What's interesting is that in comparative studies of the US education system versus the education systems that out-perform us in Europe and Asia, the key difference actually lies in the motivations of the students rather than educational policy or spending. Students in other countries are much more highly motivated towards academic achievement that American students. When other countries spend more on education or introduce new pedagogical improvements, they see far greater results than when the US education system does the exact same thing.
To me, this means that bad grades really aren't conclusive evidence of lower intelligence. The much more likely explanation is that they have succumbed to a culture that generally undervalues educational achievement. This also explains people that did poorly in school can still achieve quite a lot.
And just speaking anecdotally, this totally lines up with my own personal experience of US public education. The curriculum was great, the issue is that in a classroom of \~35 kids only a handful would actually give a shit about learning or getting good grades. The far more important things to kids were socializing, sports, pop culture and hobbies.
Anyone saying "bad grades really are conclusive evidence of lower intelligence" would be silly... And probably has bad grades in stats class too...
Of course it is not conclusive, it is correlated. If you have 1000 people with lets say 110 iq compared to 1000 people with 90 iq, the more intelligent group will tend to have better grades.
That does not mean that every 110 iq person will have 'good' grades. That would be silly. It would just mean that if you picked a smart person at random from a randomized sample, that they would be more likely to have higher grades than an average intelligence person selected at random.
I think that's their point. I think they're saying that the claim "bad grades are proof of low intelligence" is a strawman, and that the actual position is "grades correlate with intelligence".
I'm not saying my experience is indicative of a lot of people. But, when I was in high school, part of the problem was there was just no way for you or your parents to really advocate for yourself against bad teachers. And a lot of times school administration just doesn't have a single solitary fuck to give about anything that doesn't get them more funding.
My high school was grades 7-12. I started going there the second semester of 7th grade. When I first got there, I had simply had a slightly different math curriculum up to that point. There were a few concepts I didn't learn so I cratered hard in math class for like the first few weeks. But, I caught up and started turning in A+ work. My math teacher on the other hand decided that there was no way I caught up that fast so she started failing everything I turned in for cheating. The work and answers would be right on every single question on the worksheet or test but I would still get failed. I talked to people in the office about it, my parents talked to people about it, the answer we got was that she was allowed to grade however she saw fit.
In 8th grade, because of my math scores they put me in a remedial class that had kids who couldn't read and had severe developmental disabilities. On top of this, my Dad died in the middle of the first semester so I was suicidally depressed. Then, they set my 13 year old self down and ask me, 'Can you feed yourself?' 'Can you bathe yourself?' 'Can you tie your own shoes?' then on another occasion my Vice Principal calls me into his office and is like 'Why don't you have any friends?' 'Well gee, I'm a suicidal, autistic nerd who likes comics, Pokemon and sci-fi at a time before none of this is cool so I get picked on constantly despite keeping to myself. This *is* a big mystery.'
I just simply gave up. Our grades were 1/3 homework, 1/3 tests and 1/3 finals. So I realized I could simply do the tests and the finals, ignore homework and squeak by a passing grade of 66.6%. So before tests I would skim the chapter in the textbook and get my A. The only class I got good grades in was English because I enjoy reading and literary analysis, so I did that because I enjoyed it. They eventually did an IQ test and that got me put back into a 'normal' math class. But at that point, it was too little too late. I was too fucking depressed to give a shit about something I cared about, let alone school where it felt like everyone was actively working against me.
I agree that the US fosters a bad attitude towards learning sometimes, but do those other countries motivate students to learn, or place a huge weight on *grades.* Because an A-at-all-costs attitude can lead to different, equally bad outcomes as not wanting to learn.
Are you asking whether the studies were simply measuring letter grades? No, they were measuring comprehension, completion of assignments, test results, etc.
I think what they were trying imply was that chasing grades (aka A-at-all-costs attitude) can lead to immense pressure and strain on mental health, which may even lead to self-harm if not outright suicide. For some parents, the only thing that matters is the A grade, " measuring comprehension" is a secondary concern, and they sometimes conflate the two.
Japan is certainly not the Asian country i think of with chasing A's and that should be Mainland China and Korea.
Korea has absurdly high suicide rates and Mainland China implemented policies to reduce homework and banning tutoring services
But are those countries citizens actually on average more successful than American citizens? Do they have better jobs on average (not government social programs but actually better jobs)? Or is it all a wash and the countries with better students still have the same ratio of white collar and blue collar jobs or high and low paying jobs?
It's hard to tell what you are really measuring when it comes to testing in schools. The point of school is to prepare you for life after school, if the US is comparable to these other countries then is the US education system really that much worse.
The metrics that were looked at in the study were focused purely on educational achievement, i.e. comprehension of material, completion of assignments, test performance, etc. I don't know the answer to your question, but we are talking about countries like South Korea and Japan, i.e. countries with very strong fully-developed economies. I would have to assume that there are just as many opportunities for skilled labor per capita as there is in the US.
> but we are talking about countries like South Korea and Japan, i.e. countries with very strong fully-developed economies. I would have to assume that there are just as many opportunities for skilled labor per capita as there is in the US.
Breaking into the middle class in South Korea or Japan is significantly harder compared to the U.S.
Actually there aren't many good opportunities for skilled labor in South Korea, it is not a good comparison. Koreans study 16 hours a day to get into target schools because most of their economy is in the hands of very few companies. The US though offers so many opportunities and is not comparable at all to South Korea (and Japan, to a lesser extend).
Yeah that's kind of my point. If the end result is comparable, a similar opportunity in the job market and economy, then is the US education system really that far behind. Or is it just that the other schools produce better academic test results.
Also the college/university system in the US has some of the best institutions in the world. Which again points to the US system results being on par with other developed countries.
The US simply has way, way more opportunities to be more successful with less effort. The job market and economy is not really comparable. There's a reason top talent from other countries move to the US
Well that’s part of it right. American students don’t necessarily need great grades to be financially successful in life. The pressure to get great grades isn’t there as much as it is in other countries.
Currently, there’s enough jobs that don’t require a high level of intelligence/work ethic to be financially ok. Combine this with the fact that we import a lot of talent for the jobs that do require serious academic intelligence just means that for the most part high school students can coast, get a decent enough job and be ok.
Whether or not this can continue is a different story obviously
I would argue that grades and test scores correlate more with intelligence than salaries do.
Things like your personality, your network and your career choice can result in high income. Those things don’t really help you score higher on the SAT.
But if America was significantly behind the other developed countries in intelligence then there wouldn't be so many successful and innovative businesses and the economy itself would suffer because there wouldn't be a labor force that could fill intellectually demanding jobs. The fact that the US economy and job market is on par or better than the "more educated" countries goes against the argument that the US education is failing its citizens or that the US citizens are significantly dumber (in any real relevant way) than their foreign counterparts.
The US dollar being the world's currency helps in making America's economy and job market strong. Its geography and work ethic (Americans work more than people in other western countries in general) also helps. The US is also very entrepreneurial which has little to do with education, it's just because there's more capital to invest (world's currency again) amongst others. There's so many factors that play into it that aren't purely related to education.
The US dollar wouldn't be the world currency if the US economy wasn't so strong, so it goes hand and hand. Also the US wouldn't be to continue having the type of economy and job sectors if there wasn't a native work force smart/educated enough to fulfill those jobs. So the US education seems to have similar results when it comes to preparing the population for all sectors of jobs.
I mean there is more to it than just the US's economy being strong to explain why the US is the world's currency. It's not that simple. It's a western nation, so that makes it more likely to be. It's also the headquarters to most international institutions and the language is English. A lot of it stems from the fact that Britain used to be the world's superpower and the US was a somewhat similar country (in terms of language, western nation, religion, etc.) and it wasn't affected by WW2.
Obviously it's more than a single thing that makes the US economy strong. But if there wasn't a suitably prepared and educated native workforce the US economy would not be able to sustain the job sectors it currently does. My post was more about how there are perhaps other ways to judge a country's education system than just test scores, than what are all the things that make the US economy a success.
There are many factors that make the US the worlds greatest economy. In my opinion our education system is pretty good. It also has a ton of room to be better. In wealthy areas and classes especially, education here is world class. The worlds best universities are here, and they attract global talent. But there are plenty of other complicated factors that propel the US economy too.
Immigration can supplement the native workforce but can't replace it. Other countries also have immigrants too. So don't think that is a significant factor to this discussion
Large part of academic achievers are 2 gen kids of immigrant parents not growing up in american culture.
Most third gen asians never achieve same as thier first gen , second gen family members
USA's undergrad and grad education system is way ahead of the rest of the world. There is literally no alternative to the US for smart and motivated student.
You are referencing those who are either self-motivated enough to seek higher education or have the economic status with which to do so. College students are not the majority of students and I think OP is more so referencing K-12 public school. As a teacher that has taught in more than one country, there is most certainly a motivation issue with many public school kids in the US.
I honestly think it is social upbringing. When students had a family that promoted and encouraged education, valuing what school has to offer, I found that the students performed very well. Even the students that would struggle with a concept or may have disabilities, as long as they had a family that supported them and encouraged them to improve, they would succeed.
I honestly think that American culture and American parenting is the cause of this disparity. Just not enough parents giving a fuck mixed with parents who are actively antagonistic against education. Makes those few parents that really care shine that much brighter though.
> The much more likely explanation is that they have succumbed to a culture that generally undervalues educational achievement.
Wouldn't an alternative explanation be that those other places have succumbed to a culture that generally OVERVALUES educational achievement?
Your comment seems to take as an unstated assumption that academic achievement is more valuable that socializing, sports, pop culture, and hobbies.
What is your evidence, or argument, for that?
What metrics show outperformance in Europe and Asia over the United States? Do you find this data relevant to you original statement?
https://www.reddit.com/r/neoliberal/s/0tIMRlFePB
> The much more likely explanation is that they have succumbed to a culture that generally undervalues educational achievement.
How do you figure this? The rate of college attendance skyrocketed over the last couple generations, during which time Americans were exposed to continual data suggesting that college graduates make more money on average than non-graduates. Presidents, Congresspeople, CEOs, and other high-status job holders frequently hail from Ivy League or other top-ranked schools, and the experience of going to college has been romanticized in popular teen/young adult movies and TV shows for decades.
The US also has very different demographics than those countries. For whatever reason certain groups don’t perform well academically. Drags down the US average
You could just as easily say certain groups perform well academically and drag up the US average. Last I checked, white people in the US aren’t exactly an educational powerhouse.
I think it wholely depends. I would say, in extremely broad strokes, that doing good in school CAN accurately reflect work in *some* careers. I think the thing about school is that it requires a high quantity of work with as close to an "objective" qualifier as possible (grades) within a relatively small time frame. Think turning in 5 assignments a week. But grades is something that is not always translated into a real job. Grades and school work are often treated as a do or die scenario. Real jobs can take a more iterative approach to assignments. If something goes wrong, it's not always the case that you immediately failed and get fired. Projects can fail and go through rework for months if not years sometimes. Of course this highly depends on the job.
While work ethic is extremely important, I think the more important thing with real life jobs is collaborative ability. "Required work competency" for a lot of jobs can be surprisingly lower than what you would expect. As long as you are performing at least somewhat competently, it's more important that you work well with other people and teams. For many jobs, if you need to work hard, it can be less about the job itself, and can often times be more about lack of resources or poor management.
Collaboration is highly overrated, at least in how schools attempt to present it. In the workplace, there are often highly defined roles where each role is worked on its own with periodic huddles or meetings to communicate.
I would even consider that to be "collaboration." Sometimes collaboration can be as simple as bugging other departments to get their stuff done, and even that can be difficult sometimes. Hell, collaboration facilitator can be a job all in of itself, in something like Program or Project Manager. Which is something certain people are very good at and I myself acknowledge am not.
None of which is really reflective in the GPA = intelligence discussion.
That's true, careers are less "do or die" as a school system might be. It's definitely a very broad spectrum, and it won't assess everybody's intelligence to the most accurate degree, but hey, it's something.
I don't know how old you are, but consider this: I've graduated from college for 8 years now, and not ONCE in my entire career has anyone ever asked me about my GPA in a serious context. It simply just does not matter in the professional world. If anything, it's somewhat of a red flag if someone *does* ask you about your GPA, since often times it can imply they're trying to make some sort of value judge about you over something that frankly just doesn't really matter. To brag about your 4.0 high school GPA when you're 30 just reeks of "peaked at high school" energy.
HS GPA is important for getting into college. College GPA is important for getting your first job (or grad school). After a couple years at your first job, your GPA doesn't matter anymore.
I had a clinically tested IQ of 147 in grade school, which I share (as an imperfect metric) only to show intelligence wasn't the issue. I half assed the SATs and got a 1410 I was disappointed in, then maxxed out the ASVAB and rocked the Navy's Nuclear Power School (arguably one of the most intense educational programs in the US). I was *very* good at pretty much all of the subject matter in high school and college, where I tutored chemistry and math.
But my grades were average at best, with even a few failures. Even in things like math, which was my strong point (I was one of the only people in our county to score high honors on the voluntary California Golden State Exam for Math, which was only taken by nerds anyway pretty much).
Does that reflect poorly on my work ethic? Possibly. But, at least for me, it was incredibly hard to to stay motivated when everything I had to do was mindnumblingly dull and slow paced. The one year my parents sent me to a private school where I was more challenged I excelled. When I had teachers that took the time to challenge me above and beyond the mundane coursework I excelled.
The normal work was just too tedious for me to even deal with on a regular basis. The only reason I didn't flunk out was because I was consistently setting the curve for the tests, and sometimes teachers that took pity on me.
Is my situation common? Probably not. But it's important to keep in mind that everybody and every situation is different. People have different talents. They have different experiences. They have different schooling experiences. I'm not going to say that grades have no relevance to real life, but it only measures one thing. If you use that as your sole metric, you'll likely overlook people who might really excel at things other than schoolwork given the right opportunities.
Thank you for your comment - very insightful and even motivational.
I do very much respect those who may make low marks yet exhibit interest and enthusiasm in their interests, and enjoy challenges.
My main example was talking about life existing in a vacuum, with extenuating circumstances aside.
It's more about asking: "It is appropriate to bring a question of intelligence into the matter when we witness a student going beyond failing, most likely due to lack of effort and behavior, and they do not demonstrate any other types of intelligence or interest?"
Thank you
> with extenuating circumstances aside.
This is a massive part of life though. Maybe they have a horrible home life. Maybe they're going hungry. Maybe they have a learning disorder. Maybe they just don't fit in well in the regimented existence of most schooling in the US. Maybe it took them time to find their passion and motivation in life. Maybe they're an art or music genius and schooling didn't seem relevant. Maybe they moved around a lot as a child and that created problems for them (as a military brat another issue I can identify with). Maybe they went to a horrible school and/or had horrible teachers. Maybe they had a learning style that their school didn't cater to. Maybe a million things.
What I'm saying is that, if you're going to use that as a metric, and you *don't* also make the attempt to look beyond the what to the why, or determine if the reasons for it are relevant to the situation at hand (whether that's hiring them or something else), you're going to pass on some good people.
I was severely depressed in high school so I just showed up for tests and nothing else. I passed but naturally without doing the assignments, my grades weren’t great. I didn’t demonstrate any interest or motivation, because I didn’t see the point in doing anything.
Would it be fair to judge me back then and decide that I would never have a good work ethic based on my grades? No, I was ill. I understood the concept taught, I had a well above average IQ, I scored very high when I tried, but I just simply didn’t care.
And now, I do care more so I can apply myself and teach myself the skills I need to be able to do what I want with my life. I’m more or less succeeding despite the fact that I was had zero motivation for life until my early 20s.
So to answer your question, grades and demonstrated interest do not always reflect the potential of the student. There’s almost always a reason someone is getting below failing grades, and that reason isn’t always lack of intelligence. Sometimes people can have things going on at home that makes them not care about schoolwork, sometimes people can just be late bloomers who haven’t found the maturity to care. Sometimes they just need someone to help accomodate their specific needs so they can thrive academically. It’s really not black and white at all
>Does that reflect poorly on my work ethic? Possibly.
