Senior Awards Rants

Parents Forum
81

<p>"Somehow, at D’s high school, the valedictorian managed not to receive a single academic award other than the one for being valedictorian. Excuse me, but didn’t he by definition have to have done better than everyone else in at least one class or subject?* "</p>

<p>-The same here. No Valedictorian titile though, not used, school do not rank. Parents awards are given to Top Student at graduation - at this point it became known who is the Top Student. However, all subject awards are given to others. This is to avoid complaints. Nobody cares at this point, since the most important awards are Junior, not Senior. Junior awards are used in college applications. Usually the Top Student at the end of Junior year, receives the most, including the ones with attached Scholarships (science awards to be used at Rochester and RPI), along with Writing award …etc. Who is at the top could be determined at this point by Student GPA and class profile in cases when school does not rank. Really NOBODY cares too much about tons of Senior Subject Awards, that in D’s class all went to one girl, who was NOT Top Student and who did not get many Junior awards.</p>

82

<p>My rant: In 8th grade, the art award went to a boy. Art teacher called me at home to say that D should have gotten it but they “had” to give it to a boy. (I still don’t know why she bothered to call me.) I told her that D will have plenty of opportunities in her future to get awards for her art work.
Fast foward 5 years. She just successfully finished her 1st year in a selective design program after garnering all sorts of stuff in HS.</p>

83

<p>I don’t have the patience to read the whole thread but our town is so small everyone knows everyone’s kids since they were born or at least since they were 5 years old. That makes the awards ceremony very emotional for everyone attending. We’re not particularly competitive - last year my daughter was the salutatorian and the valedictorian’s mom and I used to joke about my daughter always giving her son a real run for his money. Another friend, who doesn’t think much of her son, could not figure out what award her son could possibly be getting (cutting most classes?). Turns out he was tutoring Math to underclassmen for the last two years and she had no idea. I was so proud of him, I was in tears.</p>

<p>Is it hot, long, and boring? Absolutely. Are there always disagreements in the final decisions as to who wins awards? Absolutely. Is there even some embarrassment for the recipients? Absolutely. (One year they had the local head Boy Scout leader announce, after a long speech, the names of the boys who earned their Eagle Scout Award, unbeknownst to the boys, and they were so embarrassed and angry at that!) But in our small town it’s something we look forward to each year.</p>

84

<p>^As I said, lots of politics at both publics and privates. So, watch for important awards, do not be bothered with non-relevant non-usable like Senior subject awards. And there are plenty and much more at college. No politics anymore there, the best wins, period. Grants, awards, scholarships. Tell them, that is where they need to really apply themselves. In college, “A” is what counts, they do not care about parents anymore.</p>

85

<p>My D’s award night is coming up next week. She got an invitation and will be getting corded or hooded or whatever the heck it is for IB. This is a big school and it will be a looooong night. But I enjoy her principal a lot and find that she does these things well. As a small bit of humor, the dean of D’s class can not attend because of a family conflict, so the kids have made and decorated a cardboard representation of her that they plan to bring that night and seat on the stage, take pictures with as a way of teasing the dean for not being there and reminding her that she was missed. I think she’ll get a kick out of it. On a less light note, D’s stalker’s parents will be there. I’ve already got stomach pains worrying about that.</p>

<p>Anyway, at my older D’s school, the val and sal could only win those awards for academics (they could get local scholarships or non-academic awards), so they never got subject awards. Just a policy that they had.</p>

86

<p>To those who say it doesn’t matter, or this is meaningless: D was that top (#5/400) student who spent 4 years working hard, getting the VERY top grade in many classes, being happy for others’ accomplishments and achievements and being snubbed at awards day. According to the head GC , D was nominated for “many” awards each year (she was apparently the Susan Lucci of her HS), but never received one.</p>

<p>Senior year, we got a letter that she was getting an award. And yes, it mattered to her. She was thrilled to be recognized. She was talented and involved in EC’s but never the top student in those, so it meant something to her to finally be recognized in an area in which she excelled. </p>

