The High Cost of Low Expectations

There was a time when America’s education system was top-notch according to the culture and society. With time, a myriad of things has changed, but unfortunately what has not evolved is the American education system. The country is still following a system which was not designed for the current global economic climate. Equality, as positive as it sounds is not as sufficient when it comes to education. The system treats students equally yet expect a similar culmination and outcome. Every child has his individuality and distinct abilities; one cannot judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree. Conversely, a few of the prominent reasons why the education system is failing are overcrowded schools, the rise of technology, and following the same old school hours.

“Who Gets to Graduate’ by Paul Tough, publish May, 2015 in the New York Times discusses. The story of a young girl’s mindset on college. It begins with her starting in college and first failure on a test. It highlighted the doubts she had in her abilities. This opening introduces the article’s man discussion, which involves low income students who want to earn a four year degree but experience “troubles” along the way. It then discusses statistics that show dropout rates are highest with low-income students. The author included ability versus economics status.

Higher education in America is facing many challenges, i.e., low retention, low graduation rates and less funding. Postsecondary institutions are scrambling to remain a competitive entity within society. In order to do so, students must remain in school (Talbert, 2012). The Office of the White House states (2014), educational attainment is critical to our county’s economic success. In essence, the work force is creating more jobs requiring more education and a higher level of skill than was previously achieved. Individuals with only a high school diploma will not make into the middle class sector because of

In "College Isn 't for Everyone," W.J. Reeves argues that colleges have become too easy to enter and students show a lack of drive to succeed once enrolled in college. Reeves believes colleges should raise expectations when accepting students into their schools, and the students admitted continue to demonstrate responsibility during the years spent at school. He points out colleges have lowered the bar when it comes to admissions due to the fact that a college cannot exist without a funding source. Reeves argues against unwilling matriculations by drawing your attention to the fact those students are not ready for college. Reeves is specific on the areas where students are slacking most in. He cites another professor 's experience with a student where the student informed the professor of a very elaborate excuse as to why they had not come to class. He

Our education system does seem to be in trouble for the way that it is headed, but also a lack of motivation from the children seems to aid in the problems. It is said that America keeps up well with other leading nations in the early years of education, but as soon as kids start to grow older getting good grades just for that special trip to get ice cream doesn’t seem to be enough anymore and as the high grades begin to “weaken as students move through school.” (Bethell).

A look back at the institution of education over the past 20 years will reveal that once upon a time a bachelor’s degree was long since considered the marker of ultimate success, the highest level of achievement that one could make in their lives. In those days, if for some reason you failed to march across the stage on graduation day after an epic, four-year stretch of high tuition, long nights studying, and unrelenting professors that found great joy in riding your back, then you had indeed failed at life.

Mark Rose once said in the essay I Just Wanna Be Average, “Students will float to the mark you set.” This quotation means that in order for students to succeed in there academics they need a teacher who will demonstrate to the students that they believe and have faith they will succeed in there class. In order for many students to reach there potential the teacher needs to be supporting and willing to take the time to help there students and give the encouragement they need to succeed. Students are all at different levels so some will “float to the mark” at a faster pace than others, but some will be lazy, and others will drown. Throughout my life education has pushed me to succeed in my future, and has motivated me and many students through the education system.

Schools and college professors, who give you a good grade for excellent productivity on assignments, allow students to perform poorly, but still benefit relative to a person with an A. Two articles that observe grade inflation, find the rising problems of grade inflation, and finding solutions for grade inflation. Stuart Rojstaczer, an author from Grade Inflation Gone Wild, is a professor of geophysics at Duke university, and created gradeinflation.com in regards for his concern about grade inflation. On the other hand, Phil Primack is a journalist and teacher at Tufts University, and published in the “Boston Globe” Doesn’t Anybody Get a C Anymore? While college students, who work with little effort and still attain easy A’s by working poorly on assignments and exams, Primack and Rojstaczer, develop a firm connection towards grade inflation and the solution that can regain control over real education.

