades than those who start off from a socially disadvantaged background, but still, it is an achievement of the child.

The answer, as others have said, is yes DO reward those who excel, but at the same time help those who need it – and let live those who are in the “middle of the pack”, which includes not planting in their minds the idea that it harms them if someone else does well. There is no dishonor in being an “also ran” IF that IS your best.

105

Really? Must be nice to have had parents who were so supportive and encouraged you, instead of cutting you down all the time. Maybe academic recognition wouldn’t have meant so much to me if there were any other source of affirmation in my life then.

It’s pretty easy to kick the down dog I was then. Lots of people did it. I guess to others I would look like a whiny child, though to me it was the first time I’d ever stepped out of my role as obedient, take-whatever-shit-comes doormat. First time I ever had enough strength to stand up for what I thought was right. So by an outsider’s standards I was wrong? So be it. At least I discovered the power of righteous indignation. Whether it was in a just cause or not is a separate point. At this far remove (over 30 years), it doesn’t have a whole lot more than that to do with who I am today.

As to the topic of this thread: I for damned sure didn’t have pushy parents boosting my self-esteem out of all proportion to my worth, or fighting the system to get me extras I hadn’t earned, or any of the other behavior that started this discussion. I’ve had to work for what I wanted all my life, and the award experience was a small first step in finding out that crap wasn’t my foreordained lot in life; that I could have some say over it. So go ahead, call me a whiny bitch; but you haven’t experienced what brought me to that point. If it makes you feel good to look down on me for it, hey, go for it.

106

My parents had other methods for cutting me down. They reminded me that I was ugly, fat, and that my only worth to them was my intelligence. If I didn’t put up big numbers, I got no attention. They loved me when I earned it. And they certainly never cared whether I wanted to excel at all the things they thought were important.

I was their racehorse, and they still see things that way.

It gets you honors you didn’t earn through merit. That’s the problem with the things like the girl who sued to be valedictorian of a high school she didn’t even go to, or demanding to be let into the gifted and talented program. There’s a metric fuckton of ‘righteous indignation’ these days, and it’s only getting worse.

I suppose browbeating a school official into giving you an award you did not, by the rules of the contest, actually win is work.

No, I had my own problems. You definitely are not the only person in the world to have ever had a hard life. Your example was extremely similar to the girl who sued the school because by the rules of the contest, she didn’t earn the valedictorian title. Scream and yell and make a scene until you get what you want, not what you earned, right?

This isn’t about feeling good by looking down on you for it. However, I am going to be honest and say I have no respect for people who demand they be given awards they didn’t rightfully win.

107

Actually, catsix, this whole discussion of winning awards is a great example of why I have come to believe what I’ve already stated in this thread:

To expand on that thought: Regarding the educational process itself as a giant contest focuses the students who care about such things narrowly on how to win points (like the senior you cited who took gut courses to keep the valedictorian title). It discourages exploring learning for its own sake, if by doing so one might lower one’s GPA. It encourages parents to measure their child’s worth and success by artificial trophies that don’t say much if anything about the child’s intellectual and ethical growth. (Your horse race parents come to mind.) It holds cheap talents and abilities that can’t be neatly boxed up, weighed and measured.

Honor rolls give credit where it’s due, but without the winner take all aspect, that in effect says, “Who cares how hard you worked, or how well you did? LOSER.” Most kids get plenty of chances in life to learn that lesson. If their parents try to shield them from all disappointments, then indeed they do their children a disservice. If they cut them down, say for being fat or ugly, they also harm them. There’s a delicate balance to be struck between the two, to encourage kids’ development and give them the praise they need, without overinflating their sense of self.

Well, I don’t have much admiration for my 18 year old self, either; she wasn’t that great a person. I do feel compassion for the poor kid, though; she was what her life so far had made her. The intervening 37 years have at least taught me to be a bit less judgmental of others’ perceived sins, since I don’t know what kind of life history they arise from. “There but for the grace of God” and all that. YMMV

108

I think the competition teaches a valuable lesson about the way life is. Life is, especially if you want a career, a ruthless competition. You learn that you lose often and win rarely, but so does everyone else. The valedictorian of my senior class flunked out of college because she was ill prepared. I’m now an engineer. You learn that whatever your choices in life, they will affect the next set of choices open to you. And above all, you learn that life is not fair before those competitions really matter and really cause ruin.