<p>I think its just human nature to want to be acknowledged for something well done.</p>

87

<p>Our high school does things a little differently than most schools I am familiar with. They have a NHS induction night, during which they announce the val and sal. There is also a brief ceremony during the annual Spring concert where the winners of music and performing arts awards are presented.</p>

<p>In lieu of a senior awards night most of the awards are announced during the graduation ceremony, which takes about 2 hours; about half that time is taken up with awards presentations. On occasion a particularly verbose presenter will ramble on for 5 or 6 minutes before announcing the name of the winner, who then spends another couple of minutes untangling him/herself from the throng of soon-to-be graduates, marching down to the dais to accept the award and returning to their seat. I’ll never forget the ludicrous sight of my eldest daughter marching back and forth to the dais to accept three consecutive awards during her graduation. While the recognition was nice I really question the sensitivity of combining “awards night” with graduation. Aside from the fact that the val and sal usually speak at graduation, this is a day when, in my opinion, all graduates should be on equal footing. Adding a competitive element to graduation day is both inappropriate – again IMHO – and can put a real damper on the day for those who are overlooked and even for those who win the awards (My daughter, for example, was stung by some nasty remarks from one of her academic “rivals” after receiving the third award). I am hopeful that our BOE will reconsider combining awards night with graduation by the time D2 is a senior.</p>

<p>Thanks for the chance to rant.</p>

88

<p>Our school was heavy on math and science awards. Many awards have strict policies on how they are awarded.If one student gets the highest avg. in math and science that student ends up with 6 or 7 awards by the end of the evening.</p>

89

<p>My biggest rant this year: the parents sitting around me who only applauded when their kid or one of their kid’s friends was called up during the almost-three-hour ceremony but who sat there like lumps for all of the other awardees.</p>

90

<p>well, I think sometimes life isn’t fair. My high school senior DD was told she would’ve gotten the sr. math award at the awards ceremony in two weeks, but isn’t going to because she didn’t take math in high school all four years.</p>

<p>– and why didn’t she take math all four years? Because she was bright enough to finish the highest level of math our high school offers – eg calculus-- as a junior and so “topped out” the math courses . . .which doesn’t bode well for our younger son who is finishing his calculus class this year as a sophomore. </p>

<p>I think their rule is unfair to kids who came in already having advanced math classes under their belt. Not to mention the grades they got for Algebra, Geometry and Algebra 11 (which they took 0 period at the high school while still in jr high) doesn’t “count” towards their high school GPA because they “weren’t actually in high school yet” (even though the classes were taught at the high school – and they took the class with older Freshman through seniors, and everybody else got grade credit for the class).</p>

<p>So my kids got "A"s on their Jr High transcript, but “credit” only on their high school transcript – although they earned "A"s, it doesn’t count.</p>

91

<p>At D’s HS they just had some awards program (for the students, not parents) and apparently one boy who had just transferred from Brazil THAT VERY DAY got a perfect attendance award, because he had attended for all of the days during which he had been enrolled. A little silly, IMHO.</p>

92

<p>My rant from second-grade: Every week, there was a class spelling bee. The prize was a little plastic Easter egg from the local bank, featuring a picture of the bank. I loved them, and I won every week. After awhile, the teacher said I got to become her “assistant” and so longer was eligible to compete. Even then, I got what was happening. But it didn’t make me feel bad; I was proud to be such a threat to the other kids that I got pulled from the competition.</p>

<p>I wonder what ever happened to those eggs?</p>

<p>ETA: Everyone knows the score. Even if your kid didn’t get the math/science/basketweaving award because of an asinine school/district rule, kids know who the real deal is. I wouldn’t sweat it, especially senior year.</p>

93

<p>I find it helpful to read these threads before I have to face the events at our school; no matter how bad things are, someone always has a worse story to tell. My S will be one of the top students (tied for val) who will probably not get an individual academic award. Although he is the only one in his class to have a 4.0 for the year in calculus, he is not especially gifted in math, just responds well to good teaching. He received his only B, freshman year, in English, which IS probably his best subject. He would like to skip the program but I told him that was not an option.</p>

