Successful students? You don’t deserve to be recognized
At least that’s how I’m reading this. Our collective sensitivities are now so fragile we are unable to recognize high-achieving employees, students or volunteers because the people who are not recognized may feel devastated? I know this has been going on for awhile, but come on now…
A Massachusetts principal has been criticized for canceling his school’s Honors Night, saying it could be ‘devastating’ to the students who worked hard, but fell short of the grades.
MyFoxBoston.com reports that David Fabrizio, principal of Ipswich Middle School, notified parents last week of his plan to eliminate the event.
“The Honors Night, which can be a great sense of pride for the recipients’ families, can also be devastating to a child who has worked extremely hard in a difficult class but who, despite growth, has not been able to maintain a high grade-point average,” Fabrizio penned in his first letter to parents, the station reported.
If not being valedictorian or salutatorian could be devastating – the principal’s word – then those same kids may crumble in the real world when it comes to employment and raising their own children. They will be turned down for jobs. They will get a speeding ticket they don’t deserve. They will get turned down for the mortgage they need for their dream home. They will get laid off from a job they love. Their child will not be selected for the baseball team.
Snowflakes…
Update: And in the UK, some schools are banning kids from having best friends.
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The scourge of the liberal’s need to preserve “self esteem” at all costs is destroying our schools, and as the students matriculate and eventually graduate, they will eventually face the millions of better prepared, highly competitive graduates from the rest of the world.
?
This cannot end well.
You’re assuming didn’t that the students will “eventually graduate.” Next thing you know, they’ll get rid of graduation ceremonies because the students who dropped out or goofed off and didn’t meet the graduation requirements will feel bad about themselves.
Doubtless too, there will be some analogue of “affirmative” action for these low esteem, non competitive future cart riders.
What confuses me is how we switch back and forth between caring about academics and ensuring our children receive a quality education and are prepared for the workforce, and caring about extra-curricular activities, sports, and ensuring they have optimal “social lives” inside school so that they’re well-adjusted and not anti-social loners who will become mass-murderers. So which is it? Is school a place for learning, or one big sleepover with pillow fights?
David Fabrizio should be institutionalized and evaluated before he’s allowed to be near our children again. ?The guy is a flake, and a dangerous flake at that. ?Nor should he ever be allowed to carry a firearm. ?This man cannot be trusted!
It seems that they are trying to engineer a population of emotional cripples whose fragile mental state needs and demands the institutional intervention that a mega-bureaucratic extremist liberal nanny state can provide.? It strikes me as social engineering support for tyranny by rewarding mediocrity.
Ans are Boards of Education and other politicians too stupid to understand why home schooling is a growing phenomenon?
Should read “And are…..”
Should have read “…highly successful growing phenomenon.” given the performance of most home schooled children.
As my son is fond of saying, it is time for the Comet.
Punished by Rewards is a great book on this topic – think I got the title correct….
Sounds as if this principal is a loser…
I checked out Alfie Kohn. It is a con. I remember when that drivel was swirling around educational circles. Children are not mice. It was dreck then and it’s worse now. It has always reminded me of Soviet propaganda, for consumption by the West only.
For the learning, a cooperative learning situation is useful, like a lab. But, there has to be an assessment; what does the kid know? Which kids excel?
There has to be assessment and motivation. Otherwise, you have a large, unruly daycare. How’s that work in high school? In life?
The so-called principal should be pilloried and then sued for educational malpractice and harming children.
More liberal angst.
?
Loser!
This “fair-share/even-steven/entitlement” mentality is out of control! Kids need to be taught that working hard and giving 100% doesn’t?ALWAYS mean you come out with a tangible reward or high praises from others. The more important “prizes” that you will have EARNED are a sense of self-worth, a sense of achievement, as well as learning that ambition, goal setting, discipline, responsibility, productivity are all good for character building and self-growth. But most importantly, would be the pride you would have in yourself.
So what’s next? Scholarships cannot be given out because those who don’t win them will feel bad? How about financial Aid and work study jobs at colleges, will they be stopped because of hurting the feelings of those who can’t get them? Keep electing those Liberal Democrats and we will have all this and more.? Too bad the low info voters don’t know they are low info voters.
Do the educators ever understand, that students who do not learn to achieve by hard work ultimately feel bad? Honestly, poverty because you can’t earn a living because you have no life skills makes you feel bad! Dumpster diving for food, doesn’t make you feel warm and fuzzy inside.