Life is winner take all. If one position is open at a company, and five hundred people apply, only one of them is getting the job. The others will be summarily rejected with no explanation as to why. How will someone who has never lost at anything in their life handle that?

At the time it hurt greatly. In the long run, it made me a much stronger person. It’s why I finished college a month after I was supposed to be dead.

109

At my school, the “popular” kids are all different kinds. Some are “A” students, some are athletes, some are slackers. Most of them have a marked lack of maturity, though.

I’m one of those gifted, honor roll students. I actually find it amusing to watch other people’s surprise to find out that I actually read books for FUN, and am currently reading one in another language; that I actually ENJOY learning, and that sometimes I actually gasp STUDY. :eek:

You know, we have a pretty open policy with our gifted program. Non-identified-gifted kids can still take a couple of the classes that we have, as well as be on our Gifted Advisory Board.

110

I could not disgree more. You are, in essence, arguing that life is a zero sum game. If I get a dollar, you lose a dollar. However, economist (which I must admit is generally a voodoo science), have clearly demonstrared that life is not a zero-sum game.

Bill Gates has made bilions starting Microsoft, and as a result thousands of others are millionaires, and the lives of many have been enriched (or perhaps ripped off if you are a /. true believer). If we teach our children that life is winner-take-all, we will only contribute to the enronization (yes it is a word b/c I say so) of our society, and we will all loose.

111

I think there’s too much emphasis on sports both in high school and college. Not that they should be eliminated of course. I do seem to recall that the national spelling bee is primarily for kids in the junior high age range, while state championship sports are generally for high school juniors and seniors, with the occasional underclass superstar thrown in for good measure. So maybe there’s a maturity level difference that can help the sports stars understand defeat better at the state level than the 13 year old kids competing nationally.

Then again, the very young Olympian athletes don’t always seem unduly crazed by the stress so maybe it’s just down to how they’re trained and how much pressure is put on them to value themselves based on success.

112

I agree with you, [b[culture**. There are plenty of opportunities for kids, in and outside of school, to play to win and discover the character-building lessons of losing. Football games, spelling bees – perfectly appropriate to have winners and losers there. Honor rolls with qualifications that require genuine merit and hard work, but where the bar isn’t set absurdly high – a very good idea.

To reduce every aspect of school into cutthroat competition is just as harmful, IMHO, as to take away all recognition for achievement. It predisposes students to treat others as competitors rather than allies, and to do whatever it takes to beat them out. It can even teach them that “Life is, especially if you want a career, a ruthless competition.” Baloney. I’ve been in the working world for over 35 years, as a professional, in both government and the private sector. I’ve enjoyed the pleasure of working with supportive, collegial workmates who would be horrified at the idea of stomping over someone else to raise themselves. Perhaps those who treat life as a zero-sum game are the ones most likely to experience it that way.

113

I guess this thread is as good a place as any to apologize for the fact that my eldest - the HS soph - brought home what I ignorantly considered a perfect midterm report card - all 5s, including mostly honors-level classes.

Hopefully, her younger siblings will be more considerate of their classmates, and at least post a 4 or two.

And none of them participates in organized athletics.

I’m such a failure as a parent! I hope my children forgive me.

It will have to be hot fudge sundaes all around until they see the error of their ways.

114

:smiley: :smiley: :smiley: :smiley: :smiley:

I strongly recommend you double the punishment. :smiley:

On a serious note, this brings to mind the reason why my parents were so nonsupportive of me. The poor deluded people thought they were doing the right thing. When it became apparent the second of their four chldren was above-average bright, they consulted child-psychologist friends who advised them to be sure their other children didn’t feel inferior because of my academic excellence. My parents interpreted this as: give the others plenty of praise, but none for me. After all, I was smart, so I didn’t need it, right? So don’t do anything to reward me.

:: Pause for those familiar with child psychology to shudder. ::

I discovered this in my late 20s, after years of… well, it’s too painful to revisit. The conversation was bloody awful (Mom [bewildered]: “But we used to praise you to the skies to our friends!” Me [anguished wail]: “Why couldn’t you praise me to my face???”) but you know what? No, of course you don’t. Here it is: It took a while to work through it, but it let me forgive them. Forgiving them let me forgive myself for the pathetic schlub I’d been. Forgiveness all around! And the wounds that had bled and bled all those years healed.