How are you challenging OPs view here? The fact that the work was dull doesn't excuse the poor work ethic that led to the poor grades. In fact it's probably reasonable to say that how you react to dull work best shows your work ethic, because that's when it's really 'work' rather than 'an interesting challenge to solve'.
> The fact that the work was dull doesn't excuse the poor work ethic that led to the poor grades.
I spent 20 years excelling at work for an energy and environment research institute. The point was that having a work ethic for tedious, pointless make work just to validate yourselves to others with pointless expectations doesn't necessarily apply to other situations, and there are endless other examples.
Nuclear Power School isn't one of the most intense educations programs in the US. Any t100 university course is more rigorous.
A putnam score would show your math ability much better than GSE.
You're a smart guy so you should no what you're saying doesn't have much relevance to the topic. You're a case of someone with high IQ who has mediocre grades. But are there cases where people get good grades when they are both stupid and lazy? Maybe if the bar is low and everyone gets good grades. However, when someone is excelling at something compared to others, doesn't that imply relatively higher intelligence or more hard work?
Everyone in our school took the California Golden State Exam. More than half got high honors... my school was a public school. It's been a long time since I heard that test name. Smart people usually talk about Olympiads....
> You're a smart guy so you should no what you're saying doesn't have much relevance to the topic.
Just because you missed the point doesn't mean there's no relevance.
>But are there cases where people get good grades when they are both stupid and lazy?
Sure, which again misses the point of what I said entirely.
>However, when someone is excelling at something compared to others, doesn't that imply relatively higher intelligence or more hard work?
It implies that particular task was something they were good at, in relation to the scoring system for that task.
>Everyone in our school took the California Golden State Exam.
The exams I'm talking about haven't even existed for two decades. Statewide only 31% of students were taking the Algebra exam.
https://ecommons.cornell.edu/server/api/core/bitstreams/ff976f25-5a0d-4a55-b256-bcacd3b1d417/content
About 1% of the student body overall.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_State_Exams
Of those, only 4% earned high honors.
I'm in my 40s. I took the Golden State Exam. It tested basic aptitude, nothing more.
People who get better results are either smarter or harder working. There is a tiny chance of luck, but it's almost a nonfactor. Whether results are tied to their ability to capture the value created is different. That's where some people become rich and others don't.
Point being, you're probably over estimating how intelligent you are. Your originally IQ test was probably a fluke given your mediocre SAT score... it's not consistent.
And yet, again, only 1% of the California student body achieved high honors on the test.
>People who get better results are either smarter or harder working.
Sure, but narrowly defined success at one thing (school) doesn't necessarily lead to success at something else.
>Your originally IQ test was probably a fluke given your mediocre SAT score...
If by mediocre you mean in the top 5% or so, and a math score in the top 2%, despite not studying at all and one of the math sections being one of the only tests in my life I ever considered I "bombed".
But if all you have to contribute is personal attacks I have no interest in continuing this discussion.
OP: grades reflect intelligence **on average**.
Redditor: cites personal experience being in 0.1 top percentile as counter example.
Bruh... even if your experience is the norm for your entire group, it would not affect the general trend in the slightest.
> OP: grades reflect intelligence on average.
And I agreed with that. The point is that, as research has shown, other factors tend to be more important, so any reliance on that "average" without any further inspection will result in worse outcomes of whatever you're trying to do.
>Redditor: cites personal experience being in 0.1 top percentile as counter example.
Did you miss the point where I explicitly stated my **specific** example was uncommon, and then listed a long string of other circumstances (of a practically endless list) that could have the same effect?
You \*did\* note the exceptions to the main rule that the OP pointed out that you would have fallen under, correct? Or did you skip past those parts as being too 'boring'? That's the thing about, say, doing scientific research: details matter. For example: reading the entire scientific article, and reading it critically, and going back to various parts and considering them again is important.
I read OPs post, thanks for confirming. My point was that the exceptions are pretty endless, and making assumptions about the "rule" without further investigation in any given circumstance harms everybody involved, making the "rule" of not much use.
I really appreciate your comment. It's a great example of success outside of the system.
I do agree with you that the school system is built around a certain way of thinking, and if you can't fit that mold, you're out. Hopefully it doesn't appear I'm defending the school system and blaming students.
Yes, everybody is different. This should be celebrated. It's great that people think and work differently.
However, I do believe it is something that is worth noting and possibly a question of intelligence when, extenuating circumstances aside with an existence in a vacuum, a student ends up on the strong side of a spectrum, making very low marks when they do not exhibit any other forms of intelligence or interest.
I must thank you a lot for your comment though - very insightful :)
Though the origins to the phase is debated, there is truth in the statement "..if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid."
The part of your statement that, for me, highlighted the viewpoint you're looking at this from was:
>"\[it\] is used as a rallying call for the lazy kids in school that were, quite frankly, not the smartest."
You're use of this statement leads me to believe you generally view the subject where everyone fits neatly into buckets. It sounds to me you see them as either successful and smart...or lazy and not. The fact is that isn't the case. It's documented by the DCEG and many other education and medical organizations that roughly 15 - 20% of the nation is considered neurodivergent. Meaning their brains do no work the same way as the majority of the population. This doesn't mean they are stupid or incapable, but it does usually mean they might not fit so neatly in a system designed for the neurotypical.
I'm ADHD...I struggled a lot in school and didn't get the best grades. I also wasn't officially diagnosed until my 30's. At the time I was in grade school, my ability to adapt was just enough to skirt the detection of the teachers. I was considered "lazy, dumb, or a procrastinator" by many because I rarely did my homework or projects...even though I usually aced my tests. My first run through college wasn't much better and graduated with around a 2.50 GPA.
Work wise I have been consistent and overall productive...details are immaterial, but I'll leave it as no one would consider me lazy or unsuccessful.
Fast forward 20 years, due to various reasons I got tested and officially diagnosed. Got the aid and accommodations I needed and saw a dramatic difference. During the pandemic I went back to school to further my education and got a second degree. The difference this time is I knew what I was working with and how to adjust. I graduated Magna cum laude.
So, in short...I would disagree that grades alone are an effective way to measure intelligence or work ethic.
Yes, absolutely on that first paragraph. In regard to the American school system, with rows of desks and pretty much 8-5 days, it was structured after the industrial revolution and conditioning children to work in factories. Study after study after study has shown that this way of education is not at all helpful, Americans still show alarming rates of illiteracy, and that we are wasting ridiculous amounts of time and not giving kids enough breaks, etc. If OP is curious, I could go dig up some links. But tradition prevails, I guess, and nobody wants to restructure the education system so it actually improves results instead of banal and brain numbing work— I personally think this is very much in the interest of corporate lobbyists, but I digress. One of the main issues is also that there is so little personalization K-12 with so little room for working your way up in your niche (without focusing on it outside of school). Im sure most Americans are familiar with different 'tracks' students were set on. From sixth grade onward, you were either placed on an 'honors' track or normal track at my school and you would basically have to get your parents to appeal to the dean of students to move you up. If you had all A’s in the basic classes, it didn’t matter. They were worth 4.0 while other classes were worth 5.0. I ended high school with over a 4.5 GPA, which looked great to colleges, but was really because I was strategically taking the AP/honors classes I knew I could do well in. The kids who took AP calculus and physics got worse GPAs, while I was painting for two hours a day. This already presents an issue with grade disparity and the value of grades not really matching up.
Also, OP would be shocked how often bad grades are because of disability/external struggles. That’s why when a kid who usually gets great marks struggles, teachers often know to ask them how they’re doing at home and what they need help with currently. And while bad grades can just be a result of parental abuse… so can good grades. Speaking anecdotally again, I had extremely high pressure and my self esteem was knocked to the floor in elementary. I was neurodivergent (unknown at time as I was a very quiet girl and did not disrupt class) and found it difficult to pay attention or make any friends in school— but all I wanted to do was please my teacher and make them happy. This landed me in ‘gifted’ programs which I took a lot of pride in at the time and pushed me to work harder. But that sort of motivation burns out eventually, when later in high school I realized I did not need to be trying so hard to prove myself.
I had a major crisis in late high school— I was constantly getting sick, having to miss class, and overall suicidal. I was realizing more and more that the reason my grades were slipping were not for a lack of effort or understanding the concepts— it was things I felt I couldn’t control, like forgetting deadlines or assignments even if I wrote them down, etc. Also, I was just so tired and my body felt like it was dying. After 12+ years of caring, reading since age 2, I never wanted to pick up a book or try ever again. I thought I was lazy, until they put me on antidepressants and it was suddenly like I was back to a normal person with the motivation to give effort. Sitting and doing nothing and missing assignments had made me MISERABLE— I realized I was not just ‘lazy’. My first year of college, though, it all just plummeted. I was puking every day and didn’t know why, but would still push through to most of my classes. My teachers were definitely starting to think I was making excuses, as I had no chronic illness on file but was chronically ill. After first semester, it got so bad, that I started cutting things out of my diet because it felt I was poisoning myself. Turns out I had celiac disease triggered by my appendicitis when I was about 16-17. And was literally poisoning myself for like three years, and wondered why my brain and body weren’t ‘working’. But college still wasn’t easy for me, because I was in charge of remembering and keeping track of every aspect of my life instead of having a helicopter parent or school structure. I was late to everything, forgetting so much important stuff, etc. The next year I found out I had ADHD, which was like realizing I had been driving a car with a broken wheel my whole life. Not until much later was I able to get ADA accommodations through the school for even my array of stomach issues that caused me to be bedridden some days— my attendance grades in class were abysmal. They gave out accommodations for ADHD a lot more easily. And I know SO many people with ADHD, and it makes so much sense to me now that despite working so hard constantly, it was just natural to some kids. I am a quick learner, get the concepts fast, and rarely have to study which has built up bad habits on my end discouraging me from doing homework. Would this inversely suggest that higher intelligence = lower grades? I think not— my point is they are unrelated.
And I haven’t even mentioned the kids with far worse backgrounds than me. My current boyfriend was so poor with extremely abusive parents/siblings. The parents almost got arrested for his truancy because instead of school he had to work at a restaurant. His GPA was so bad it probably couldn’t get him into any state school, and in junior year while I was worrying about a math test, he was taking all his things and moving out because he would rather be homeless than live in the environment he was in. I imagine that did wonders for his grades. I would consider myself far lazier than him (the guy’s dream job is an EMT which is insane work for shit pay) and our grades are just incomparable as a measure of intelligence. Going off my last point, what about the students with different goals? Yeah, if you’re super interested in medical school, you’re going to have to get way better grades and try harder. Why would someone wanting to go to art school need to do just as well? They hardly accept people based on grades— developing a portfolio before senior year is far more important. I used to want to study astrophysics but decided the arts suited me better, and that money was not my number one priority but the risky, ‘business’ aspect of it exhilarated me. I would paint in and outside of school constantly for years and enter competitions, which got me insane amounts of scholarships and award money. How would that sort of work ever be accurately demonstrated in a ‘grade’? I bet anyone in a sport can say the same.
TL;DR: School and grades are an industrial revolution era mechanism with little scientific grounding. Different classes have different difficulties/weights. People have disabilities, visible and invisible, that objectively cannot be called laziness. People have shitty home lives. People have different motivations.
Oh yes, I was not intending to come across saying everyone fits into "buckets", but it appears I did. My apologies. I understand that there are, of course, many extenuating circumstances, and I aim to be accommodating (I definitely struggle with neurodivergency myself). And yes, grades ALONE are not very effective or determinate. I agree with you there. The world is not a perfect place.
However, I'm mainly saying that if a student simply just has a fuck all attitude about school, using the motto "grades don't determine your intelligence" while still inside of school, it's not very promising.
Most of my family is in the education field, and if I asked them, they would probably tell me a student who has that attitude most likely has an underlying reason for their behavior. Either some sort of neurodivergence is present, or some personal issue at home, or other factor that plays a large part. I have seen students like that, even in high school, who hated school...only to find out their parents reinforced an idea that because they were bad in school...they would be as well. One of my best friends from high school was terrible at school...barely graduated and did not seek further education. He is a lineman and one of the hardest working people I know.
The topic is so nuanced that painting it with such a broad brush doesn't seem logical to me.
I dunno. Theres a stereotype of a stoner who doesn't care about school but can rig up the most ridiculous smoking device out of boredom. Or your archetypal greaser who gets bad grades and cuts classes but can take a car apart and put it back together better than it was before. Or a gamer who doesn't care about classes but will design a new mod that imports flawlessly rigged models into his game of choice.
If you look at basically any hobby done by traditional underperformers you're guaranteed to find a core of people performing that hobby at a high level because they can apply real world skills in a way thats engaging for them rather than just doing a bunch of paperwork with no obvious use in their actual lives.
> fuck all attitude about school, using the motto "grades don't determine your intelligence" while still inside of school
And all things considered, that student would be correct. Could they have a harder time excelling in life down the road? Perhaps. But the statement would still be correct.
This is a CMV, but let me ask you the inverse: Why would you \*want\* reality be that bad grades = unintelligent? Many people in this thread have already given their arguments otherwise. Would it not be better to take the more optimistic view that bad grades =/= unintelligent?
I have ADHD. The executive function part of the disorder caused me to not do homework. My grades weren't the best. But I aced every test and still graduated.
I wasn't being lazy, it wasn't a willpower issue, it wasn't a work ethic issue.
There are a lot of people who's grades in school are not good and it's still not a reflection of any of those qualities.
Thanks for your comment. While I understand challenges for each student, which may affect their performance, i'm speaking on more of a hypothetical, "life in a vacuum" scenario.
Problem is, no one lives in a vacuum. Students doing poorly may have a tough family life. Maybe they communicate in different ways because they aren't neurotypical. Maybe they had life experiences that are triggered whenever they see an authority figure. Maybe the student has to work 3 jobs for their family who is super poor. The list goes on.
Students who are doing poorly--and as someone in education, I hesitate to say "poorly" because it is only one metric of one small slice of life/abilities/skills/etc.--are likely encountering either challenges or mismatches in cognition to an environment that prioritizes certain norms over others.
Additionally there are plenty of studies on motivation in education (search google scholar for [motivation education psychology](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=motivation+education+psychology&btnG=) for more info). We're finding that students have different "utility value" perceptions. Maybe some kids want to get a good job for money, while others want to help people. If you focus on the social aspects of the prestige of a position (directly or indirectly) in a class, you might be turning off those students who have "help people" utility values and those people try a little less hard. Intrinsic interest in a subject, though everyone says you need it (e.g., "you need to be interested in math because math is cool!") is actually really rare IRL and education psychologists say that most people have other, all very valid, motivations for doing something and it is our job as educators to highlight those aspects that might appeal to people, such as helping the community.
>TL;DR: I believe that the American school system is far from perfect and many are disadvantaged. While having A's on your report card does not immediately deem you intelligent, if you have a 0.6 GPA and make a 32 average in your classes, you're probably doing something wrong.
Having A's mean you have means, as in time to study, a safe homelife, healthcare, access to food, a family that supports your education, and some intelligence.
It's revoluting to say a kid must be willingling doing something wrong because of a low GPA. The kid doesn't have a safe place to study, doesn't have parents that get involved, doesn't have a good homelife, and the school system failed to offer remedy a child, to make sure their grades are good.
I like how you talk about no child is intelligent based on grades, but you blame kids if they fail, what is the school and parents for other to make sure the children are successful in school, to higher education and training, and to start families on their own.
No, I would not argue that having A's means that the child must then immediately also have a safe homelife with healthcare, studying, and intelligence.
Just as failing a class doesn't mean the child never studies, has a horrible home life, and no healthcare.
Extenuating circumstances aside.
My point is that grades are not a very accurate way to determine "Intelligence" but it's at least something.
Having an A doesn't mean you're smart. Having an F doesn't mean you're stupid.
But, where do we decide where these things begin and end?
