North Carolina Schools Will No Longer Name Valedictorians Cause It Makes The Dumb Kids Feel Bad
Fox News- Apparently working your hardest to be the best you can be — and being recognized for the effort — is one lesson a North Carolina school board no longer believes is worth teaching. Citing what it calls “unhealthy” competition among students, the Wake County school board is the latest in the country to make valedictorians and salutatorians a thing of the past, The News & Observer of Charlotte reports. The school board unanimously gave initial approval last week to a policy that would prohibit high school principals from naming valedictorians and salutatorians – titles reserved for the two graduating seniors with the highest grade-point averages – after 2018, according to the newspaper. “We have heard from many, many schools that the competition has become very unhealthy,” school board Chairman Tom Benton told the paper. “Students were not collaborating with each other the way that we would like them to. Their choice of courses was being guided by their GPA and not their future education plans,” Benton said.
I can’t keep up with these trends. First it’s Everybody Gets A Trophy and now it’s Nobody Gets A Trophy. And honestly, everybody usually hates the valedictorian because they’re just some smarty pants who tried way too hard, but that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t get the honor. I was and continue to be one of the dumb kids and I never once felt bad that I was dumb. Dumb kids feeling bad about being dumb is a product of Everybody Gets A Trophy. But in reality it’s just how the world works. There are dumb people and there are smart people. Smart people get rewarded with good jobs and stable lives while the dumb kids become college dropout bloggers who are one blown transmission or fender bender away from being totally broke. Take away the honor of being valedictorian and it fucks up the whole ecosystem. Smart kids stop trying to be as smart and dumb kids, well, they just continue being dumb. The outcome is less smart people and that’s bad because we need smart people to take care of the world. Figure it out, North Carolina.
