<p>^ ^ uh-oh calmom, u just – intentionally or not-- gave an excellent argument for affirmative action! love it! lol</p>
<p>Hahahaha!!! Good one… I’d like to thank all the frustrated parents everywhere, every student who has ever been overlooked as well as every student who has received an award. Most importantly, I’d like to thank my three children whose quest to gain admission into a top academic institution resulted in such a stress level that I went in search of College Confidential… What a ride it has been. :-)</p>
<p>Don’t forget to thank all the “little people” whose backs you stepped on to get your award, momfirst!</p>
<p>Hahahaha!!! Glad to see we all have our sense of humor intact. hahaha I will be chuckling all the way to my son’s awards ceremony tonight.</p>
<p>Momfirst3, how can we *possibly *close this thread when you haven’t even BEEN to your son’s awards ceremony yet?! I’m sure there will be something about which to rant tomorrow morning…if not who got what award, there will be the length of the ceremony or the mispronunciation of someone’s name or the temperature of the room!</p>
<p>I’m going to rant that I have to wait a whole year for my kids’ senior awards ceremonies. It’s not fair!!</p>
<p>Haha. My son has been the overlooked child for the past four years, but not tonight… Tonight he will be acknowledged for being the Scholar of Scholars. So I’m just going to smile and enjoy the sweltering conditions in the gym as my tush goes numb from the oh so comfortable seats. I promise I won’t rant tomorrow. I will check in and let you know how it went.</p>
<p>Pizzagirl, I insist that next year you revive this thread – if it ever dies – and let us know how your children did in the awards dept!</p>
<p>Pizzagirl - I am loving the humor! This is fun now, isn’t it??!!</p>
<p>Is anyone else craving pizza for dinner?</p>
<p>"hen someone else posts about a not-important-in-the-grand-scheme-of-things topic (like what’s a good restaurant near their child’s school, or where’s the best store to buy XL twin sheets) , you’ll also tell them the same story of some underprivileged person in a far-away land who can’t even go to a store or restaurant, and ask them why on earth they even spend time worrying about trivial things like that? "</p>
<p>If someone describes him/herself as “hurting” because of the disappointing restaurant, this is the reaction they’ll get from me.</p>
<p>OK, I have read this whole thread over the past few days, and there were times I figured I’d never post on it, but everyone’s in such a calm mood here now that I feel all right telling our little story.</p>
<p>Flash to 1980: I sat at my awards night, watchfully. I had had a contentious relationship with the Spanish Dept; in 9th grade I’d dropped Spanish 2 because it moved too slowly. I’m grateful to my parents and the advanced Spanish teacher for finding me a tutor, so that in 2nd semester I completed Spanish 2 and 3. In 10th grade I took 4, and 11th 5 (there was no AP then), getting a silver medal (I think statewide) in composition. 12th grade I had taken Spanish lit at a college. I was a straight-A student through it all.</p>
<p>Yet I knew the head of the FL dept felt that all I had done was thumb my nose at their program, and I was ready not to get the Spanish Achievement Award, even though the advanced Spanish teacher loved me. And I was right - the girl who got all As in the regular classes got it. It did bother me, because I did think I had done all I could to learn and excel, what I felt they meant to reward. But I knew things could go south on me because of the dept head.</p>
<p>Flash to 2002: My 9-year-old D has just successfully worked and auditioned into the local Youth Symphony on violin, which she has studied for 4 years. Every other 4th grader in town has only played their string instrument for only 9 months. It’s the night of the big concert. My D has told her strings teacher (for whom she has started cello, to learn with the group - this is not her private violin teacher, though) about her great news, and says to me in the car going over to the concert, “They’re giving out awards tonight - maybe she’ll give me one for getting into the Youth Symphony.”</p>
<p>I’m stuck - do I just say, “We’ll see” or “That would be cool”, or something profound like “You know you did this whether they give you an award or not”?</p>
<p>She was a smart little cookie way back then, so I gave her the whole business. I told her my story, and I said, “Don’t count on it. People value different things, and the people in charge might have different ideas than you about what deserves an award.” Then I told her she was great no matter what.</p>
<p>I’m glad I said this, because at the concert that night, they not only didn’t recognize her acceptance into the Youth Symphony (which believe me was a big thing for a kid in this town - we had maybe 2 HS kids in it for the past 10 years), but she didn’t even get a “Special Recognition” (something like 5 kids per elementary school got this, on an unexplained basis). To boot, a boy from another school played an unannounced solo on the violin and got a standing ovation - a song my D could have played 3 years earlier - while the teacher stood beaming at him (she clearly had coached him on it).</p>
<p>Do I wish I had gotten the Spanish award? Not any more. Do I wish she had gotten some kind of recognition? A little. Am I glad she had the preparation of what to expect, even as a 4th grader, when adults’ egos and their personal programs are put on the defensive (I do believe this was the cause of both her and my being ignored by our respective teachers - we’d worked outside their box)? Yes, absolutely. </p>
<p>It might be inherent in our species to enjoy and seek recognition. I don’t know if we can grow out of it. I do think that we have overgrown it with too many awards given, at too young an age. I think understanding that this is essentially an arbitrary and often unfair process by definition will help kids take these things in stride. I hated having to burst a 9-year-old’s bubble, but I figured if she got an award, she’d see it for what it was - just something kind of nice - and if she didn’t, it wouldn’t break her heart.</p>
<p>She told me after the concert that the disappointment hurt, but she was glad she was ready for it.</p>
<p>EmmyBet wins my vote for Mom (?) of the Year. That’s exactly how it should go.</p>
<p>That is very sweet. Yes, I’m a mom. Gee, I’m speechless. </p>
<p>(Pssst - is there money involved?)</p>
<p>Seriously, though, my kids will both have their crap-that-really-sucks memory from HS. For my older D, it will be not making the very top singing group. For the other, I suspect it will be being kicked out of band - completely, not just a class period - for no reason at all (you don’t want to know the story; please just believe me). Both of these are “real” disappointments - meaning they missed out on an experience they valued and wanted to have, but not just an opportunity to get a little piece of paper and some applause.</p>
<p>Great post, EmmyBet! Your d has a major prize in you. 