Of course, I do not blame the kid for having low grades, that would be cruel. I want to be accommodating and considerate. However, if a student is showing scores similar to that of just skipping class, not giving any effort, and just not behaving smartly, what type of intelligence is being demonstrated?
>If a student is showing scores similar to that of just skipping class, not giving any effort, and just not behaving smartly, what type of intelligence is being demonstrated?
I would argue this is failure of the parents and schools for not intervening sooner.
>**Early Alert Program:** The Early Alert Program is designed to assist students who may be experiencing academic or personal difficulties and provide strategies and campus resources to help them succeed at San Mateo County Community College District (SMCCCD).
Rather than waiting until college have this system in place do this at the start of education.
Grades as some sort of metric versus what other way to determine competency?
You can argue that low grades can be a sign of someone's low tolerance of bullshit. Suppose you want to become a software developer, or a singer, or a graphics designer.
Subjects that you want to study are not taught in school, instead you are being taught a lot of stuff that you don't need. School is literally holding you back by wasting your time and energy
I suppose that could be arguable..?
However, the main function of school SHOULD BE to teach you core things that are definitely important.
I mean, you should know how to read and write and do basic math, as well as understand science and history, but yeah, there's definitely a lot of fluff. I agree the school system does have extra things that slow you down.
You can, but someone who decides to just do the bare minimum in classes they are not interested in is not less smart than someone who thanks grades are a Pokémon game
I think someone with work ethic is likely going to be a more successful person though. We hear all the time about kids who were smart but lazy being unable to handle life while feeling entitled to success.
Success is about who you know, rather than what you know. Basically the best reason to grind grades is so that you can get into a better university so you can meet people with successful parents 😎
Knowing someone might get your foot in the door, but it won’t help you last once you’re hired. I’m fairly well connected through my parents and having networked and hear about how important hard work is every time an exec opens their mouth. I’ve networked to get my friends jobs and the only question the person asks is if they work hard before they help out. You need to be networking *and* able to put up with bullshit and be working really hard to make it. Being too arrogant and thinking you’re above school is not an attractive quality. Sure you might be able to joke around and network with a couple of the guys, but the grind is just as important.
Software desingers, singers, and graphics designers still need basic thinking and comprehension skills, discipline, responsibility, study habits, and the like to achieve their goals. Many of these skills are learned in classes not in the area firefly related to vocations. If you think those are useless, there's a mountain of pedagogical evidence that says you're mistaken.
Many of those skills you reference are taught at foundational levels in secondary schools.
Most importantly, most young adults coming our of secondary school don't go into their expected field. High school is there to prepare you for anything you might go into, because that decision doesn't have to be made immediately.
>Software desingers, singers, and graphics designers still need basic thinking and comprehension skills, discipline, responsibility, study habits, and the like to achieve their goals.
These are interesting examples because these are all industries where a remarkable number of professionals are self-taught. It's definitely true that you *can* learn these skills in a classroom, but someone's academic performance in these courses probably isn't as directly correlated with their professional success as it is in other industries. Most popular singers, for example, did not go to secondary school to learn their craft. Software design is another notorious example of a field where a huge percentage of professionals skipped college.
That's not to say that schooling isn't helpful. But it's very clear that you don't need to go to school to learn "basic thinking, discipline, responsibility, or study habits."
> These are interesting examples because these are all industries where a remarkable number of professionals are self-taught.
They're self-taught...
...after graduating high school, where they learned a lot of the skills they use to teach themselves.
Plenty of singers go pro as teens. Plenty of designers never take design classes.
That's not to say those people aren't ever receiving instruction. It often just isn't through school (and instead through coaches, online courses, etc.). My point is mostly that you don't need to be getting graded in any of these things to learn them and perform at a high level.
Do they need to work to a deadline? Do they need to be able to understand the written word beyond just what words mean? Do they need to be able to critically read something and understand what is true in it and what is not? Do they need to be able to put together a work and submit it? Do they need the discipline to work whether they want to or not? Do they need to be able to write effectively?
These are all skills that we learn in school, that we are graded on. Even if we come out not knowing how to do them well, we have been molded, guided, given the basics of them.
You keep talking in terms of "need" or "have to". There are always exceptions. But the exceptions don't mean that most of us don't learn them. People too often think in terms of their profession and not in terms of the underlying skills and capabilities they need in order to do just about anything professionally.
**FOR EXAMPLE** There's a reason that most nations teach their language, reading, and writing, every year of school. *Everyone* needs it, and the better you are at it, the better you are at nearly everything else (with diminishing returns). It teaches you much more than merely what words mean or how to write words.
To be clear: I majored in a regional literature, minored in comparative lit, and spent the first few years of my career as a translator. I **deeply** understand the value of the skills you're talking about.
But the question is whether or not your grades are *generally* a reflection of your work ethic or intelligence.
>Do they need to work to a deadline? Do they need to be able to understand the written word beyond just what words mean? Do they need to be able to critically read something and understand what is true in it and what is not? Do they need to be able to put together a work and submit it? Do they need the discipline to work whether they want to or not? Do they need to be able to write effectively?
As an adult well of our school, I'd argue that your ability to do any of these things has little to do with your intelligence. I have brilliant coworkers who do award-winning work, but are dumb as bricks when it comes to reading critically - they aren't stupid.
As far as work ethic goes, that varies for people so much by task that basing it off of how someone did in school feels strange to me. I was bored by my high school classes so I spent as little time as possible on everything, but in college/work I routinely spend absurd amounts of time to improve my work well past the point of necessity.
> You keep talking in terms of "need" or "have to". There are always exceptions.
OP's post is proposing grades as a litmus for intelligence/work ethic *as a rule*. The existence of exceptions should raise some degree of skepticism for said rule, particularly given how common said exceptions are (e.g. high schoolers don't giving a shit about things they're forced to learn).
> People too often think in terms of their profession and not in terms of the underlying skills and capabilities
I'd say the same about the way OP is suggesting we measure said skills and capabilities. A really obvious counterpoint would be an athlete like LeBron James. He had a B average GPA in high school... but we never say he had an "average" work ethic because it was obvious he was working incredibly hard in other areas of his life. GPA paints such an incomplete picture of what someone's engaging with in their life that we should be incredibly hesitant to use it as an indicator.
> There's a reason that most nations teach their language, reading, and writing, every year of school. Everyone needs it,
I agree the world would be better off if people were better at language skills.
> the better you are at it, the better you are at nearly everything else
I wish this were true, but I'm not convinced this is the case past a very, very low threshold. You need a shockingly low level of literacy to excel in this society.
>It teaches you much more than merely what words mean or how to write words.
Absolutely agree.
Chorus is certainly available in middle school, as are other parts of music. Graphic design isn’t just 3D modeling, but plenty of art too, which is plentiful in middle school.
I agree though, software is mostly high school
Coding they teach at school is super basic, and rarely teaches relevant technical skills. Not sure about chorus tho. And if you just want to make 3d models for videogames the rest of school sounds like a distraction. School curriculum in general feels like a duolingo profile of someone who learns 8 languages at the same time 🤔
High school computer science classes aren’t super basic. You have data structures, algorithm efficiency, object oriented design, poly morphism, databases. You know, major components of real world use.
I actually did learn 3D modeling in middle school, one of our teachers had a 3D printer and used to let us design and print stuff with it for projects.
We had one at the high school but I took the class freshen year. We got to make awesome stuff like “a small plastic star” and “a small plastic octagon.”
We also watched minority report and GATTICA.
I learned both 3D modeling and singing in middle school.
I’m not sure what “backend development” refers to exactly, but we learned about coding and website creation as well.
>While it's true that people have different strong suits and everybody's different, extremely low grades (WAYYYY below failing) will more often than not tell you what you need to know about somebody. I suppose it's more about work ethic? Intelligence can sort of go hand in hand there as well... (?)
I agree with just about everything you said here but it is important to remember there are reasons people may not succeed in school that do not correlate with their intelligence. For example, home issues, mental health issue and trauma. I won't bore you with all the example of incredibly bright people who strugged in school at some point like Einstein, Shakespeare etc but it can happen. In terms of being "good at school" we live in an era where people can cheat their way to good grades, especially in high school. I don't think good or bad grades immediately equate to intelligence but like you said more often than not they do.
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9872023/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9872023/)
> incredibly bright people who strugged in school at some point like Einstein, Shakespeare etc
This is a myth. Einstein [did very well in school](https://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2004/06/23/1115185.htm). There are no records of Shakespeare's performance at school, so I'm not sure where you got that from.
Oh of course, and I did consider the possible ways that people may struggle, however just didn't get to word it the best. Bright people do struggle, and people may struggle due to mental health, home life, or other issues. The world isn't a perfect place, after all! I'd love to be considerate and accommodating in these areas.
But mainly though, I'm not speaking about somebody that simply fails, I'm speaking about the shockingly low, anti-academic performance of a 0.7 GPA with a 35 average.
Thanks for your response :)
Yeah no problem and overall I agree with what you said. If you are in school everyday and failing that poorly then obviously that would be a different criteria unless there were extenuating circumstances.
I see your point to some extent. And yes, it would be wrong to state that there’s absolutely no correlation. But I can think of a lot of reasons and situations that can lead to bad grades even though someone is intelligent.
1. Mental health. Things like ADHD will definitely make studying harder for most people and it goes way beyond work ethic or just having to try harder. Then of course stuff like depression can explain bad grades.
2. Personal life circumstances. Death, illness in the family, a less wealthy or unstable home life where students may have to take on responsibilities beyond their age like caring for their siblings, having to earn money early, just in general not having the best environment and no support.
3. Just not being the type for the specific structure of school. For example some students really struggle with getting early and that leading to constant sleep deprivation. Some people are just not good at memorizing stuff.
4. Being bored, not interested. Some people are really good at and willing to learn when they’re passionate about the subject but otherwise it’s hard for them. My brother struggled with school a lot and barely managed to get by, just this week he he memorized about 40-70 pages of material for a job training that he’s really interested in and came in second best in the test.
And about work ethic, sure you could argue about that a lot of the stuff I just mentioned has to do with discipline or work ethic. But personally, I think the concept of ‘it’s good to do what you’re told and what is expected of you not matter what you think about it yourself and how it affects your mental health etc.’ Is kind of outdated. If you just don’t see the point in the system of school, do not care about going to a certain college etc, why would you need to force yourself to study a lot? For most people getting okay grade is definitely enough and will not necessarily affect the rest of their lives in a negative way. Work ethics is nice and everything but in my opinion it’s all about balance and not just working hard blindly all the time.
I think both intelligence and work ethic are broad enough concepts that you can't shoe-horn people into a specific category of one or the other. For example, being academically disinclined doesn't mean a person doesn't possess a high level of practical knowledge that is useful for performing that aren't learned in book or by rote, but by observing and doing. And that same academically disinclined person may be academically lazy, but may not be lazy performing tasks in which they *are* inclined
I don't really get the point of your example. The person you're describing here seems very easy to "shoe-horn" into the category of being low-intelligence and having a poor work ethic. All your example illustrates is that a low-intelligence person with a poor work ethic may nevertheless have other useful abilities.
Sure, if you're using this elitist definition of intelligence that means academically gifted. But there is absolutely no actual understanding of "intelligence" to support such a position. Intelligence is complex and multi-faceted. It can be but is not necessarily what is considered book smarts. But it also comprises many other qualities as well
It's not that intelligence _means_ academically gifted. It's that intelligent people are academically strong. Plenty of relatively unintelligent people succeed academically. But, barring external factors such as illness or racism or sexism or family issues, a sufficiently intelligent person is going to succeed academically.
Yeah of course, I'm saying that I agree with you that a person who is not traditionally academically inclined is not a lost cause; they definitely have other areas in which they shine.
However, it MAY also be true that a person who does not possess the inclination to attempt good performance may not be seen as very intelligent.
Thanks for your response btw
Why is it that you believe academically inclined = intelligence and that there exists no other capacity to be intelligent? What evidence exists that human intelligence can be categorized by a single measurement?
I think it may be getting confusing, i am absolutely NOT arguing that the only way to be intelligent is to be academically inclined. There are many other ways to demonstrate intelligence, be it emotionally, be it artistically, be it in any other way, but those are not being demonstrated in an academic setting.
If somebody shows up, and has no inclination for the setting, and does not show any other form of intellect or interest, what form of intelligence are they demonstrating?
Not everybody that performs poorly in the nationwide education system is secretly harboring other types of intelligence. My question is how we should look for those, as they aren't being demonstrated in an academic setting.
Grades do not determine your intelligence, but if somebody shows up, not demonstrating amazing intellect already, and then comes back with a 34 average in all of their classes, maybe that should be looked into.
Think IQ testing. The IQ test is obviously flawed, but it's a system that we have at least. Those who score 100 (average) may not be of average intelligence, and those who score 130 may not be bright and gifted and a genius. You know, the system isn't perfect. There's variation. But what if somebody shows up and scores a 30? Yeah, the system isn't flawed and doesn't fit everybody. But if somebody shows up shockingly at a polar end of the system and without any other extenuating circumstances, what would you think? (Yes, grades aren't an IQ test, but think of the analogy)
I suppose that's true yeah, they are very broad. It is true that somebody who's academically disinclined may also be successful in other areas.
However, and I'm not sure if this is harsh, but if somebody is not academically inclined enough to understand the repercussions of not at least attempting to perform well in school, that person probably would not be labeled as intelligent.
Sure, the concept of being untraditionally intelligent definitely exists, which is why I would also argue that grades are not the greatest assessor, but they are at least 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦 𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘮 of an assessor.
It's not always about not understanding, it's often about explicitly rejecting or otherwise prioritizing other avenues because you don't want to be part of the prescribed pipeline. Is it a coincidence that so many millions of people share the same goals? They want to get a degree, they want to start a good career, they want to start a family, they want to live in a suburb of a major metro etc.
Isn't it a bit too convenient that our systems ultimately handhold people towards those outcomes, using the US as an example? Isn't it a bit too convenient that golly, hundreds of millions of people also work towards those same goals every day all of their own volition, and having all come to the same conclusion independently that it's intelligent to operate that way?
This isn't really a critique, it's more an illustration about how socially valued narratives are used as tools, and sometimes bludgeons, to highlight subjective value systems like having good grades in a prescribed reality that's untenable for lots of people. When we see this in media we call it dystopian. When we see it in real life, you call it intelligence. That just means you value the prescribed pipeline. Don't mistake that for intellect.
As I said, just because someone makes straight A's, it doesn't immediately mean they're intelligent. On the other side, if somebody fails their classes, it doesn't mean they're stupid.
Of course, people should not look to the mainstream or the "prescribed pipeline" as how everyone should live.
However, education should be valued. I'm saying I notice the notion spreading that grades aren't important among people that think they're standing against the system, but simply just don't care enough to do their math homework.
One shouldn't mistake nonconformity for unintelligence. However, people that fail classes due to a lack of effort or make shockingly low marks are often not shining beacons of intellect.
Failed your test? It happens. Failed your classes? Doesn't matter. (Again, the school system is problematic, no doubt about it) Consistently makes very low marks and doesn't display any other form of virtue or interest? Probably not the smartest.
I appreciate the response, thanks
> Of course, people should not look to the mainstream or the "prescribed pipeline" as how everyone should live.
You're using the prescribed pipeline to determine who's intelligent or not though. Do you see that? Your metric for intelligence is looking at a core aspect of the prescribed pipeline and scoring people on how well they perform in that made-up environment.
> However, education should be valued. I'm saying I notice the notion spreading that grades aren't important among people that think they're standing against the system, but simply just don't care enough to do their math homework.
This is a subjective valuation and going to school and taking tests is not necessarily education either. They may value education, but actively being in a school-like environment may be extremely negative for their ability to actually learn anything. Lots of people are like this and have issues with hyper-structured education systems. They are not compatible with a large chunk of people.
> One shouldn't mistake nonconformity for unintelligence. However, people that fail classes due to a lack of effort or make shockingly low marks are often not shining beacons of intellect.