Deduction from this sorry pit of personal history: ALL KIDS NEED REALISTIC PRAISE. Not phony praise, that will overinflate their assessment of themselves, or that’s so patently false that they’ll feel patronized and put down. They need recognition for the things about themselves that are good, that they’ve earned, proportionate to their achievement. You don’t need to tell your kid he’ll be a Nobel Prize winner if he aces a science test, but you do need to give him a “Well done!” You don’t lay the public “Unsung Hero” humiliation on a kid who tries but just can’t hit a particular mark, nor do you excoriate her as a dumbass; you tell her, “Yes, you did fail. But it wasn’t because you’re worthless; it’s because it’s not one of your talents, and nobody’s great at everything. I’m pleased that you did your best.”

Best of all about this approach: It doesn’t require beating someone else down to put your kid up. IMHO, it helps kids to develop a more realistic and healthy way of coping with disappointments and losing. Most kids will live up – or down – to the expectations of them.

115

First off, I guess I want to say that I was completely oblivious to honor rolls and such in school. I was living in my own little anti-social, miserable world. Most of the time, my grades sucked—not because I was dumb, but, well, because I was living in my own little anti-social, miserable world. I was also one of those kids who read for enjoyment. Because of this, some people assumed that I was honor roll material and could not fathom that I usually was not. I did have friends (we were all Star Trek geeks, artist geeks, or just geeks), so it wasn’t like I was completely out of it—but I just didn’t “connect” to high school. I could hardly wait to get out. Others’ accomplishments in high school did not affect me—neither negative or positive. I simply was not paying attention.

One time, I think I did get some sort of mention on the honor rolls—I think that was what it was. I think I had to sit in a special area, and my name was called during some sort of ceremony? I think I was told it was related to me getting really good grades. But I really have no idea what it was all about. Only that it happened that one time and made almost no impact on my life.

OH, TELL ME ABOUT IT!!

In my case, it was my mom and in a lot of cases, teachers.

My mom saw that I was keenly interested in art and she saw that I was pretty good at it. So her response was to praise all the other kids, fellow classmates, everyone but me. For me she only had discouragement, criticism, and mentions of how I should stop doing so much art and do something else for a change. My dad, bless his heart, was encouraging in his own way (he paid for art lessons starting when I was age 14, ignoring my mom’s complaints and protestations). But he did not do a whole lot, verbally, to counteract my mom’s discouragment.

Years later, my mom (who has now seen the error of her ways) explained that she was so worried that I’d have an inflated ego so she wanted to make sure to squash that. Also, one of my other siblings was interested in art and my mom didn’t want this sibling to feel inadequate. So, better to sacrifice me and my talents, I suppose.

The thing that I really couldn’t fathom, though, was when art teachers did this to me. None of them were as critical as my mom, but many simply ignored me. Just ignored me. Not a comment, not anything. Just like I wasn’t there. Except when it came time to give grades—then I was given a B or C and told that I “wasn’t trying hard enough” or “wasn’t living up to my potential.” What, pray tell, is that? I was always ignored! How the hell was I to know what “extras” they expected of me?

I knew it wasn’t because I was a mediocre artist—I was already selling my work at art shows and so forth. And occasionally, I’d get an art teacher who was actually nice, threw some crumbs of praise my way and (gasp!) actually gave me something higher than a B once in a while.

I would have been eager and, indeed, very happy if an art teacher had given me something meaty to dig into—some difficult assignment, some actual constructive criticism—something that showed that they had an interest in what I was doing. Instead, most of the time, I was simply ignored.

Yes, yes, yes. That’s exactly what my mom told me. Oh, she was very proud. But God Forbid I ever know about it.

My dad was much better. After all, he paid for art lessons and so forth. He was a sweetheart, really. But I regret that he didn’t talk to me more.

I do remember accidentally overhearing a phone coversation he had with one of his friends. He was bragging to this friend about over some artistic accomplishment I’d made. He was carrying on, crowing and boasting to this friend. I never heard him express such bald-faced pride to my face. (Sadly, he died a few months later. I often think that me overhearing that conversation was God’s gift to me—but that’s getting way too maudlin and personal for this thread.)

