Failing While Making All “A’s”

Abstract

Good grades and high-test scores are universally held to be valid indicators of student success. Ironically, our obsession with earning high grades and scores has little to do with whether students are being well educated, while in fact our focus on competitive forms of assessment are contributing factors to the lack of personal meaningful learning taking place in our schools. Schools are not serving students well when they merely prepare students to make good grades and earn degrees. We should be alarmed that our schools are not adequately preparing students in perilous matters that are connected to solving real present day and future personal and global issues, grooming serious thinkers, and creating better communities for all people. Continuing to fail our students is not merely a curriculum or institutional issue, it is an ethical, moral, and spiritual issue that calls us to respond from the very best we have to offer.