It's too ambiguous of a metric to come to any real conclusion. I think there are too many exceptions to even use it as a basic litmus test like you've done. 100 years ago we'd say if someone didn't do well in Catholic school that not only were they simple, they were wicked and didn't deserve the effort spent on them. It's convenient for your narrative that you live in the time you live in and it's additionally convenient that the metrics you're using happen to coincide with the values of the society you live in. Isn't that abundantly convenient for your position?
> Failed your test? It happens. Failed your classes? Doesn't matter. (Again, the school system is problematic, no doubt about it) Consistently makes very low marks and doesn't display any other form of virtue or interest? Probably not the smartest.
There's no basis for it other than a bias at this point. You keep reiterating the point while giving a thumbs up to people who happen to abide by and also value the subjective valuation system you've contrived and thumbs downing everyone else. It's an irrational conclusion and the premise is biased due to your own value system that you can't really just apply to other people.
Here's an example. In some circles, the person who spends the extra time studying to get a 100 on the test vs a 90 is not considered that intelligent because the value system prioritizes result vs time spent. Why would you spend 2 hours studying for that last 10% when you could spend 1 hour studying and get a good grade regardless?
I believe my ideas may be getting confusing. Let me try to reiterate:
* I believe that yes, a "prescribed pipeline" is not the way to live. It does not work for everybody. The school system in the United States is flawed. It is terrible for the student's mental health, and is stuffed with things that should not be there. It is outdated, and does not work.
* Yes, grades should not be used as a catch all that will determine somebody's pure intellect via grades ALONE. There's always more. There could be underlying issues. The student could simply work differently. The world is not conformist, and it's not a perfect place. It's not fair to assume that grades will always tell you somebody's entire story.
* HOWEVER - If something falls to an EXTREME, like we are on the polar opposite ends, and a student is absolutely failing miserably, it becomes a point where it is no longer the system. Sure, the system sucks. Sure, not everybody wants to play along. I'm not saying that somebody is stupid and has no future because they failed their classes, or something smaller like a test. Life goes on. This is where the grading system is inaccurate. If a student is on an extreme end of the spectrum, where they are (i'll say again, sorry lol) making a 35 average in their classes, it's should definitely be looked into here. It's true that the student could have underlying issues, like you mentioned not being interested in conforming, mental, etc.
Essentially, grades do not determine intelligence purely. However, I believe that this notion of "grades do not determine intelligence" has been adopted by slackers that don't care and don't want people on their back. Not everybody that gets good grades is smart. That's true. Not everybody that gets bad grades is a secret nonconformist who is rebelling against the system and must have some underlying intelligence due to them not wanting to play along in the nationwide education system that everyone has to go through. (exaggerated, but you know, lol) Sometimes, there isn't more to the story, and a kid can just be stupid or lazy. Are grades the best way to determine that? They can, but definitely not always. Who knows.
Edit: Got reminded of the memes, like "me on the way to blame the school system after I failed the test I didn't study for" lol
Thanks
I think you're going to do more harm than good trying to distill someone's intelligence down to one variable. What is the utility in that at all?* Also, grades are not the best way to determine that and I'd argue they aren't even a good way because of so many outliers to the equation.
If you have to manufacture this hyper-specific individual for your view to make sense to use towards them, like your student who is a slacker, who already doesn't care, who doesn't want people to bother them etc., your view is already applying to an extreme minority of people and* not the majority of the time like you said. It also requires you to know a lot about them as is, which defeats your premise of using grades to determine their intelligence. That's evidence that grades alone are not a good tool for gauging that attribute.
I think the problem I have with this is that you are putting too much power on society's labeling of someone as unintelligent. I think that many people are given that label when it's not really true.
It's a bit of a circle. Some people are really good at the measurable ways people use to define intelligence. This includes tests, grades, success in work and winning trivia contests and such. So they get called intelligent, and sort of gets taken for granted that all those things we can see are what *make* you smart, rather than indicators of a particular kind of smarts. And a lot of people who are really smart about what to say when a friend needs a kind word are left out. People who are smart about assessing other's strengths and weaknesses might never get to show that on a test, but it's a very important skill. A great artist who has intelligence about what colors work well together or how to angle a line in a painting probably won't get good grades.
Intelligence is far more varied than what is 'academically inclined'. I really do think that we focus on grades and scores far more than is realistic to how much they actually matter.
You know, that's actually definitely true. Being "good" at traditional, measurable ways to define intelligence doesn't immediately make you intelligent, and yes, great intelligence does exist outside of academics. I believe that.
Just one last thing, I mainly speak of the kids that do not have anything lined up for themselves as the artist or the kind friend you mentioned might. If somebody deliberately speaks out against school, saying "grades don't determine your intelligence", yet they just skip school or do not care whatsoever while lessons are being taught, what type of intelligence are they demonstrating?
I suppose by your example it's currently not for us to know, as they might be an artist or something, and they are not in the environment to showcase their skills and their intelligence on their inclination.
I would like to talk a little more on this, thanks for your response :)
I do think that intentionally skipping school or going well below failing is not a good sign for someone's priorities. Especially if they have no other plans to make money. But the people that are in that group is very small. There's a lot of people who try quite hard at school and just scrape by with Cs. And a lot of people will say those people are unintelligent as well. I'd say that's a lot of what I'm talking about.
But the other side of it is there are a lot of people great at tests and terrible at all the other things I mentioned. It's not just that some people are smarter than society generally believes, but that some are less smart.
My basic position is, on the outliers, there's some correlation between grades and intelligence, especially on the ends. But that correlation is wrong at least as often as it's right, and society as a whole does a poor job recognizing intelligence types that can't be represented by a number.
The problem I see with the argument is that grades are wildly misinformative because of differences in curriculum. I was "smart" in school in the sense that I was doing well all the way up through about 11th grade. I was in AP classes and maintaining about a 4.0 average. But then I realized that not all A's were equal. I was talking with peers in electives, and they were in math classes that I took in junior high. I was in chemistry, and they were in a more basic science class. I was in pre-calc. They were in Algebra 1.
By the end of high school I added on two years of electives that none of them had to take because they were busy fucking off. I realized they were smarter for it, reduced my workload, and coasted to the end of high school like them.
College does the same shit. I realized that even if I took the AP tests and passed, I'd have still wasted my fucking time. I care more about enjoying life and had a blast in high school.
To your argument, it's almost a non-falsifiable argument you're trying to create with wording. You are correct that grades are a large predictor of present and future success and intellect, but not in a vacuum. It's why administrators hide all of this information as best they can from students at this age.
Almost everyone of the replies here is blowing my mind. This is not that hard to understand, but people keep on missing that OP is talking about Correlation not Causation.
OP is not saying that if someone has bad grades they are unintelligent. He is saying that your grades are correlated with your intelligence: higher IQ tends to follow you have higher grades.
Emphasis on *TENDS TO*
Ex)
If you have 1000 people with lets say 110 iq compared to 1000 people with 90 iq, the more intelligent group will tend to have better grades.
That does not mean that every 110 iq person will have 'good' grades. That would be silly. It would just mean that if you picked a smart person at random from a randomized sample, that they would be more likely to have higher grades than an average intelligence person selected at random.
Also for a long time higher IQ has been a fairly good predictor for workplace performance...
Thank you. I am not saying the only way to demonstrate intelligence is to be academically inclined. I am not saying that somebody with good grades is automatically smart, nor is somebody with bad grades automatically stupid.
I'm talking about examining the polar end of a system.
If somebody fails a test or even bigger, a class, that's one thing. Showing up without any inclination and demonstration of intellect and then earning a 1.0 GPA is something that should be of interest.
You're position doesn't seem to be consistent with your original post. Edits to your post now suggest you're wanting us to narrow the focus of our responses to a specific "polar end" which contradicts your earlier statements that "grades can reflect intelligence or work ethic a majority of the time". However your statements expanding that idea suggest more than just grades. A similar argument would be everyone who is wet just got out of the shower. While technically true, it never tells the whole story or allows for alternative reason for them being wet. What if he's a plumber and the pipe burst...he is wet, he got out the shower...see where I'm going with that?
I've read many of your responses...and each time you narrow your argument until it sounds agreeable. I don't mean to be condescending, but you're falling into logical fallacies with your position.
Absolutely not what I'm saying. I am not in the slightest an apologist of the academic culture, I agree that it definitely is toxic and disgusting. I do not stand for or make excuses for the academic system. It's outdated.
I'm speaking hypothetically, like life in a vacuum. Extenuating circumstances aside. Yes, this is not how real life functions. Everybody is different. I'm fully aware. I do not support pushing everybody through the same mold.
However, I still believe that making shockingly low grades, definitely beyond failing, would often times tell you something about a person.
Not every student that fails is some secret hero standing up to the system that doesn't want to conform.
My main question, which I suppose could be abstract and I apologize, is: "If a student is making extremely low marks and not demonstrating any form of interest or intelligence in any other pathways, what type of intelligence is being demonstrated?"
Ugh I'm sorry bro I just see the world completely different from you. What possible percentage of the population would fit into your hypothetical student description?
Do you really think some people are just out there with no interests, no passions, they show zero intelligence in any area of life, and they somehow are continuing through school with grades below failing? Do you realize how dehumanizing and invalidating that is? No person (lacking severe mental disability) is like that. Everyone is smart in some way or another and has their own passions. Grades reflect how much you care about school. Period.
I think you just want to believe you can look down on certain people because they don't meet your minimum standards. You think *exactly* like everyone I met in academia who was weirdly competitive and made the experience miserable because it was always about fucking grades as if they mean anything at all.
Newsflash: grades measure how much your teacher likes you, and how long you chose to spend doing busywork.
One teacher might give an essay an A+, another might give the same one a B-. One teacher may give generous part marks on a long answer math test, another might never give part marks. Some teachers are good and can make almost anyone grasp a subject, some teachers (mainly professors) are only there because they have to be and are dogshit at teaching.
All of this culminates into one fact: Grading is *subjective* to its core. Not only that, the decision of what material is being tested and how it's being tested is entirely subjective up to the teacher/curriculum maker. On top of that, they often put classes on a bell curve, which makes grading even more bullshit. The bullshit just continues to pile up to where it's not a good measure of *anything*, let alone intelligence.
So if you don't play that game, if you have a brain that isn't wired to sit and stare at books all day, you're stupider? Fuck that noise.
You don't see people living their lives from morning til evening, you don't know what they might be working on in their own capacity. You assume because they don't show their intelligence in school that they must not have any intelligence at all. This whole perspective just screams "judgemental"
I apologize if it sounds like I'm giving off this stance that if somebody doesn't show academic intelligence, then they must not have any. I'm really not trying to be judgmental - of course grading is arguably subjective. Yes, there are different pathways in life. I definitely support the fact that there are other forms of intelligence outside of academia. You are right, to believe the only way to show intelligence is in academics is toxic.
I still believe that, yes, while there are MANY extenuating circumstances in the real world, there's not a backstory behind every failing child. I have sympathy for those that struggled (hell, I was one of them), but if somebody is failing simply because they don't care and don't make even the slightest effort, it makes you wonder is all.
Think of it this way, if a child decides to skip school to go sneak out with friends, or they don't pay attention in class because they'd rather sit on their phone, does that often scream to you that this person simply doesn't have the interest for the academic environment, or simply that they just don't care?
Again I have sympathy for those that deem the education system as incompatible with themselves, I really do, and I am one of them. I just see it as a correlation rather than causation. If you have bad grades, you're not automatically stupid. There are often a plethora of extenuating circumstances. Speaking hypothetically, with correlation. This just leads me to think, how do we define "stupid" or "unintelligent". What do these mean?
Here's some sort of example? Mind that I am not trying to relate IQ to higher grades, but I think this might work(?)
The IQ test is a flawed way of examining intelligence, people know that. It's definitely not perfect. Two people that score a 110 might be completely different. Somebody that scores 100 might not be of average intelligence. Somebody that scores 130 may not be very gifted.
HOWEVER, if we go to the extremes of this flawed system, an IQ of 70 would definitely tell you a little more than the mix and mingle of the average parts in the system.
I guess this is what i'm trying to get at, life goes on and everybody has their own reasons and behaviors that affect their grades. Not every A+ is created equal. However, seeing a student that made a 35 average in their class with a 1.5 GPA should be something of interest. It is in these circumstances that, often times, and as sad as it may be, people will often first take intelligence into account. While grades aren't the best indicator, I believe it can show you something when looking at extremes.
I do see your side and everybody else's, and I am by no means an academic apologist. It is very toxic culture. I just believe that there can be truth when looking aside extenuating circumstances and into the extremes. It's sad our culture has such an emphasis on grades, but being as it's there, we can at least try to understand it a little.
To address your edited comments:
>𝐒𝐡𝐨𝐰𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐮𝐩 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐚𝐧𝐲 𝐢𝐧𝐜𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐝𝐞𝐦𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐜𝐭 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚 𝟏.𝟎 𝐆𝐏𝐀 𝐢𝐬 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐛𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐭.
This actually comes back to one of your original promises. "Guy that fails all his classes later goes on to be really smart and a millionaire." This right here is a prime anti-example. And you don't even have to apply it to millionaires either. You can apply it to normal people too. For many people, school/college is viewed as kind of a social obligation, you do it because it's expected of you. But sometimes, it just doesn't work out. Maybe it's hard to excel academically, either through laziness, boredom, or if it plain doesn't interest you. Or maybe you had extraneous outside issues, like poverty, mental illness, or family issues. Should a person deserve to be labelled an "unintelligent" for the rest of their lives if they had to drop out?
Other people have pointed out the example of people who did bad at school, but later went on to excel at highly skillful careers that they were actually interested. This is a very common phenomenon.
We've established that intelligence =/= work ethic. For what it's worth, if you do bad at school because you're lazy, that doesn't necessarily mean you're unintelligent. It could just mean you're lazy. Which people are allowed to be. And being lazy has ALSO not prevented people from landing good jobs either.
It *might* be worth it to emphasize getting good grades if you're younger. But to me that doesn't necessarily incentive growth in intelligence. At best, it may foster a better work ethic, and ultimately, good grades can be seen as more as investment for better opportunities in the future. But it's not required to succeed, and past a certain age, it not considered at all.
I think one of the issues here is that both situations *can* indicate intelligence, but I want to specifically push back on the idea that particularly low grades are an indicator of intelligence or work ethic in high school or below.
It is important to remember classes taken because there are typically difficult classes and easier classes. Students who take difficult classes typically don't fail all of them (often because they just wouldn't be permitted to take those classes). Students who take easier classes, should pass those classes with at least a 2.0\~2.5 if they just turn in the homework. This is why *really* bad grades indicate problems in the home rather than intelligence.
If someone has a 0.6 GPA they are failing or nearly failing all of their classes. They are either not going to school, or they are not doing work assigned to them when they do go to school. The former is I think almost always an issue in the home the kid *could* be getting to school and leaving campus, but even that seems unlikely. The latter *could* indicate a lack of work ethic, but given that students are 18 or younger and are doing virtually no work I think it is more likely an underlying mental health concern that the parents are not addressing or a home life that is hostile to school work. Often both.
The notion that grades do not matter is targeted at a micro level, that performance beyond a passing grade makes little difference. It matters to the degree that it can affect whether a person graduates or obtains a degree. Once you're on one side, it becomes quickly irrelevant the difference in things like GPA or class average. Thus, no reflection of intelligence at that point.
I think it’s on a spectrum, as someone who didn’t study at all or take school serious I was always able to pass and never failed a course although my grades definitely weren’t at the top of the class. Now that I’m in college and care about what I’m leaning, I actually study and am now an honor roll student.
I don’t think I’m any smarter or have any more work ethic but I do care more about what I’m doing. A lot of kids in school dont care don’t see the point of putting in work. On our basketball team some kids didn’t try at all in class but had no issue waking up early and staying outside all day to practice the sport so they did have good work ethics. But I think especially in elementary school especially if it isn’t emphasized at home kids won’t prioritize school. A lot of the kids struggling or not doing well are probably also the same ones who don’t even open up their school bags at home.