Bruni quotes the President of the National Center on Education, Marc Tucker, “ Our students have an inflated sense of their academic prowess.They don’t expect to spend much time studying, but they confidently expect good grades and marketable degrees”(par.25). From a young age we need to teach these children you succeed from hard work. Many parents have been exempting their children from test and are expecting them to learn? In order for kids to be able to learn what they need to, parents need to allow them to deal with the difficult times.

The article says that many high school students get their diplomas. But not all graduates are academically ready for the real world. Also, that when they go to get a job it is difficult because they were just passed on at school and didn’t earn their diploma rightfully. Throughout the reading Mary’s views change on this topic. She feels that teachers should use a certain tool to make sure students who graduate, earn and work for their diplomas.

In his op-ed, “Are Kids Too Coddled?,” author Frank Bruni argues that children need to be exposed to the harshness of reality. According to Bruni, “praise… can lessen motivation and set children up to be demoralized when they invariably fail at something” (par. 25). By showering children in praise even when they are not successful, students will never learn the importance of hard work. There is no reason to put in effort to go above and beyond expectations if mediocre work receives the same amount of acknowledgement. Due to the excess of undeserved praise, Bruni believes that “students have an inflated sense of their academic prowess” (par. 26). Students expect to get good grades without studying and working hard. In order to reverse the damage caused by sheltering our children, Bruni argues that an application of more rigorous standards in school is necessary to make America’s children “ready to compete globally” (par. 29). By setting higher standards, students will be able to learn more and attain true academic excellence.

When my chemistry teacher handed back the test we took, I frustratingly wiped sweat away from my eyebrow. Another C- no saving my grades now. Even if I studied diligently for eight hours a day and aced everything, I can do no better than a B-. I thought about my friends who go to a less prestigious school; they can put in minimal amount of work in chemistry class and still manage an A-. Then, I stumbled upon “In Praise of the “F” Word”. In her article “In Praise of the “F” Word”, Mary Sherry makes a case that high schools are giving students grades that they don’t deserve or didn’t work for, producing “semiliterate” graduates. “In Praise of the “F” Word” attempts to persuade teachers to grade harshly on students in order for them to truly comprehend the material and be prepared for the workforce when they graduate. Sounds fairly reasonable at first glance, doesn’t it? However, if one analyzes this proposal, it’s not hard to find a myriad of underlying consequences with it. If teachers decide to go through with Sherry’s plan, they put their students at an immediate disadvantage and jeopardize their chances of getting into a better college.

In “In Praise of the F Word” Mary Sherry focuses not on how the difficulties that the students have to face affect their performance in school, but how the “fear of failure” compels them to work. Sherry believes that diplomas are meaningless; because most passing students did not master the work. Additionally, some high school graduates told her that they do not even know how they get the diplomas. She believes that the fluning policy is “an expression of confidence by both parents and teachers” (Sherry 560).And we should give the students the choice to be success or fail. Sherry falsely assumes that flunking a student will make the students perform better at school.

“Kids who are the first in their families to brave the world of higher education come on campus with little academic know-how and are much more likely than their peers to drop out before graduation” (1). Many people believe that school isn’t for everyone, and whoever goes is privileged for doing so. Countless people in the world today do not attend college, and this is mainly due to an influence of those in their family. Perhaps they are unsupportive of higher education, their parents and family members may view their entry into college as a break in the family system rather than a continuation of their schooling and higher learning. Most of the first-generation students decide to apply to colleges, because they aspire to jobs which require degrees. However, unlike some students whose parents have earned a degree, they often seek out college to bring honor to their families, and to ensure they make a decent amount of money for their future.

The decision to obtain a higher education beyond high school is no longer a question of if, but when. This is the question that author Caroline Bird discusses in her article, “College is a Waste of Time and Money,” written in 1975. This text strives to convince students, parents, and advisors that obtaining a degree might not be in the best interest for those involved. Circling around the idea that college is a requirement and no longer an act of free will. Bird starts the article off strongly by building her credibility through her own personal research and other credible sources as well as appealing to readers through logical reasoning using numerous statistics, but fails to convince readers and discredits her ultimate goal through a disconnect in her use of analogies.