For many young people, success in school is measured by how they perform compared to others, says Isaac, 17, from Wyggeston & Queen Elizabeth I College.
Many students today see education as a competition rather than just a way to learn. In schools across the country students often compare test scores, grades and class rankings.
This can make learning feel like a race to be the best instead of a chance to understand new ideas.
One reason for this competition, I believe, is the pressure to achieve high exam results. Important exams such as GCSEs can affect which colleges or courses students can attend later along the path. Due to the importance of these results, many students feel they must compete with classmates to achieve the highest grade.
This social pressure can make school feel really stressful.
Another reason is the influence of parents, teachers, and society. Adults often encourage students to aim for the highest grades achievable. Schools may often reward high-ability students with prizes, awards or public praise. While these rewards can motivate students, they can also place pressure upon those who feel as though they are “losing” for not performing well enough.
Social media can also increase the sense of competition. Students sometimes share their results or achievements online which can make others compare themselves. Seeing classmates celebrate high grades can make others feel as though they must work even harder to keep up.
While competition can encourage students to be further motivated to work harder, it is also important to remember that education should be focused on learning and growth, and helping every student reach their individual potential.
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The Cavendish School - 7Y1
We think that the competition issue in schools is a large problem and people should be much more aware of it. Lots of people are very competitive and feel that they need to be the best in order to be good at something, which is not the case. We believe that schools should not put so much pressure on pupils to get top in everything which can lead to children to feel bad at various subjects or activities. This problem should be combatted and made a real issue.
Dame Allan's Schools - Newcastle Upon Tyne - 9x
I agree that it can demoralise some students, and school is still incredibly competitive, the way to solve this is not with getting rid of competitions or providing participation certificates, it is to change the way it is taught in schools as a whole, and the social media interactions these students have. By having easily comparable test scores, built for the student body as a whole to gauge progress, we can make student’s certain strengths feel unrecognised and some weaknesses amplified, making them compare against the best in the class at specific tests when they should be comparing against themselves. Furthermore, social media creates a huge platform to share and spread information, meaning whole year groups can communicate about tests relatively quickly, and making students compare not just against the best in the class, but in the country and looking up to figures who can memorise whole syllabuses and get 100% fairly easily, bringing me to my next point: schools are made to memorise. In 90% of our classes, we don’t need the cognitive reasoning skills or analytical skills to pass the test, we just need to memorise the type of questions we will get asked, certain aspects of life or the class, and memorise how marks will be awarded. By fixing this, and making tests actually test our reasoning and varying the type of questions much more.
The radcliffe school - 8rs/en7
Hmmmm! Good points! However, I think participation awards for things like the UKMT maths challenge and the like basically solve this problem
Kearsney College - 9E
I feel like this article highlights this “competition” very well because I feel like it relates to me personally, and you get made fun of instead of lifted up.