Education is a Non-Profit Event for Kids

The process or practice of rewarding children with money for grades impacts me as wholly unacceptable. My children are past school age but I can state with absolute certainty that the idea of paying for good grades would never have been considered or considered to be acceptable. More importantly, I find the entire concept an injustice to the child, the family and the entire educational system.

In spite of our most honorable and lofty aspirations with regard to educational content, most of what children are responsible for learning in school is methodology. If that doesn't seem manifestly obvious, spend a few minutes thinking about conjugating a few Latin verbs, developing a full-blown chemistry experiment or tracing the entire course of events leading up to and through the French revolution.

Needless to say, those exercises rely on our not utilizing that information on a present-day basis as a teacher, chemist, linguist, etc. But most of us will never remember most of those procedures clearly enough to be competent as much as the methods by which we sought answers.

Children typically don't have many jobs. Going to school, however is one of them. Rewarding a child for doing what he or she needs to do to prevail in a society that traditionally places a premium on knowledge is absurd. Grades are ultimately less important than the practice. Learn how to get up, get out of the house, manage your time and arrive at your classes with punctuality and the right attitude. It's process. Bribe you to learn life lessons in an manner that is considered better than others? I think not.

My parenting has always been defined by asking questions and posing potential outcomes, something done from the time my children were young. Do you think that these grades represent what you've learned? Do you understand the advantages of studying harder, earning better grades and learning how to work within established institutional guidelines?

Ultimately, grades were not as important as effort made and the fact that other children were compensated for them suggests emphasis on earning rather than learning.

If grades are unsatisfactory and we have fulfilled our responsibilities as parents, a child will have worse feelings than we do as parents. Exacerbating that through punishment will not positively impact academic performance. Prudent conversation, offers to assist and celebration of achievement will be much more likely to result in continued successes.