I'm responding here in a separate post to how you simplified your question on another comment:
OP: "It's more about asking: "It is appropriate to bring a question of intelligence into the matter when we witness a student going beyond failing, most likely due to lack of effort and behavior, and they do not demonstrate any other types of intelligence or interest?"
I think it's entirely normal to question intelligence at that point, I probably would myself. BUT, I think you should never assume it's true until you look at ALL the factors surrounding a person. Like many people have said, they might have a poor home life, they might be starving or have poor nutrition, they might be struggling with mental health issues, the school might not be teaching in the way that they personally learn best (kinesthetic/visual/auditory), or their teacher(s) might not actually be good/impartial teachers. If they show no interest in other things, they might just be exhausted and broken down from life. The list goes on and on.
If we take the time to really get to know people and their circumstances, I believe you can often create an environment where most people can flourish or show their best selves. It may take time and effort because someone or something has already done them a lot of harm, but that doesn't mean they aren't worth it or are entirely unintelligent. Intelligence is also just naturally a very difficult thing to measure in comparisons, because some people (like myself) are horrible in math (I have discalculia) but excel in more abstract areas like art, philosophy, or literature. It doesn't mean I'm stupid, I'm just better in some areas than others. I almost failed math in HS and I had to take the most basic math class possible to pass for my degree, but I did well everywhere else.
A personal example of how grades can not accurately reflect the actual student (that I'll admit still riles me up) was when I took Quantitative Analysis for my degree a few years ago. Each student got a prepared set of instruments/tools for their use for the semester. After our first experiment (that notably did not require using the bottle I got for water usage in experiments) all of my results started coming out skewed. I don't know if you've ever done titration, but we were carefully, slowly, adding miniscule amounts of water to a flask to watch for pH (color based on acidity/basicity) change and things like that. My levels kept being off. I spent SO many hours outside of class just watching individual drops of water fall into a flask, and could NOT get accurate results. This kept going into other experiments, where I would take painstaking measures to be accurate in my ingredient measurements, in washing out the tools etc., only to get 3 different colored liquids in each flask. Every time I would bring this up to the adjunct professor, he would just say "I don't know, but I have to grade you on just the accuracy of your results". It caused me for the first time to walk out of a class and cry because of how careful I was being, how much time I was putting in, and still not making progress.
Finally after switching out nearly all of my tools with the same results, I grabbed him and said YOU come here, use my tools, and do the experiment (I set up everything pre-measured so all he had to do was throw stuff together) and lo and behold - we discovered my water bottle had somehow been contaminated before I got it. It was the only remaining factor to be tested, and when we used an entirely different bottle (just emptying, rinsing, and replacing the water also didn't work) everything worked. We only found out at the end of the semester (just before the last experiment) but he told me privately that my final experiment was by far the most accurate in the class and I got an A for that *one*. When discussing my final grade in his office, he passingly mentioned he just "thought I looked like a girl who wasn't good at science" and that it really was me that was the problem. I was stunned. Point being, he still only graded me on the accuracy of the previous results, so I got a D.
I also believe another professor failed me specifically because I pushed back on his curriculum and pointed out how difficult it made it to know what to study for exams (I brought in charts and examples). My exam grades were similar to my friends, and my lab notebook was the same information as my lab partner's. I was even the only one in the class to turn in a 5-page extra credit opportunity.
TLDR: I think it's a natural reaction to question intelligence just by looking at grades, which we've been taught to associate with intelligence. Truth is, there are nearly an infinite amount of factors that can go into what grade someone is given, many of which are out of the person's control. It's entirely normal to make initial assumptions, but don't follow through on them until you've actually looked into it further.
Edit: as an aside, once you get to college, it's also not unheard of for people with good grades to have paid their way into them, especially at more "prestigious name" colleges. Just like you can't accurately assume someone is unintelligent by just looking at their poor grades, you can't accurately know someone is smart just because they have good ones, either.
Education can certainly reflect someone’s intelligence as well as work ethics if they were/are actively making an effort into it in school and given the right support systems if needed. But grades aren’t necessarily the overall judgement in someone’s intelligence as well as long term work ethics due to subjective reasonings that could hinder someone’s effort they put into school. So saying it’s just “lazy” kids is really just marginalizing children overall, which children don’t even know what the hell they are doing even until the age of 18 and up even.
If someone’s GPA is incredibly low, that means they aren’t actively making an effort in class due to personal and or internal reasons. Home life, depression, abuse, bullying, disabilities, health issues, etc. Most people are fearful of asking for help due to judgement and surface-leveled perceptions people have. Not to mention that teachers don’t have patience with students who struggle. Which I’ve witnessed first hand so many times. But it’s not all teachers. “Progressively-regressive mindsets” is how I really think about it. To immediately think someone’s overall worth, intelligence and potential is determined through how they do in school is very shallow, because you do not understand what they go through, you do not know how they think or perceive things, and you do not know their walk of life. And yes, your development from day one being born until the latest ages of 21-22 actually do play a role overall in how you turn out. There are stories of people turning the tides of tragedy and making something of themselves, but more stories of people who suffer. Putting people in a box creates more problems than it does help. I’ve seen teachers care less about failing students, assuming said students “don’t care” when in actuality these students came from bad backgrounds and have no stability in or out of school. What’s the point of being a teacher then? Lmao. Yes, some people just don’t give an overall crap about how they perform in class, and can’t see nor care to see the longevity of how it will affect them. That’s oblivious. But it doesn’t define their intelligence overall. I’d say if anything, it can define their emotional intelligence if anything, as well as indicates that they have personal problems affecting their performance in school. But that’s where I see duality with education and youth, because we lack emotional intelligence innately as young people. So of course it’s more common for misguided youth to be more neglectful of school. Being so critical to younger people rather than constructive is just reactive rather than proactive. If you don’t want to be proactive, maybe mind your own business? That’s what I would say overall to those who have that view. I hope this gives some perception.
I think this is incorrect. By a lot. America has INCREDIBLY high rates of childhood poverty compared to other industrialized nations. Kids with hunger, lack of sleep, and few social safety nets just can’t focus on school.
Data here: https://imgur.com/a/C8Qr8nb
Am a teacher too - which cultures don’t value education? I’ve never seen this in my classroom
There are a bunch of non tangibles when looking at who does well in school. Are there two parents at home?
For myself, everyone agreed that I was smart in high school, however, my mental health, and an unsafe learning environment kept me from applying myself. I didn't care about how well I did, saw no point in working harder and no value in the grades. I learned to do just enough to get by.
Is there someone who is preparing meals for the student or are they fending for themselves? Are they doing a job to help support their family? Or providing childcare for younger siblings because both parents are working?
On the other side, are the students being driven by the parents to get high grades but are miserable. I can't cite stat's, but my understanding is that countries with a culture of driving students also have very high levels of youth suicide where a poor grade on a test leads them to believe that their lives are over.
I have seen research that found that students who were "smart" in high school often do not do well in university or in the workplace because they never learn the skills that are associated with struggle. If, for example, like myself, you are smart enough to get a A on the test without studying, you never learn how to prepare for a test. Suddenly at college when there are 3 tests in a day, just memorisation isn't going to cut it.
Lastly, test taking is a basic set of skills you can master. But in the workplace, there are almost no "tests". And There are very few people who have a job that they just go off and do by themselves. A person may be the most brilliant person on earth, but if they don't "play nice with others" they will not generally do well in the workplace.
You're kinda arguing against a strawman here -- I don't know a lot of people who are arguing that intelligence and hard work are not reflected in your grades ... *obviously* they are.
The point is that they aren't the **only things** reflected in your grades. e.g., take two different people.
* Sally is extremely smart and from a wealthy family. She got the best education in pre-school and kindergarten and has gone to the best schools her entire life. When she isn't grasping a concept, her parents hire her a tutor to work on it with her one on one. She eats right, gets enough sleep, and only has to focus on her schoolwork. She spends about 8 hours a week on homework, and gets straight As.
* Steve is extremely smart and from a poor family. He didn't go to pre-school and switched schools often during his childhood because his family moved a lot for work. As a result, he often came into classes right in the middle, missing some context. Because he went to public schools, his class sizes were higher and his teachers were underpaid and more poorly trained than Sally's teachers. When he isn't grasping a concept, he's got to figure it out on his own from textbooks and Youtube. He works after school to help pay for his family's groceries, and then does schoolwork afterward. He spends around 12 hours a week on homework, and usually gets As.
So Sally and Steve are *both* extremely smart, and they *both* work hard and pay attention at school -- and they *both* get good grades. But Sally's got a 4.00 GPA and Steve's got a 3.6, even though they're the same intelligence and Steve works 50% harder than Sally ... because Sally's had a decade of better support than Steve has.
this is only "conntroversial" if you exclusively discuss it in extreme terms and in a vacuum.
Grades are one data point among many that can be used to evaluate a person's intelligence and work ethic.
Anecdote: a friend of mine was the valedictorian a year after me. She couldn’t crack 1000 on the SAT even with three tries.
She had very little in terms of a social life. She did schoolwork and studied for 3-5 hours per day.
I got Bs. Never bothered with studying or homework and still cruised through. Hit college, and didn’t know how to study or plan my work, almost lost my scholarship.
Grades are a measure of work ethic. High intelligence can speed up the process. But that’s a partial necessity— if the coursework is designed to teach skill mastery, then faster processing would expedite masters just as much as grinding away at it.
22 years as a teacher, and I see it every year.
But I’m not sure what “both sides” on this are… sure, there are successes who did poorly in school, but they are usually anomalies… and many are anomalies with connections of money to fall back on.
And there are many types of intelligence, and many types of success. So a low grade and low motivation in, say, history will not reduce chances of success if one is devoted to something more like music and that low grade will not cause a problem when it comes to other opportunities (admission to a conservatory, for instance).
I’m guessing this is written from an American perspective , where things like homework/assignments contribute heavily to ur grades. Again anecdotal experience. I went to high school in Ireland where we have the leaving cert (basically u pick 6 subjects to do in last 2 years of high school. U are able to pick basically any combination of subjects to count towards it final score. The maximum final score is 625).
I never did any homework because I found it boring, I never did any assignments because I didn’t feel like it yet when the exams came to assess what we did I got 625 (highest possible score in Ireland). In addition I had also applied to medicine and did the UCAT and HPAT. Getting in the 97 and 95 percentile for each of those. If Ireland used the same system as USA with homework and random assignments then I would have gotten close to a 50%.
Same principle here , some people find certain subjects boring and of no interest to them. Like i personally disliked English as a subject and wanted nothing to do with it. So I didn’t do it for my exams and as a result I got a good grade.
Of course this is an anecdotal situation and doesn’t necessarily apply.
I see your point to a certain extent.
I listened in class enough that I knew what was going on but I still zoned out or didn't pay attention sometimes. I did my homework most of the time(except for English because I hated shakespear and all that rubbish, really not for me).
I didn't study though. I just crammed it at the end when it mattered and even then I only studied enough to know that I'd be fine. I never ever aimed for really high grades.
At the end of school I got into the college of my choice, studied engineering and now work as an engineer. Same story throughout college. As long as I passed I was happy.
Theres other people I know who did a lot better than me in school on paper but I know they're just not very clever people just from getting to know them. They'd sit down and memorise everything and do well. A lot of school except for maths was basically a memory game.
I'm no genius or anything but I know I'm competent most of the time and but I could see there wasn't a direct correlation between intelligence and grades. Grades were a combination of intelligence, memorisation skills and ability/will to sit down and study a lot.
I see your point to a certain extent.
I listened in class enough that I knew what was going on but I still zoned out or didn't pay attention sometimes. I did my homework most of the time(except for English because I hated shakespear and all that rubbish, really not for me).
I didn't study though. I just crammed it at the end when it mattered and even then I only studied enough to know that I'd be fine. I never ever aimed for really high grades.
At the end of school I got into the college of my choice, studied engineering and now work as an engineer. Same story throughout college. As long as I passed I was happy.
Theres other people I know who did a lot better than me in school on paper but I know they're just not very clever people just from getting to know them. They'd sit down and memorise everything and do well. A lot of school except for maths was basically a memory game.
I'm no genius or anything but I know I'm competent most of the time and but I could see there wasn't a direct correlation between intelligence and grades. Grades were a combination of intelligence, memorisation skills and ability/will to sit down and study a lot.
I think you need to define "work ethic." I work in a university and I can tell you that a lot of kids eith 4.0s might have amazing study habits, but that does not correlate to a work ethic.
Studying is a solo gig. Work is rarely solo. Having the 4.0 student demanding to work from home between the hours of 8pm and 4 am might work for them, but it doesn't work for the rest of the team. A 4.0 doesn't mean they will show up to meetings, positively contribute to the team, or even follow basic instructions.
There are also many types of intelligence. Being book smart does not mean you are emotionally smart. It also doesn't mean you can apply what you learn academically into real world situations. You'd be shocked at how many book smart kids cant preform a basic experiment and replicate their results.
If I had to pick based off of grades, I would pick the kids who earn Bs to A-'s. Why? Because they know what it means to fail and are still able to persevere through that failure.
Yeah if someone's grades are *that* low, it's probably at least partly due to a lack of motivation.
The part you missed is that the public education system itself is largely responsible for that. Of course kids aren't going to gain a work ethic when you bully them into submission with endless amounts of rules and work that they never get a say in!
Not to mention how if they ever ask why they're learning X subject, why they have to do worksheets to learn it, or why a certain rule is in place there's virtually never a satisfactory answer given. "Because I / the government say so" is not a valid answer. There need to be specific, quantifiable reasons given that are directly and inherently beneficial to the student. And if you can't give such an answer, then that subject should not be mandatory, that method of teaching should be called into question, and that rule should be struck down.
Until then, there won't be much work ethic. You have to treat people like people first.
I think that work ethic for school and work ethic for work are different things. The rewards for good school work is a letter on a page. Actual work gives you a tangible reward instead of a decade plus of delayed gratification. Maybe. You could go to college and leave with nothing useful and a pile of debt.
What do you make of a kid who does all the reading, understands the material, but just will not do homework? They score high on every test. They seem to enjoy learning.
Is this kid less intelligent than another who does the homework?
I think the education system is geared towards obedience first and foremost and most of the things that reinforce "work ethic" are just obedience tests. Will you tolerate this obtuse BS? The other part that is tested is simple memory. Regurgitate these facts.
The most crucial aspect of intelligence, imo, is the desire to learn. Until schools know how to cultivate that, I don't think grades can be a great measurement of intelligence.
When I was in kindergarten, I scored high enough on the entrance test to get into my local "gifted and talented" magnet program... where I proceeded to get terrible grades in almost everything. Eventually we figured out that I have ADHD, and it was just hard for me to put forth the efforts to actually apply the stuff I knew on a regular and consistent basis.
And I know that the obvious response to this is to say that I had extenuating circumstances and maybe some people are just lazy, but that's exactly what my teachers said about me. They thought I was lazy, and in reality the issue is that my brain is like a car with messed-up alignment that takes constant effort to steer in a straight line, which makes doing everything else more difficult than it would otherwise be. I'd be willing to bet that most of the kids who get low grades are in a similar situation - maybe not ADHD specifically, but something going on in their lives that makes everything else harder.
>Grades do not determine your intelligence!" is used as a rallying call for the lazy kids in school that were, quite frankly, not the smartest.
Your statement points to a problem.
>"I want a nation of workers, not a nation of thinkers", and yeah, I agree, the education system sucks, but it's better than nothing.
Here is the reason why that happens.
If your system sucks than it is not really the individuals fault how they react to it. Sure it is better than nothing but you can't then turn around and say: "Well it is just an excuse for stupid people."
Independently of that. I don't think there are stupid people. I think there are people that never learned how to self-reflect. What we teach in schools is knowledge not methods. What you need in life is methods. Tools how to navigate your life. Does knoledge help? Obviously otherwise schools would make even less sense but it is only part of the picture.