Very well handled back in 2002. </p>
<p>(No money - how about a nice certificate in a frame from Walmart?)</p>
<p>Has anyone brought up Alfie Kohn, author of Punished by Rewards, and his theories about the damage awards and rewards do to children? It’s fascinating stuff:</p>
<p>From his website:</p>
<p>“Teachers are often encouraged to rely on rewards rather than punishments, but research suggests that carrots can be just as counterproductive as sticks. Both are forms of manipulation, and neither can produce anything beyond temporary compliance. In fact, as Alfie Kohn, author of PUNISHED BY REWARDS, will argue, students who see themselves as doing an assignment in order to receive a gold star, an A, or an award are actually less likely to develop an interest in the subject matter or to challenge themselves to do their best. By the same token, stickers, popcorn parties, and even praise give students no reason to act responsibly when there is no longer a goody to be gained for doing so. For students to become lifelong learners and good people, we need to work with them rather than using techniques like rewards and punishments, which merely do things to them.”</p>
<p>His classic example is the Pizza Hut competition that gave kids pizza coupons for reading books. Kids lost the joy of reading as they struggled to find easier-to-read books to get the pizza coupons quickly. </p>
<p>I wasn’t going to post on this thread, but I was able to connect this to the pizza theme :)</p>
<p>I see no value in award ceremonies. They tend to be boring, and only the children on the stage, and their parents enjoy them, and only for the split second their child is in the spotlight. </p>
<p>Teachers, admins, coaches, parents and friends of the child should simply speak privately, and from the heart to children when they see outstanding work and encourage the child to get in touch with the tremendous feelings of accomplishment they have when something goes well. Not gushing praise, just acknowledgement that the child really has done something noteworthy. Emmybet’s example is perfect.</p>
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<p>At any given high school, there are things that are on the radar screen to be recoganized and other things that aren’t. Seems like every summer we have kids on the debate team that place at nationals, but because it’s in the summer, there is never any recognition. A kid could be cast in a Broadway play and there would be no official mention of it, but the kid with the highest grade in Theater Arts I would get to walk across the stage and receive a certificate. Last fall a girl from the HS placed in the honest to goodness world championships of a non-school sport and I bet that almost no one even knew she went.</p>
<p>OK, I’ll tell my nice story now, and it has nothing to do with my kids.</p>
<p>My town has one of the most generous community scholarship programs I’ve ever seen. For a graduating class of about 250, they give out between $150-200,000 in scholarships every year. The class awards night is mostly these scholarships. The kids fill out generic applications and a team of teachers, counselors and others (not sure) give out awards from $250-3,000, with nary a repeat kid. This means over 100 kids get awards that night, and it’s really lovely. The top 10 kids definitely get big ones, and kids who haven’t been angels surely get money someone doesn’t think they “deserve,” but as a testimony to community generosity and the belief in giving kids a hand with their higher education, I wouldn’t trade the experience. This year they also managed to do it in 1.5 hours!</p>
<p>One teacher was so brought to tears in announcing his award this year that another teacher had to take over for him. These people had helped a girl from a completely unsupportive family to get a full - I mean full, everything included - scholarship to our state flagship for 4 years. Other people’s merit awards from their schools weren’t announced, but we were all touched to see this particular one, because of its special circumstances.</p>
<p>emmybet: that’s a wonderful story. there are some lucky kids in your town!</p>
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<p>Exactly!
My S just interviewed today with a specialized newspaper (specializing in news / stories in a particular interest area) and he’s going to be a weekly columnist. He won’t be recognized the way the kids on the school newspaper get recognized (he was on the school newspaper himself, but dropped it) – but that’s OK. It’s fun and it fits his personality / interests beautifully. And if the editor of the school newspaper or a weekly columnist for the school newspaper gets an award at our school – that’s great for them, too! It’s all good. It’s only zero-sum if the only game in town is the awards ceremony.</p>