This morning, I managed to spark my daughter.
She had mentioned that her health teacher is absolutely convinced that if you eat right, you will never get any form of cancer. I expressed some surprise at that view, and she said, dismissively, that he was a lousy teacher -- everyone knew he'd been hired to be a wrestling coach; being a health teacher was just something they gave him to do. So I asked her what she thought generally about her teachers. She said she'd liked all of the ones she'd had, thus far (presumably not including the health one). I told her that a woman with whom I'd worked at the polls told me that colleges don't like getting transcripts from this high school because they find them too confusing -- what's the value of this course versus that course; is that a weighted grade; what does class rank mean in their environment. She erupted, telling me that the school says they grade the way they do - 76-84 is a C, 85-94 is a B, 95-100 is an A - because that's how colleges do it, so they're "holding us to a higher standard. But everyone knows that what it REALLY means is that you get a 90 here, and you have a B, while another school, you get an A -- and that's all the college looks at. She thought a minute, and added It used to be that they said you had to get a certain number of credits by senior year to graduate; now, you have to have it each year. Before, if you didn't have the credits for a year, you still moved up, and just got the credits the next year; now, you don't move up until you have that year's credits. Paige (a friend of her's) wasn't going to graduate with us because she didn't have all of this year's credits; now she's graduate with us anyway because she's taking a summer course, so she'll have the credits. Even though the summer course is way easier than the same course during the school year!
She was actively steamed. Now, some of the school's policies, I happen to agree with -- don't wait till the last year to make sure that the kid has enough credits, for example. And I know its tough to compare courses even in the same school, let alone across schools -- is a kid doing tenth-year-math in the ninth year here at the same level as a kid doing AP tenth year math in the tenth year there? I'm glad I don't have to navigate those waters. But I remember that teens can be actively aroused by perceived inequality -- and clearly, this is one of them.
Wow.
2 comments:
IF it really IS unequal.
On the other hand, in MY world, "fair" is a noun, (where you go on the pony rides) not an adjective.
It was the hardest thing I could do with my troops back in the day...to convince them that "yes, it was true that they were not paid for the true value of their work." and "Yes, you can always find somebody else who vastly over paid compared to themselves". I usually pointed out that Madonna was paid a LOT more for mediocre singing than they were paid for keeping an airplane from crashing and killing 100 plus passengers. "Fair is where you go on the pony rides, and guys...just count yourselves LUCKY they don't pay for what you are ACTUALLY worth!".
Fairness is in the eye of the beholder. But in this case, the beholder's perception could keep her from getting into a school that she wants, and for which she's qualified. Which is why objective tests are important.
Then again, I took an objective test for my French Immersion class, and did poorly. Took a subjective one, did well, and enjoyed the class.
Post a Comment