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Academic Entitlements

by Karoli on March 30, 2006

Another one from Liz:, this time concerning parents who believe their children are ‘entitled’ to an A or B in a class.

Maybe I am one of those. I’ll let you judge whether I am or not.

My daughter’s report card arrived over the weekend. She is a mostly-A, occasional B student in honors classes. She does all of her homework, classwork, is on time and receives outstanding citizenship grades.

This is her first year of middle school and she has worked especially hard in circumstances that are less than ideal. The honors program at this school is unchallenging and uninteresting — at least in the English/History piece. I have encouraged her to keep at her usual standard of good work and use this time to learn to adjust to different “management styles”, figuring that real life will deal her a hand that’s often less than perfect and it’ll be up to her to figure out how to make it work.

When the report card arrived, she had C’s in English and History. This came as a surprise, along with the comment that excessive absences affected her grade. I was a little incredulous, considering that she’d done all of her homework before she left for Ireland, kept a blog (fixing the spelling and grammar when she had more computer face time to do it), did a report and turned in a video for that time she was gone.

Not wanting to be an obnoxious parent, I emailed the teacher and asked her if she could possibly provide me with a breakdown of her grades. The reply I received made my jaw drop.

Test scores: Solid A
Homework: Solid A
Class Participation: D, because of absences. with the comment that she could not possibly be given a higher grade when she was not in class or even in the country to participate. (Her history and english teacher are the same, BTW)

Net grade: C

Help me out here. Shouldn’t a grade reflect a student’s mastery of the material they’ve been assigned to learn?

The message they sent my daughter was that hard work and mastery of the required material is not grounds for an A.

The message they sent me is that they’d rather reward the student who underperforms on tests and homework but has a high rate of class participation, so that the grades do not accurately reflect what they have mastered and are therefore meaningless.

I’m pissed about this. Really pissed. So pissed, in fact that I’m considering the possibility of switching to a different middle school inside the district where the honors program is more challenging and fair.

So there it is — am I being an ‘entitlement parent’ or do I have a legitimate complaint? Should I just bite my tongue and ride the rest of the year in the hopes that next year will be better or should I consider a transfer for the fall to a different school?

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  • I just read this as my friend let me us her computer. From my standpoint of being one who was forced to suffer through years of boring dumb downed class material and instructors that fit into the formentioned discriptions- that sucks!!
    Schools get money based on how many students are present not how many learn - go figure?
    You keep keeping on your daughter is lucky that she has parents that care. Also I posted one picture from my depressing tour of the gulf coast on Catfish ddogs blog. Wordpress will not allow me "authorization" from this computer - I made my security to tight I guess, I am locked out myself :)
    Catfish's site
  • Donna,

    I have yet to find any middle school options I'm liking. It's frustrating. I'd do the homeschool thing in a heartbeat except that I don't have the bandwidth to manage it properly, and for her to have any social life along with it, more driving would be involved.

    Swamphag,

    It is ridiculous. But I've discovered that making a stink will just make it difficult for her. Wait till you hear the latest....I thought I would absolutely go ballistic, but I was too tired. Still, it's just amazing.
  • You have a right to complain! This is ridiculous. In addition to the 'lessons' your daughter is being taught by this, she's also being taught that she will be punished for striving for excellence in other areas of her life. What the hell kind of message is that? It would be different had she not kept up academically or if she was off on a vacation with Mummy and Daddy in the Bahamas, but that was NOT the case. Sheesh. I'd fight for this one.
  • Oh, that just SUCKS.

    I can't tell you how sick I am of stupid school administrative nonsense. Over the last several weeks, I've been obsessing over the fact that daughter goes into fifth grade in September and that I will soon need to make a decision about which middle school she'll attend the following year. And given her current schedule and academic demands, I'm not pleased with my options.

    I'm thisclose to sending away for homeschool information.
  • Hi sassymonkey,

    Me too. I could have accepted one letter grade -- begrudgingly. But two just seemed to be too much weight on class participation and not enough on mastery.

    Sticks had this teacher when he was at this school...I honestly thought that the daughter would fare better, but she isn't. The scary thing is that this isn't just one teacher -- it's reflective of overall school philosophy. By structuring the grading this way, they make sure that everyone has a 'fair shot' at an A. To me it's more of a giveaway than simply giving A's to the students that master what they need to master and pass the tests.

    It's more "dumbing down" of the classroom in my view.

    Take care,

    DnW
  • I think 2 full letter grades seems like a steep drop considering she wasn't really out of class *that* long. The comment about "she was not in class or even in the country to participate" seems a bit um...snarky.
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