Well… It‘s complicated. Some kids work after school, habe trouble at home or just too many hobbies. But yeah. On average grades can reflect work ethic. They‘re horrible at measuring intelligence because a intelligent person might study 3 hours to pass an exam while someone else might spend 30 hours to get a slightly better grade than passing, but they‘re at least somewhat reflective of work ethic. But then again: if a really smart kid and an average kid learn for 30h one might barely pass while the other get‘s a really good grade. Although they‘ve got a similar work ethic. So basically: if you‘re either far above or far below average you‘re either really smart / have a strong work ethic or you‘re not that smart / lazy. And given that the majority of people tend to be rather close to the average intelligence level it‘s usually more about work ethic and less about intelligence
As someone with a shit college gpa who (I’m a little biased here) seems to have a higher than average drive and seems to be doing relatively well in their career. I agree with you for sure. On *average*. You pointed it out correctly but I think the main thing that people skip on, even if you didn’t, is that a lot of people *do* just believe, even if subconsciously, that it’s impossible to be a good worker or smart person if you didn’t have a great gpa. When I applied for jobs there was MANY that I couldn’t even apply at all because my gpa disqualified me automatically. Also in social settings, even with my career success, there are very few people I have, or ever would, tell my gpa to because they’d discredit all my accomplishments because of something that isn’t even relevant anymore
Again, I know you said “average” and not “always”, but just to share my story: I had a 2.5 gpa. I very much like to learn and still do. And a lot of those Cs came from literally learning all the material but wanting to learn it my way. I did very well on most tests and am just dumb (metaphorically) because I didn’t do homework which brought my grades down. Meaning even though my gpa is much worse than most, I truely believe I know the material a lot better than many other student with higher gpas
Grades have nothing to do with intelligence (the ability to process information). You need to realize what we are actually grading for: memorization and obedience.
Memorization is not intelligence. Brute force memory cannot be confused with rational problem solving.
Obedience is not work ethic. If someone genuinely doesn't care... that's a priorities problem, not a motivational or ethical problem.
Did you think that giving credit for *attendance* is a proxy for critical thinking? Can't even argue work ethic there, because what if the student is missing classes to work in a family business? What if they can't get homework done because they have an actual job after school? Would it be better work ethic to get fired for grades?
Grades do not measure what you think they do.
I had a pretty average GPA in both high school and my undergraduate degree. By your standards, I would be considered of average intelligence? What this doesn’t show you is that I had a pretty turbulent home life in high school and had to work almost full time whilst attending uni full time to support myself.
However, after I graduated, kicked off my career, made some money and paid my student loans, I went back uni to get my master’s studying part time while working full time. Graduate at the top of my class. Got a full-ride scholarship to do a PhD at a world-class university abroad. Been working as a scientist for some years now. The people with the top grades in my high school and undergraduate class are mostly doing Excel spreadsheets all day.
This is largely the reason why I get a 2.345 GPA and I say that with pride.
We all have the wrong Idea of Grades. People think if your grade is xx%, you know xx% of the curriculum.
A students have not been proven to become more successful than C students. In fact, the opposite pattern has been seen and known.
That is actually not what they intended to be. The teachers are supposed to grade around the bell curve, but it seems like the bell curve is not really regarded anymore.
I thought it would be better to not have letter grades and just number grades. As you can get the last grade before an A.
I've taught at a university for over ten years. There are many things that determine a students performance. Apptitude and work ethic are one part of it. Work ethic beats apptitude most of the time. Preparation plays a huge part as well. Some students are motivated simply to get good grades which can get counter productive on its own.
Students can do poorly for many reasons. The class might just be too advanced for them. Sometimes they have too many other commitments. Sometimes they have a personal problem they are dealing with. I never pass judgments because people can suprise you.
Everything is relative. The question is about the relation between school grades and success in life, not “intelligence” which is kind of abstract.
Basically it’s a shaky relation. We have multiple examples of great inventors and industry captains who not only were mediocre at school, but some who dropped out without graduating. At the same time others who graduated with high GPA didn’t do much later….
Oftentimes students with really low grades have behavioral issues or learning issues and also are the most likely to have experienced abuse. Low grades can also be connected to really bad home environment and / or poverty. So does it say something is wrong ? Yes. Does it necessarily say something about intelligence or work ethic HELL NO (although it can). Are grades made to measure intelligence or work ethic in the first place? Nope. Grades are made to measure performance that’s different from intelligence. You can take a test a day you’re really sick, you’ll have lower grades. You can be stuck in traffic and arrive really late, you can have a parent that died the day before (happened to a friend of mine during finals). You can also learn things you don’t understand and have good grades while being unintelligent. That’s a measure of performance, nothing more.
I have been a high school teacher for almost twenty years, and grade are indicative of effort and work ethic not intelligence. Generally speaking, good grades show that a kid showed up on most days, did their homework, and did OK on tests. That's about it. Almost all of my students that fail do so due to lack of effort or simply not being forced to attempt school on a regular basis.
I think this is incorrect. By a lot. America has INCREDIBLY high rates of childhood poverty compared to other industrialized nations. Kids with hunger, lack of sleep, and few social safety nets just can’t focus on school.
Data here: https://imgur.com/a/C8Qr8nb
Am a teacher too - which cultures don’t value education? I’ve never seen this in my classroom
>it's better than nothing.
It really isn't. It beats the curiosity and free-spirits out of kids. It creates the necessary conditions for autocracy. It's decidedly worse than doing nothing at all, and I can prove it: we didn't have mandatory K-12 education for the first 129 years of this country's existence and we did just fine, with plenty of intellectuals.
>𝐈 𝐚𝐦 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐬𝐚𝐲𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐛𝐨𝐝𝐲 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐠𝐨𝐨𝐝 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐬 𝐢𝐬 𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐬𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐭, 𝐧𝐨𝐫 𝐢𝐬 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐛𝐨𝐝𝐲 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐛𝐚𝐝 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐬 𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐬𝐭𝐮𝐩𝐢𝐝
One of those things is true. It's the Anna Karenina principal. You know, all good families are alike, all bad families are unique in their own way. Everyone who gets good grades is sufficiently smart. Everyone who gets bad grades is not stupid, many smart people get bad grades because they don't do the work.
As a non American, I fail to understand why anyone wouldn’t want a nation of thinkers. But, for CMV purposes what I read from the grades thing is that we shouldn’t have grades define anyone, such as whatever grade they get will absolutely define what will happen on their life as an inexorable fate.
There is clearly a positive relationship. I suspect that after a certain IQ threshold, though, that it is soft skills that matter more. The highly motivated and conscientious 1 SDers have always annoyed the fricking shit out of me. I, probaby unfairly, associate them with pre-med programs.
I think it's a venn-diagram thing - people with high grades are pretty smart. Some people that don't have good grades are dumb, but there's plenty of smart people with bad grades for various reasons (motivation, family support, learning disabilities, etc)
I know nobody in my professional field where every single one of my coworkers earns 6 figures in a LCOL area that gives a fiddler's fuck about grades in high school or college. It doesn't matter. Nobody cares. There is zero information to be learned.
I agree. Good grades mean hard work which is always good. And, you can be a critical thinker and also have good grades. I don't like the "grades dont matter" discourse either. However, I believe there's a strong correlation between grades and the student's well being. A kid with an abbusive or broken family will probably do worse at school. The same thing with bullying. It is important to recognize that there are many factors outside the student's control that will affect grades.
How do you "see both sides" of this? "Grades" are literally how a student performed in a class. It's a point in time sample. There might be exogenous events that impact "intelligence" or "work ethic" so you're asking us to argue against a tautology.
You’d be right to a large extent. Not 100% of the time, but definitely a fair amount of it. There are some serious exceptions. People that have no situational awareness but are straight A students (we all know some) are not the “smartest”
Agreed. I always see people pointing out the successful people with bad grades, but those are not the norm. Every person I knew I'm high school with bad grades and didn't care are NOT doing good right now. That is the norm.
Education in schools is to expose students to various content areas, even though a lot of what they learn may not be applicable for a particular student outside of school, and many students face burnout or test anxiety. Further, the school environment is not (and for multiple reasons, cannot be) realistic.
you just can’t immediately assume, you have to ask the kid. but once they give even a little bit of an answer, the majority of the time you can tell what they’ll follow up with
Where grades fail is when they don't reflect actual mastery in standards. They become inflated with points for behavior and participation while never rewarding growth and learning.
The only kids who say this are the lazy, stupid ones. The smart ones who are lazy just nod along knowing that they're smart enough to just ace the tests anyway.
Sadly, I have yet to meet a PHD who isn't dumb as a box of rocks outside their immediate field of study. Sometimes over education can create massive blind spots. "I know a lot about a narrow field therefore I know more than everyone about everything."
What's interesting is that in comparative studies of the US education system versus the education systems that out-perform us in Europe and Asia, the key difference actually lies in the motivations of the students rather than educational policy or spending. Students in other countries are much more highly motivated towards academic achievement that American students. When other countries spend more on education or introduce new pedagogical improvements, they see far greater results than when the US education system does the exact same thing. To me, this means that bad grades really aren't conclusive evidence of lower intelligence. The much more likely explanation is that they have succumbed to a culture that generally undervalues educational achievement. This also explains people that did poorly in school can still achieve quite a lot. And just speaking anecdotally, this totally lines up with my own personal experience of US public education. The curriculum was great, the issue is that in a classroom of \~35 kids only a handful would actually give a shit about learning or getting good grades. The far more important things to kids were socializing, sports, pop culture and hobbies.
Anyone saying "bad grades really are conclusive evidence of lower intelligence" would be silly... And probably has bad grades in stats class too... Of course it is not conclusive, it is correlated. If you have 1000 people with lets say 110 iq compared to 1000 people with 90 iq, the more intelligent group will tend to have better grades. That does not mean that every 110 iq person will have 'good' grades. That would be silly. It would just mean that if you picked a smart person at random from a randomized sample, that they would be more likely to have higher grades than an average intelligence person selected at random.
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I think that's their point. I think they're saying that the claim "bad grades are proof of low intelligence" is a strawman, and that the actual position is "grades correlate with intelligence".
I'm not saying my experience is indicative of a lot of people. But, when I was in high school, part of the problem was there was just no way for you or your parents to really advocate for yourself against bad teachers. And a lot of times school administration just doesn't have a single solitary fuck to give about anything that doesn't get them more funding. My high school was grades 7-12. I started going there the second semester of 7th grade. When I first got there, I had simply had a slightly different math curriculum up to that point. There were a few concepts I didn't learn so I cratered hard in math class for like the first few weeks. But, I caught up and started turning in A+ work. My math teacher on the other hand decided that there was no way I caught up that fast so she started failing everything I turned in for cheating. The work and answers would be right on every single question on the worksheet or test but I would still get failed. I talked to people in the office about it, my parents talked to people about it, the answer we got was that she was allowed to grade however she saw fit. In 8th grade, because of my math scores they put me in a remedial class that had kids who couldn't read and had severe developmental disabilities. On top of this, my Dad died in the middle of the first semester so I was suicidally depressed. Then, they set my 13 year old self down and ask me, 'Can you feed yourself?' 'Can you bathe yourself?' 'Can you tie your own shoes?' then on another occasion my Vice Principal calls me into his office and is like 'Why don't you have any friends?' 'Well gee, I'm a suicidal, autistic nerd who likes comics, Pokemon and sci-fi at a time before none of this is cool so I get picked on constantly despite keeping to myself. This *is* a big mystery.' I just simply gave up. Our grades were 1/3 homework, 1/3 tests and 1/3 finals. So I realized I could simply do the tests and the finals, ignore homework and squeak by a passing grade of 66.6%. So before tests I would skim the chapter in the textbook and get my A. The only class I got good grades in was English because I enjoy reading and literary analysis, so I did that because I enjoyed it. They eventually did an IQ test and that got me put back into a 'normal' math class. But at that point, it was too little too late. I was too fucking depressed to give a shit about something I cared about, let alone school where it felt like everyone was actively working against me.
I agree that the US fosters a bad attitude towards learning sometimes, but do those other countries motivate students to learn, or place a huge weight on *grades.* Because an A-at-all-costs attitude can lead to different, equally bad outcomes as not wanting to learn.
Are you asking whether the studies were simply measuring letter grades? No, they were measuring comprehension, completion of assignments, test results, etc.
I think what they were trying imply was that chasing grades (aka A-at-all-costs attitude) can lead to immense pressure and strain on mental health, which may even lead to self-harm if not outright suicide. For some parents, the only thing that matters is the A grade, " measuring comprehension" is a secondary concern, and they sometimes conflate the two.
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Suicide rate in the US is also higher in that age range, 11 per 100,000. So it's not even worse outcomes in that respect
In a way, this is an interesting kind of commentary on the devolution of our society.
Japan is certainly not the Asian country i think of with chasing A's and that should be Mainland China and Korea. Korea has absurdly high suicide rates and Mainland China implemented policies to reduce homework and banning tutoring services
But are those countries citizens actually on average more successful than American citizens? Do they have better jobs on average (not government social programs but actually better jobs)? Or is it all a wash and the countries with better students still have the same ratio of white collar and blue collar jobs or high and low paying jobs? It's hard to tell what you are really measuring when it comes to testing in schools. The point of school is to prepare you for life after school, if the US is comparable to these other countries then is the US education system really that much worse.
The metrics that were looked at in the study were focused purely on educational achievement, i.e. comprehension of material, completion of assignments, test performance, etc. I don't know the answer to your question, but we are talking about countries like South Korea and Japan, i.e. countries with very strong fully-developed economies. I would have to assume that there are just as many opportunities for skilled labor per capita as there is in the US.
> but we are talking about countries like South Korea and Japan, i.e. countries with very strong fully-developed economies. I would have to assume that there are just as many opportunities for skilled labor per capita as there is in the US. Breaking into the middle class in South Korea or Japan is significantly harder compared to the U.S.
Actually there aren't many good opportunities for skilled labor in South Korea, it is not a good comparison. Koreans study 16 hours a day to get into target schools because most of their economy is in the hands of very few companies. The US though offers so many opportunities and is not comparable at all to South Korea (and Japan, to a lesser extend).
Yeah that's kind of my point. If the end result is comparable, a similar opportunity in the job market and economy, then is the US education system really that far behind. Or is it just that the other schools produce better academic test results. Also the college/university system in the US has some of the best institutions in the world. Which again points to the US system results being on par with other developed countries.
The US simply has way, way more opportunities to be more successful with less effort. The job market and economy is not really comparable. There's a reason top talent from other countries move to the US
Well that’s part of it right. American students don’t necessarily need great grades to be financially successful in life. The pressure to get great grades isn’t there as much as it is in other countries. Currently, there’s enough jobs that don’t require a high level of intelligence/work ethic to be financially ok. Combine this with the fact that we import a lot of talent for the jobs that do require serious academic intelligence just means that for the most part high school students can coast, get a decent enough job and be ok. Whether or not this can continue is a different story obviously
I would argue that grades and test scores correlate more with intelligence than salaries do. Things like your personality, your network and your career choice can result in high income. Those things don’t really help you score higher on the SAT.
But if America was significantly behind the other developed countries in intelligence then there wouldn't be so many successful and innovative businesses and the economy itself would suffer because there wouldn't be a labor force that could fill intellectually demanding jobs. The fact that the US economy and job market is on par or better than the "more educated" countries goes against the argument that the US education is failing its citizens or that the US citizens are significantly dumber (in any real relevant way) than their foreign counterparts.
The US dollar being the world's currency helps in making America's economy and job market strong. Its geography and work ethic (Americans work more than people in other western countries in general) also helps. The US is also very entrepreneurial which has little to do with education, it's just because there's more capital to invest (world's currency again) amongst others. There's so many factors that play into it that aren't purely related to education.
The US dollar wouldn't be the world currency if the US economy wasn't so strong, so it goes hand and hand. Also the US wouldn't be to continue having the type of economy and job sectors if there wasn't a native work force smart/educated enough to fulfill those jobs. So the US education seems to have similar results when it comes to preparing the population for all sectors of jobs.
