Many time I try my best on an assignment in school, but receive a poor grade. And many time I’ve done an assignment but retained none of the information pertaining to it. Sadly, for me, this is the reality of education. I believe America’s education system is  damaged because nowadays, school revolves around getting good grades rather than  learning something.

In the past, people fought  for knowledge and  the right to  receive an education. However,  the people I know now treat school as a  burden and  no longer  yearn for knowledge. This is due to the  preoccupation with  grades. For me, high school is  an obstacle course preparing me  for college, training me  to believe the only way to be successful is to obtain above average grades in all my classes. This mindset  causes me  to believe that I  must obtain good grades despite the circumstances. And besides this,  “good” grades never quite seem good enough.  For me, the drive for what is considered good grades defeats the educational purpose of school altogether.  I have seen students do whatever they is needed  to receive good grades, whether it’s cheating or completing assignments without  in-depth thought, no matter the subject.

For example, I often find myself mindlessly completing and submitting assignments. Due to my high expectations for grades, I fill my schedule with difficult classes and try to find the fastest ways to complete all of my assignments every night. I ignore all educational factors and put little thought into majority of my assignments, while still doing what I know is necessary to get an A. Then, when tests come along I realize I’ve learned nothing. I see this scenario playing out in the lives of my fellow classmates as well. Unknowingly, the students of my generation have become zombies of education who feed off of good grades and good grades only. They spend their six hour days at school as well as their six hours after avoiding learning by copying, cheating, and rapidly completing assignment after assignment. Students will go straight from school, to extracurricular activities, to home where they’re glued to their desks until all hours of the night trying to senselessly complete the never ending stack of homework beside them for an A by asking their friends to send pictures of theirs.

On the other hand, people may argue that grades are an effective way of rewarding students as well as keeping track of their success in school. Grades have been an important and beneficial part of the education system for the entirety of its existence, so what could be the problem now? Without grading this way, how can we distinguish between the good and bad students? Why break what has been such a long-running tradition? The education system’s energy must be focused on more than letter grades. The grading system has worked for a long time, but it is now failing and needs to be fixed before it’s completely out of anyone’s control. Thus, in this case, tradition must be broken in order to fix new generations. Grades have become so high-stakes for today’s generation that nothing else seems important, not even the essential reason for going to school; to receive a real and valuable education. Students are supposed to come out of school knowing far more than they knew prior, not with an A+ that they can boast about. Students should graduate with knowledge that they can share with the world, not an attractive sash illustrating how much higher their GPA was than their peers’. The thirst for learning appears to be at an all-time low because youth, similar to myself,  seem to no longer care about knowledge. We only care about being successful, which the school system has taught us can only be achieved through good grades.

I  personally believe that the education system can be fixed. A solution to this educational crisis would be to  focus the grading system more so on effort rather than letter grades. Students should be rewarded for how hard they work rather than just the content that they produce. This style of grading will force students to truly learn what they’re studying and value that knowledge. If students are rewarded for their hard work and personal thoughts, both cheating and copying could potentially be eradicated. No more shallowly completing assignments with this effort-based grading system. In order to get full credit, students must use their critical and in-depth thinking skills. Teachers would give students feedback on the content and depth in which they went while completing an assignment, not reward them a letter grade on how correctly they deem it.

In conclusion, America’s education system is  damaged because nowadays, school revolves around getting good grades rather than  learning something. Today’s students finish assignments to get good grades rather than to benefit from the learning aspects of them. However, this can be fixed through a change in the grading system. A new system that bases its grading around effort instead of letter grades can revive the youth’s desire in true education. Moreover, I believe my high school experience in particular has been spoiled by the education system’s push for good grades to how it has trampled all hope of me graduating with knowledge and educational passion to share with the world.