Amen! Preach it, sister!

116

Excellent posts from both you and EddyFT. Both of your posts and slants were right on target regarding the subject of this rant, and were excellent personal anecdotes.

I got what you meant EddyFT and understood that you weren’t trying to excuse the idoicy of trying to make everything a level playing field, but rather just simply sharing the “dark side” of the honor rollees, if not done properly.

As I was reading both yours and YB’s posts, some thoughts occurred to me. Not only do kids need to have incentive to reach their potential, or challenges to reach in the case of not making honor roll etc, but there’s also the fact that not everyone is cut OUT for all this school honor roll, mumbo jumbo.

IIRC, several genious level inventors, artists and such either didn’t finish school, or out and out flunked certain key courses. Had those people been given "everyone gets a trophy"day trophies, I wonder what their ambitions would have been then???

When my sister and I were kids, we were as different as night and day. She was a straight A student right up to about 8th or 9th grade. I was a very indifferent, but highly social student.

I did quite well at the courses I liked, but spent my entire 12 years much more interested in the social aspects of school. My sister did really well until jr high, but was such an excrutiatingly shy child did horribly in HS.

She ended up dropping out. she made honor roll a few times during her straight A times, but I was the one who was well known, popular, and veiwed Hs as a blast.

I did graduate, but not with the greatest GPA. We both ended up continuing our education much later in life than most people, after working and being married for a few years (me with kids, her none).

Both of us ended up with great jobs, and fairly well-paying ones at that. Honor Roll or the lack thereof figured into our successes and failures not at ALL. We developed as people on our own, partially shaped by our experiences in school. Had we gone to school in this era of “let’s make everyone exactly alike, and no one can fail, or succeed more than someone else”?

Sheesh. I really wonder what’s going to happen to these kids. You don’t keep carrying a baby around when it’s ready to crawl and then walk do you??? Otherwise they’d never learn to walk.

That’s what these ridiculous “even things up” rules are doing to kids nowadays.

117

Life is a zero-sum game. Bill Gates may be rich, but how many people did he destroy on his way to the top? The fact of the matter is, that there are winners and there are losers in life. Ultimately, you have the control over which category you fall into. If you work hard, and develop a strong work ethic, you win. If you slack off and don’t do a damn thing during school… well, McDonald’s always needs more people.
I’m still going to school. But, I seem to be an exception to this whole “smart kids get the shit beat out of them” rule. Sure, I’m considered one of the “smart kids.” I also play football though.

I am on the receiving end of a lot of hatred towards intellectuals though. As one can assume, people are jealous. Often times, “I wish I was like you.” or “You make me sad, because you can just do nothing and get such awesome grades.”

What most people dont realize is that there are downfalls to everything in life.

Like others, I went through a very traumatizing middle school experience. The only aspect of myself that allowed me to get through that hell hole, was my brain. Now… even more discrimination.
I guess humans are just too competitive, that the degree of competition has reached a boiling point, in so far as to demand an anti competitive spirit.
Honor roll doesnt make a diference in my mind.

118

I’m picturing catsix as Willow in the Buffy episode where her evil vampire Doppelganger appears and people mistake her for Willow.

Scene in the Bronze:

POPULAR FOOTBALL SENIOR: “Hey, catsix! Why aren’t you at home working on my paper?!”

DOPPELGANGER CATSIX: “Bored now.” (wipes the floor with POPULAR FOOTBALL SENIOR)

GIRLFRIEND OF POPULAR FOOTBALL SENIOR: “Eek! What are you doing?”

Doppelganger Catsix wipes the floor with the girlfriend as well.

119

Yeah, unfortunately Doppelgangersix was same person as catsix, got suspended for fighting twice (one time against super tall cheerleader whose reastroom catsix mistakenly went into and one time against younger brother of football idiot who thought it OK to grab parts of catsix anatomy on bus) and was finally shown some support at home when dadsix fought catsix suspensions. Dadsix argument was catsix never threw first punch, only defended herself, and that is legal everywhere in the country.

I had(have) a bizarre family.

There are probably words missing from this post due to tiredness.