94

<p>When my D was in 8th grade (small school), the daughter of one of the teachers in the school was helped to become the val by mom’s co-workers. Everyone knew that was going on, so when the kids voted on senior awards, they awarded my D the “smartest” and did a little skit in the video that they made about how smart she was as a way of poking fun at the situation. The principal actually read the list of titles awarded by the class to each other (kindest, best athlete, musician) as a jumping off point for discussing the graduates. The girl who was named val was never mentioned by either the principal or the other students and it embarrassed the mom a little bit. Kids do know who deserves what and often have a real sense of fairness.</p>

95

<p>Attended ours last night. D, as the Val, got her share of awards. Most of the department awards went to #3. I have no problems with that. I suspect she demonstrated more intellectual curiosity and rigor than the others. There may not have been a huge difference, and I suspect maybe she took one fewer AP class than the Sal and Val. What makes me sad is that out of 500 kids, only 20-30 or so were recognized for something. There are a lot of great kids that deserved recognition. I’m not sure why there can’t be at least 2-5 kids getting department awards.</p>

96

<p>@Pizzagirl, I felt sorry for the kid whose achievement was understanted - as though he got the award only because the other student wasn’t even in the running. </p>

<p>And for some reason, in my school the juniors are not recognized for maths…weird but every other grade is.h</p>

97

<p>Not quite a rant, but I thought it was odd (last year) that some pretty significant awards won by kids in the school weren’t mentioned–I guess because they weren’t awarded by the school.</p>

98

<p>I haven’t read all the pages, but here is my HUGE RANT.</p>

<p>The school did some great things. For example, they sent a letter stating that we were invited to awards night and our child would receive an award. I ASSUMED (and we know what assume means) from previous award nights (different hs) that it was for SRs only.</p>

<p>1 hour and they were completed with all of the SR awards and scholarships…COOL!</p>

<p>Nope, they then went into every school dept, and I mean every and gave out awards, including for 9, 10, and 11. </p>

<p>The burn my goat moment was when they awarded the BEST Driver Ed student! Are you flipping kidding me! Mind you the kid doesn’t even have a permit, but they created an award for this!</p>

<p>We had to endure, the best English, SS, Math, Computer, Horticulture, Latin, French, German, SPanish, Chinese, Art, PE, etc. for all 4 grades! It took them 1 1/2 hrs to go through that process.</p>

<p>IMHO, they should have split it into 2 nights. SR and below. The majority of the kids that got the awards that were not graduating this yr did not show…it was like the Oscars, and the winner is…waiting for them to stand up, only to say, they are not here tonight!</p>

<p>Although our DD is not valedictorian, as a parent that was the saddest part of the night. They never recognized them, and I felt that should have been done.</p>

99

<p>Called the school office to nicely let them know about overlooking both of D’s previously earned awards at the ceremony. The administrator kept repeating to me “But she got the certificate, didn’t she? She got the certificate!” I explained to her that yes, she did, but my concern was that since her name was not mentioned at the assembly, and therefore must not have been on the principal’s list, I wanted to be sure her name WAS included on the list submitted for the graduation program. Again, the refrain “But she DID get the certificate!” and no apology or assurances she’d fix anything. Finally, I had to be a bit nasty and said, “You invited us to attend a ceremony in which you planned to honor my daughter for awards she already got months ago, and that we already know she earned. Wasn’t the whole point of the assembly and the program to let everyone else know? So the fact that you missed mentioning not just one, but two, was a little upsetting.”</p>

100

<p>

</p>

<p>Our HS is really diverse and I will tell you that they do an AMAZING job at pronouncing names, at the NHS induction, senior awards and at graduation. I think they really do practice. </p>

<p>I’m just back from the 8th grade awards assembly. They actually gave awards for the top Library Aide and Office Aide. These were both very smart girls who chose to do office aide or library aide so they wouldn’t have to take an elective that required homework (e.g. foreign language, yearbook). It’s certainly their business if they don’t want to but why give an award for it?</p>