To the Editor:
Your insightful June 27 front-page article “How
Many Graduates Can Be No.1? Ask the 30 Valedictorians” provides
another look at what happens as grades are persistently inflated while
the curriculum is steadily dumbed down in American schools.
Of course this feel-good maneuvering is done in the name of bolstering
students’ self-esteem. But I’m afraid that these practices actually have
a very detrimental effect: teaching young people that they can get (and
therefore expect) things they didn’t actually earn.
Unless students graduate with the identical highest grade point average
in their class, they are not really a “valedictorian.”
In the real world, these same kids will often not even get what they do
deserve, whether that’s a pay raise, a promotion or the trust of
another person. Better to start toughening them up in high school. Then
they’ll be able to rise above the slights and adversity that come to
everyone and have a shot at enjoying true success in life.
Clayton Boothe
Grand Rapids, Mich., June 27, 2010
To the Editor:
The emerging trend of recognizing multiple valedictorians is an ominous
sign for our educational system and the nation.
Spreading the traditional academic honor may well reduce competition and
pressure. But it will hardly motivate students toward academic
achievement or prepare them for the realities of post-graduation life.
With luck, this flawed “feel good” experiment will be abandoned before
it becomes the norm.
Arnie Mori
Fairport, N.Y., June 27, 2010
To the Editor:
As a history teacher for 45 years, I was led to speculate about the
percentage of those valedictorians who benefited from another
educational fad: the awarding of extra time to certain students for the
taking of tests and completing assignments.
In American schools, grade inflation is so out of control that a B minus
is a classroom teacher’s best and safest choice for indicating an
actual grade of F. One Harvard professor, obviously a warrior on the
front lines of academic excellence, assigns two grades. The first one is
the “Harvard grade” and the second one is the “actual grade.”
In a class discussion of the desirability of the extra-time option, a
young man turned to the class and asked everyone to raise his hand if he
wanted a heart surgeon to operate on him who had been awarded extra
time on his exams. Not a single student raised his hand.
Earl P. Bell
Olympia Fields, Ill., June 27, 2010
Note from KBJ: The Harvard professor is Harvey Mansfield.
Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D. 