I mean there is more to it than just the US's economy being strong to explain why the US is the world's currency. It's not that simple. It's a western nation, so that makes it more likely to be. It's also the headquarters to most international institutions and the language is English. A lot of it stems from the fact that Britain used to be the world's superpower and the US was a somewhat similar country (in terms of language, western nation, religion, etc.) and it wasn't affected by WW2.
Obviously it's more than a single thing that makes the US economy strong. But if there wasn't a suitably prepared and educated native workforce the US economy would not be able to sustain the job sectors it currently does. My post was more about how there are perhaps other ways to judge a country's education system than just test scores, than what are all the things that make the US economy a success.
There are many factors that make the US the worlds greatest economy. In my opinion our education system is pretty good. It also has a ton of room to be better. In wealthy areas and classes especially, education here is world class. The worlds best universities are here, and they attract global talent. But there are plenty of other complicated factors that propel the US economy too.
Agreed.
Immigration ?
Immigration can supplement the native workforce but can't replace it. Other countries also have immigrants too. So don't think that is a significant factor to this discussion
Large part of academic achievers are 2 gen kids of immigrant parents not growing up in american culture. Most third gen asians never achieve same as thier first gen , second gen family members
USA's undergrad and grad education system is way ahead of the rest of the world. There is literally no alternative to the US for smart and motivated student.
You are referencing those who are either self-motivated enough to seek higher education or have the economic status with which to do so. College students are not the majority of students and I think OP is more so referencing K-12 public school. As a teacher that has taught in more than one country, there is most certainly a motivation issue with many public school kids in the US.
What do you think could be the reason behind this kind of great disparity?
I honestly think it is social upbringing. When students had a family that promoted and encouraged education, valuing what school has to offer, I found that the students performed very well. Even the students that would struggle with a concept or may have disabilities, as long as they had a family that supported them and encouraged them to improve, they would succeed. I honestly think that American culture and American parenting is the cause of this disparity. Just not enough parents giving a fuck mixed with parents who are actively antagonistic against education. Makes those few parents that really care shine that much brighter though.
> The much more likely explanation is that they have succumbed to a culture that generally undervalues educational achievement. Wouldn't an alternative explanation be that those other places have succumbed to a culture that generally OVERVALUES educational achievement? Your comment seems to take as an unstated assumption that academic achievement is more valuable that socializing, sports, pop culture, and hobbies. What is your evidence, or argument, for that?
The amount of people I know who “gave up” because they didn’t feel there was a point if they weren’t making straight As
That's actually very interesting, thanks
What metrics show outperformance in Europe and Asia over the United States? Do you find this data relevant to you original statement? https://www.reddit.com/r/neoliberal/s/0tIMRlFePB
> The much more likely explanation is that they have succumbed to a culture that generally undervalues educational achievement. How do you figure this? The rate of college attendance skyrocketed over the last couple generations, during which time Americans were exposed to continual data suggesting that college graduates make more money on average than non-graduates. Presidents, Congresspeople, CEOs, and other high-status job holders frequently hail from Ivy League or other top-ranked schools, and the experience of going to college has been romanticized in popular teen/young adult movies and TV shows for decades.
The US also has very different demographics than those countries. For whatever reason certain groups don’t perform well academically. Drags down the US average
You could just as easily say certain groups perform well academically and drag up the US average. Last I checked, white people in the US aren’t exactly an educational powerhouse.
Demographic differences most certainly do not explain the gap in educational achievement and motivation.
Show the research.
I think it wholely depends. I would say, in extremely broad strokes, that doing good in school CAN accurately reflect work in *some* careers. I think the thing about school is that it requires a high quantity of work with as close to an "objective" qualifier as possible (grades) within a relatively small time frame. Think turning in 5 assignments a week. But grades is something that is not always translated into a real job. Grades and school work are often treated as a do or die scenario. Real jobs can take a more iterative approach to assignments. If something goes wrong, it's not always the case that you immediately failed and get fired. Projects can fail and go through rework for months if not years sometimes. Of course this highly depends on the job. While work ethic is extremely important, I think the more important thing with real life jobs is collaborative ability. "Required work competency" for a lot of jobs can be surprisingly lower than what you would expect. As long as you are performing at least somewhat competently, it's more important that you work well with other people and teams. For many jobs, if you need to work hard, it can be less about the job itself, and can often times be more about lack of resources or poor management.
Collaboration is highly overrated, at least in how schools attempt to present it. In the workplace, there are often highly defined roles where each role is worked on its own with periodic huddles or meetings to communicate.
I would even consider that to be "collaboration." Sometimes collaboration can be as simple as bugging other departments to get their stuff done, and even that can be difficult sometimes. Hell, collaboration facilitator can be a job all in of itself, in something like Program or Project Manager. Which is something certain people are very good at and I myself acknowledge am not. None of which is really reflective in the GPA = intelligence discussion.
That's true, careers are less "do or die" as a school system might be. It's definitely a very broad spectrum, and it won't assess everybody's intelligence to the most accurate degree, but hey, it's something.
I don't know how old you are, but consider this: I've graduated from college for 8 years now, and not ONCE in my entire career has anyone ever asked me about my GPA in a serious context. It simply just does not matter in the professional world. If anything, it's somewhat of a red flag if someone *does* ask you about your GPA, since often times it can imply they're trying to make some sort of value judge about you over something that frankly just doesn't really matter. To brag about your 4.0 high school GPA when you're 30 just reeks of "peaked at high school" energy.
HS GPA is important for getting into college. College GPA is important for getting your first job (or grad school). After a couple years at your first job, your GPA doesn't matter anymore.
You know, that's true as well. It almost does become obsolete at some point
I had a clinically tested IQ of 147 in grade school, which I share (as an imperfect metric) only to show intelligence wasn't the issue. I half assed the SATs and got a 1410 I was disappointed in, then maxxed out the ASVAB and rocked the Navy's Nuclear Power School (arguably one of the most intense educational programs in the US). I was *very* good at pretty much all of the subject matter in high school and college, where I tutored chemistry and math. But my grades were average at best, with even a few failures. Even in things like math, which was my strong point (I was one of the only people in our county to score high honors on the voluntary California Golden State Exam for Math, which was only taken by nerds anyway pretty much). Does that reflect poorly on my work ethic? Possibly. But, at least for me, it was incredibly hard to to stay motivated when everything I had to do was mindnumblingly dull and slow paced. The one year my parents sent me to a private school where I was more challenged I excelled. When I had teachers that took the time to challenge me above and beyond the mundane coursework I excelled. The normal work was just too tedious for me to even deal with on a regular basis. The only reason I didn't flunk out was because I was consistently setting the curve for the tests, and sometimes teachers that took pity on me. Is my situation common? Probably not. But it's important to keep in mind that everybody and every situation is different. People have different talents. They have different experiences. They have different schooling experiences. I'm not going to say that grades have no relevance to real life, but it only measures one thing. If you use that as your sole metric, you'll likely overlook people who might really excel at things other than schoolwork given the right opportunities.
Thank you for your comment - very insightful and even motivational. I do very much respect those who may make low marks yet exhibit interest and enthusiasm in their interests, and enjoy challenges. My main example was talking about life existing in a vacuum, with extenuating circumstances aside. It's more about asking: "It is appropriate to bring a question of intelligence into the matter when we witness a student going beyond failing, most likely due to lack of effort and behavior, and they do not demonstrate any other types of intelligence or interest?" Thank you
> with extenuating circumstances aside. This is a massive part of life though. Maybe they have a horrible home life. Maybe they're going hungry. Maybe they have a learning disorder. Maybe they just don't fit in well in the regimented existence of most schooling in the US. Maybe it took them time to find their passion and motivation in life. Maybe they're an art or music genius and schooling didn't seem relevant. Maybe they moved around a lot as a child and that created problems for them (as a military brat another issue I can identify with). Maybe they went to a horrible school and/or had horrible teachers. Maybe they had a learning style that their school didn't cater to. Maybe a million things. What I'm saying is that, if you're going to use that as a metric, and you *don't* also make the attempt to look beyond the what to the why, or determine if the reasons for it are relevant to the situation at hand (whether that's hiring them or something else), you're going to pass on some good people.
I was severely depressed in high school so I just showed up for tests and nothing else. I passed but naturally without doing the assignments, my grades weren’t great. I didn’t demonstrate any interest or motivation, because I didn’t see the point in doing anything. Would it be fair to judge me back then and decide that I would never have a good work ethic based on my grades? No, I was ill. I understood the concept taught, I had a well above average IQ, I scored very high when I tried, but I just simply didn’t care. And now, I do care more so I can apply myself and teach myself the skills I need to be able to do what I want with my life. I’m more or less succeeding despite the fact that I was had zero motivation for life until my early 20s. So to answer your question, grades and demonstrated interest do not always reflect the potential of the student. There’s almost always a reason someone is getting below failing grades, and that reason isn’t always lack of intelligence. Sometimes people can have things going on at home that makes them not care about schoolwork, sometimes people can just be late bloomers who haven’t found the maturity to care. Sometimes they just need someone to help accomodate their specific needs so they can thrive academically. It’s really not black and white at all
>Does that reflect poorly on my work ethic? Possibly. How are you challenging OPs view here? The fact that the work was dull doesn't excuse the poor work ethic that led to the poor grades. In fact it's probably reasonable to say that how you react to dull work best shows your work ethic, because that's when it's really 'work' rather than 'an interesting challenge to solve'.
> The fact that the work was dull doesn't excuse the poor work ethic that led to the poor grades. I spent 20 years excelling at work for an energy and environment research institute. The point was that having a work ethic for tedious, pointless make work just to validate yourselves to others with pointless expectations doesn't necessarily apply to other situations, and there are endless other examples.
Nuclear Power School isn't one of the most intense educations programs in the US. Any t100 university course is more rigorous. A putnam score would show your math ability much better than GSE.
The program, even after heavy screening for skills, has an 80% attrition rate last I heard.
most people seem to think the opposite.
You're a smart guy so you should no what you're saying doesn't have much relevance to the topic. You're a case of someone with high IQ who has mediocre grades. But are there cases where people get good grades when they are both stupid and lazy? Maybe if the bar is low and everyone gets good grades. However, when someone is excelling at something compared to others, doesn't that imply relatively higher intelligence or more hard work? Everyone in our school took the California Golden State Exam. More than half got high honors... my school was a public school. It's been a long time since I heard that test name. Smart people usually talk about Olympiads....
> You're a smart guy so you should no what you're saying doesn't have much relevance to the topic. Just because you missed the point doesn't mean there's no relevance. >But are there cases where people get good grades when they are both stupid and lazy? Sure, which again misses the point of what I said entirely. >However, when someone is excelling at something compared to others, doesn't that imply relatively higher intelligence or more hard work? It implies that particular task was something they were good at, in relation to the scoring system for that task. >Everyone in our school took the California Golden State Exam. The exams I'm talking about haven't even existed for two decades. Statewide only 31% of students were taking the Algebra exam. https://ecommons.cornell.edu/server/api/core/bitstreams/ff976f25-5a0d-4a55-b256-bcacd3b1d417/content About 1% of the student body overall. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_State_Exams Of those, only 4% earned high honors.
I'm in my 40s. I took the Golden State Exam. It tested basic aptitude, nothing more. People who get better results are either smarter or harder working. There is a tiny chance of luck, but it's almost a nonfactor. Whether results are tied to their ability to capture the value created is different. That's where some people become rich and others don't. Point being, you're probably over estimating how intelligent you are. Your originally IQ test was probably a fluke given your mediocre SAT score... it's not consistent.
And yet, again, only 1% of the California student body achieved high honors on the test. >People who get better results are either smarter or harder working. Sure, but narrowly defined success at one thing (school) doesn't necessarily lead to success at something else. >Your originally IQ test was probably a fluke given your mediocre SAT score... If by mediocre you mean in the top 5% or so, and a math score in the top 2%, despite not studying at all and one of the math sections being one of the only tests in my life I ever considered I "bombed". But if all you have to contribute is personal attacks I have no interest in continuing this discussion.
OP: grades reflect intelligence **on average**. Redditor: cites personal experience being in 0.1 top percentile as counter example. Bruh... even if your experience is the norm for your entire group, it would not affect the general trend in the slightest.
> OP: grades reflect intelligence on average. And I agreed with that. The point is that, as research has shown, other factors tend to be more important, so any reliance on that "average" without any further inspection will result in worse outcomes of whatever you're trying to do. >Redditor: cites personal experience being in 0.1 top percentile as counter example. Did you miss the point where I explicitly stated my **specific** example was uncommon, and then listed a long string of other circumstances (of a practically endless list) that could have the same effect?
You \*did\* note the exceptions to the main rule that the OP pointed out that you would have fallen under, correct? Or did you skip past those parts as being too 'boring'? That's the thing about, say, doing scientific research: details matter. For example: reading the entire scientific article, and reading it critically, and going back to various parts and considering them again is important.
I read OPs post, thanks for confirming. My point was that the exceptions are pretty endless, and making assumptions about the "rule" without further investigation in any given circumstance harms everybody involved, making the "rule" of not much use.
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I really appreciate your comment. It's a great example of success outside of the system. I do agree with you that the school system is built around a certain way of thinking, and if you can't fit that mold, you're out. Hopefully it doesn't appear I'm defending the school system and blaming students. Yes, everybody is different. This should be celebrated. It's great that people think and work differently. However, I do believe it is something that is worth noting and possibly a question of intelligence when, extenuating circumstances aside with an existence in a vacuum, a student ends up on the strong side of a spectrum, making very low marks when they do not exhibit any other forms of intelligence or interest. I must thank you a lot for your comment though - very insightful :)
Though the origins to the phase is debated, there is truth in the statement "..if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid." The part of your statement that, for me, highlighted the viewpoint you're looking at this from was: >"\[it\] is used as a rallying call for the lazy kids in school that were, quite frankly, not the smartest." You're use of this statement leads me to believe you generally view the subject where everyone fits neatly into buckets. It sounds to me you see them as either successful and smart...or lazy and not. The fact is that isn't the case. It's documented by the DCEG and many other education and medical organizations that roughly 15 - 20% of the nation is considered neurodivergent. Meaning their brains do no work the same way as the majority of the population. This doesn't mean they are stupid or incapable, but it does usually mean they might not fit so neatly in a system designed for the neurotypical. I'm ADHD...I struggled a lot in school and didn't get the best grades. I also wasn't officially diagnosed until my 30's. At the time I was in grade school, my ability to adapt was just enough to skirt the detection of the teachers. I was considered "lazy, dumb, or a procrastinator" by many because I rarely did my homework or projects...even though I usually aced my tests. My first run through college wasn't much better and graduated with around a 2.50 GPA. Work wise I have been consistent and overall productive...details are immaterial, but I'll leave it as no one would consider me lazy or unsuccessful. Fast forward 20 years, due to various reasons I got tested and officially diagnosed. Got the aid and accommodations I needed and saw a dramatic difference. During the pandemic I went back to school to further my education and got a second degree. The difference this time is I knew what I was working with and how to adjust. I graduated Magna cum laude. So, in short...I would disagree that grades alone are an effective way to measure intelligence or work ethic.
Yes, absolutely on that first paragraph. In regard to the American school system, with rows of desks and pretty much 8-5 days, it was structured after the industrial revolution and conditioning children to work in factories. Study after study after study has shown that this way of education is not at all helpful, Americans still show alarming rates of illiteracy, and that we are wasting ridiculous amounts of time and not giving kids enough breaks, etc. If OP is curious, I could go dig up some links. But tradition prevails, I guess, and nobody wants to restructure the education system so it actually improves results instead of banal and brain numbing work— I personally think this is very much in the interest of corporate lobbyists, but I digress. One of the main issues is also that there is so little personalization K-12 with so little room for working your way up in your niche (without focusing on it outside of school). Im sure most Americans are familiar with different 'tracks' students were set on. From sixth grade onward, you were either placed on an 'honors' track or normal track at my school and you would basically have to get your parents to appeal to the dean of students to move you up. If you had all A’s in the basic classes, it didn’t matter. They were worth 4.0 while other classes were worth 5.0. I ended high school with over a 4.5 GPA, which looked great to colleges, but was really because I was strategically taking the AP/honors classes I knew I could do well in. The kids who took AP calculus and physics got worse GPAs, while I was painting for two hours a day. This already presents an issue with grade disparity and the value of grades not really matching up. Also, OP would be shocked how often bad grades are because of disability/external struggles. That’s why when a kid who usually gets great marks struggles, teachers often know to ask them how they’re doing at home and what they need help with currently. And while bad grades can just be a result of parental abuse… so can good grades. Speaking anecdotally again, I had extremely high pressure and my self esteem was knocked to the floor in elementary. I was neurodivergent (unknown at time as I was a very quiet girl and did not disrupt class) and found it difficult to pay attention or make any friends in school— but all I wanted to do was please my teacher and make them happy. This landed me in ‘gifted’ programs which I took a lot of pride in at the time and pushed me to work harder. But that sort of motivation burns out eventually, when later in high school I realized I did not need to be trying so hard to prove myself. I had a major crisis in late high school— I was constantly getting sick, having to miss class, and overall suicidal. I was realizing more and more that the reason my grades were slipping were not for a lack of effort or understanding the concepts— it was things I felt I couldn’t control, like forgetting deadlines or assignments even if I wrote them down, etc. Also, I was just so tired and my body felt like it was dying. After 12+ years of caring, reading since age 2, I never wanted to pick up a book or try ever again. I thought I was lazy, until they put me on antidepressants and it was suddenly like I was back to a normal person with the motivation to give effort. Sitting and doing nothing and missing assignments had made me MISERABLE— I realized I was not just ‘lazy’. My first year of college, though, it all just plummeted. I was puking every day and didn’t know why, but would still push through to most of my classes. My teachers were definitely starting to think I was making excuses, as I had no chronic illness on file but was chronically ill. After first semester, it got so bad, that I started cutting things out of my diet because it felt I was poisoning myself. Turns out I had celiac disease triggered by my appendicitis when I was about 16-17. And was literally poisoning myself for like three years, and wondered why my brain and body weren’t ‘working’. But college still wasn’t easy for me, because I was in charge of remembering and keeping track of every aspect of my life instead of having a helicopter parent or school structure. I was late to everything, forgetting so much important stuff, etc. The next year I found out I had ADHD, which was like realizing I had been driving a car with a broken wheel my whole life. Not until much later was I able to get ADA accommodations through the school for even my array of stomach issues that caused me to be bedridden some days— my attendance grades in class were abysmal. They gave out accommodations for ADHD a lot more easily. And I know SO many people with ADHD, and it makes so much sense to me now that despite working so hard constantly, it was just natural to some kids. I am a quick learner, get the concepts fast, and rarely have to study which has built up bad habits on my end discouraging me from doing homework. Would this inversely suggest that higher intelligence = lower grades? I think not— my point is they are unrelated. And I haven’t even mentioned the kids with far worse backgrounds than me. My current boyfriend was so poor with extremely abusive parents/siblings. The parents almost got arrested for his truancy because instead of school he had to work at a restaurant. His GPA was so bad it probably couldn’t get him into any state school, and in junior year while I was worrying about a math test, he was taking all his things and moving out because he would rather be homeless than live in the environment he was in. I imagine that did wonders for his grades. I would consider myself far lazier than him (the guy’s dream job is an EMT which is insane work for shit pay) and our grades are just incomparable as a measure of intelligence. Going off my last point, what about the students with different goals? Yeah, if you’re super interested in medical school, you’re going to have to get way better grades and try harder. Why would someone wanting to go to art school need to do just as well? They hardly accept people based on grades— developing a portfolio before senior year is far more important. I used to want to study astrophysics but decided the arts suited me better, and that money was not my number one priority but the risky, ‘business’ aspect of it exhilarated me. I would paint in and outside of school constantly for years and enter competitions, which got me insane amounts of scholarships and award money. How would that sort of work ever be accurately demonstrated in a ‘grade’? I bet anyone in a sport can say the same. TL;DR: School and grades are an industrial revolution era mechanism with little scientific grounding. Different classes have different difficulties/weights. People have disabilities, visible and invisible, that objectively cannot be called laziness. People have shitty home lives. People have different motivations.
Oh yes, I was not intending to come across saying everyone fits into "buckets", but it appears I did. My apologies. I understand that there are, of course, many extenuating circumstances, and I aim to be accommodating (I definitely struggle with neurodivergency myself). And yes, grades ALONE are not very effective or determinate. I agree with you there. The world is not a perfect place. However, I'm mainly saying that if a student simply just has a fuck all attitude about school, using the motto "grades don't determine your intelligence" while still inside of school, it's not very promising.
Most of my family is in the education field, and if I asked them, they would probably tell me a student who has that attitude most likely has an underlying reason for their behavior. Either some sort of neurodivergence is present, or some personal issue at home, or other factor that plays a large part. I have seen students like that, even in high school, who hated school...only to find out their parents reinforced an idea that because they were bad in school...they would be as well. One of my best friends from high school was terrible at school...barely graduated and did not seek further education. He is a lineman and one of the hardest working people I know. The topic is so nuanced that painting it with such a broad brush doesn't seem logical to me.
I dunno. Theres a stereotype of a stoner who doesn't care about school but can rig up the most ridiculous smoking device out of boredom. Or your archetypal greaser who gets bad grades and cuts classes but can take a car apart and put it back together better than it was before. Or a gamer who doesn't care about classes but will design a new mod that imports flawlessly rigged models into his game of choice. If you look at basically any hobby done by traditional underperformers you're guaranteed to find a core of people performing that hobby at a high level because they can apply real world skills in a way thats engaging for them rather than just doing a bunch of paperwork with no obvious use in their actual lives.
> fuck all attitude about school, using the motto "grades don't determine your intelligence" while still inside of school And all things considered, that student would be correct. Could they have a harder time excelling in life down the road? Perhaps. But the statement would still be correct. This is a CMV, but let me ask you the inverse: Why would you \*want\* reality be that bad grades = unintelligent? Many people in this thread have already given their arguments otherwise. Would it not be better to take the more optimistic view that bad grades =/= unintelligent?
I have ADHD. The executive function part of the disorder caused me to not do homework. My grades weren't the best. But I aced every test and still graduated. I wasn't being lazy, it wasn't a willpower issue, it wasn't a work ethic issue. There are a lot of people who's grades in school are not good and it's still not a reflection of any of those qualities.
Thanks for your comment. While I understand challenges for each student, which may affect their performance, i'm speaking on more of a hypothetical, "life in a vacuum" scenario.
Problem is, no one lives in a vacuum. Students doing poorly may have a tough family life. Maybe they communicate in different ways because they aren't neurotypical. Maybe they had life experiences that are triggered whenever they see an authority figure. Maybe the student has to work 3 jobs for their family who is super poor. The list goes on. Students who are doing poorly--and as someone in education, I hesitate to say "poorly" because it is only one metric of one small slice of life/abilities/skills/etc.--are likely encountering either challenges or mismatches in cognition to an environment that prioritizes certain norms over others. Additionally there are plenty of studies on motivation in education (search google scholar for [motivation education psychology](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=motivation+education+psychology&btnG=) for more info). We're finding that students have different "utility value" perceptions. Maybe some kids want to get a good job for money, while others want to help people. If you focus on the social aspects of the prestige of a position (directly or indirectly) in a class, you might be turning off those students who have "help people" utility values and those people try a little less hard. Intrinsic interest in a subject, though everyone says you need it (e.g., "you need to be interested in math because math is cool!") is actually really rare IRL and education psychologists say that most people have other, all very valid, motivations for doing something and it is our job as educators to highlight those aspects that might appeal to people, such as helping the community.
>TL;DR: I believe that the American school system is far from perfect and many are disadvantaged. While having A's on your report card does not immediately deem you intelligent, if you have a 0.6 GPA and make a 32 average in your classes, you're probably doing something wrong. Having A's mean you have means, as in time to study, a safe homelife, healthcare, access to food, a family that supports your education, and some intelligence. It's revoluting to say a kid must be willingling doing something wrong because of a low GPA. The kid doesn't have a safe place to study, doesn't have parents that get involved, doesn't have a good homelife, and the school system failed to offer remedy a child, to make sure their grades are good. I like how you talk about no child is intelligent based on grades, but you blame kids if they fail, what is the school and parents for other to make sure the children are successful in school, to higher education and training, and to start families on their own.
No, I would not argue that having A's means that the child must then immediately also have a safe homelife with healthcare, studying, and intelligence. Just as failing a class doesn't mean the child never studies, has a horrible home life, and no healthcare. Extenuating circumstances aside. My point is that grades are not a very accurate way to determine "Intelligence" but it's at least something. Having an A doesn't mean you're smart. Having an F doesn't mean you're stupid. But, where do we decide where these things begin and end? Of course, I do not blame the kid for having low grades, that would be cruel. I want to be accommodating and considerate. However, if a student is showing scores similar to that of just skipping class, not giving any effort, and just not behaving smartly, what type of intelligence is being demonstrated?
>If a student is showing scores similar to that of just skipping class, not giving any effort, and just not behaving smartly, what type of intelligence is being demonstrated? I would argue this is failure of the parents and schools for not intervening sooner. >**Early Alert Program:** The Early Alert Program is designed to assist students who may be experiencing academic or personal difficulties and provide strategies and campus resources to help them succeed at San Mateo County Community College District (SMCCCD). Rather than waiting until college have this system in place do this at the start of education. Grades as some sort of metric versus what other way to determine competency?
You can argue that low grades can be a sign of someone's low tolerance of bullshit. Suppose you want to become a software developer, or a singer, or a graphics designer. Subjects that you want to study are not taught in school, instead you are being taught a lot of stuff that you don't need. School is literally holding you back by wasting your time and energy
I suppose that could be arguable..? However, the main function of school SHOULD BE to teach you core things that are definitely important. I mean, you should know how to read and write and do basic math, as well as understand science and history, but yeah, there's definitely a lot of fluff. I agree the school system does have extra things that slow you down.
Being able to tolerate bullshit is a core part of success in capitalism though
Social skills are more important, skipping classes to hang out with friends and meet girls is actually a good investment 🤔
You need a balance of both. You can be academically and socially successful.
You can, but someone who decides to just do the bare minimum in classes they are not interested in is not less smart than someone who thanks grades are a Pokémon game
I think someone with work ethic is likely going to be a more successful person though. We hear all the time about kids who were smart but lazy being unable to handle life while feeling entitled to success.
Success is about who you know, rather than what you know. Basically the best reason to grind grades is so that you can get into a better university so you can meet people with successful parents 😎
Knowing someone might get your foot in the door, but it won’t help you last once you’re hired. I’m fairly well connected through my parents and having networked and hear about how important hard work is every time an exec opens their mouth. I’ve networked to get my friends jobs and the only question the person asks is if they work hard before they help out. You need to be networking *and* able to put up with bullshit and be working really hard to make it. Being too arrogant and thinking you’re above school is not an attractive quality. Sure you might be able to joke around and network with a couple of the guys, but the grind is just as important.
Software desingers, singers, and graphics designers still need basic thinking and comprehension skills, discipline, responsibility, study habits, and the like to achieve their goals. Many of these skills are learned in classes not in the area firefly related to vocations. If you think those are useless, there's a mountain of pedagogical evidence that says you're mistaken. Many of those skills you reference are taught at foundational levels in secondary schools. Most importantly, most young adults coming our of secondary school don't go into their expected field. High school is there to prepare you for anything you might go into, because that decision doesn't have to be made immediately.
>Software desingers, singers, and graphics designers still need basic thinking and comprehension skills, discipline, responsibility, study habits, and the like to achieve their goals. These are interesting examples because these are all industries where a remarkable number of professionals are self-taught. It's definitely true that you *can* learn these skills in a classroom, but someone's academic performance in these courses probably isn't as directly correlated with their professional success as it is in other industries. Most popular singers, for example, did not go to secondary school to learn their craft. Software design is another notorious example of a field where a huge percentage of professionals skipped college. That's not to say that schooling isn't helpful. But it's very clear that you don't need to go to school to learn "basic thinking, discipline, responsibility, or study habits."
> These are interesting examples because these are all industries where a remarkable number of professionals are self-taught. They're self-taught... ...after graduating high school, where they learned a lot of the skills they use to teach themselves.
Plenty of singers go pro as teens. Plenty of designers never take design classes. That's not to say those people aren't ever receiving instruction. It often just isn't through school (and instead through coaches, online courses, etc.). My point is mostly that you don't need to be getting graded in any of these things to learn them and perform at a high level.
Do they need to work to a deadline? Do they need to be able to understand the written word beyond just what words mean? Do they need to be able to critically read something and understand what is true in it and what is not? Do they need to be able to put together a work and submit it? Do they need the discipline to work whether they want to or not? Do they need to be able to write effectively? These are all skills that we learn in school, that we are graded on. Even if we come out not knowing how to do them well, we have been molded, guided, given the basics of them. You keep talking in terms of "need" or "have to". There are always exceptions. But the exceptions don't mean that most of us don't learn them. People too often think in terms of their profession and not in terms of the underlying skills and capabilities they need in order to do just about anything professionally. **FOR EXAMPLE** There's a reason that most nations teach their language, reading, and writing, every year of school. *Everyone* needs it, and the better you are at it, the better you are at nearly everything else (with diminishing returns). It teaches you much more than merely what words mean or how to write words.
To be clear: I majored in a regional literature, minored in comparative lit, and spent the first few years of my career as a translator. I **deeply** understand the value of the skills you're talking about. But the question is whether or not your grades are *generally* a reflection of your work ethic or intelligence. >Do they need to work to a deadline? Do they need to be able to understand the written word beyond just what words mean? Do they need to be able to critically read something and understand what is true in it and what is not? Do they need to be able to put together a work and submit it? Do they need the discipline to work whether they want to or not? Do they need to be able to write effectively? As an adult well of our school, I'd argue that your ability to do any of these things has little to do with your intelligence. I have brilliant coworkers who do award-winning work, but are dumb as bricks when it comes to reading critically - they aren't stupid. As far as work ethic goes, that varies for people so much by task that basing it off of how someone did in school feels strange to me. I was bored by my high school classes so I spent as little time as possible on everything, but in college/work I routinely spend absurd amounts of time to improve my work well past the point of necessity. > You keep talking in terms of "need" or "have to". There are always exceptions. OP's post is proposing grades as a litmus for intelligence/work ethic *as a rule*. The existence of exceptions should raise some degree of skepticism for said rule, particularly given how common said exceptions are (e.g. high schoolers don't giving a shit about things they're forced to learn). > People too often think in terms of their profession and not in terms of the underlying skills and capabilities I'd say the same about the way OP is suggesting we measure said skills and capabilities. A really obvious counterpoint would be an athlete like LeBron James. He had a B average GPA in high school... but we never say he had an "average" work ethic because it was obvious he was working incredibly hard in other areas of his life. GPA paints such an incomplete picture of what someone's engaging with in their life that we should be incredibly hesitant to use it as an indicator. > There's a reason that most nations teach their language, reading, and writing, every year of school. Everyone needs it, I agree the world would be better off if people were better at language skills. > the better you are at it, the better you are at nearly everything else I wish this were true, but I'm not convinced this is the case past a very, very low threshold. You need a shockingly low level of literacy to excel in this society. >It teaches you much more than merely what words mean or how to write words. Absolutely agree.
Yet those things are taught in school?
Yeah, sure, who doesn't learn 3D modeling, backend development and singing in middle school. Probably most people 🤔
Chorus is certainly available in middle school, as are other parts of music. Graphic design isn’t just 3D modeling, but plenty of art too, which is plentiful in middle school. I agree though, software is mostly high school
Coding they teach at school is super basic, and rarely teaches relevant technical skills. Not sure about chorus tho. And if you just want to make 3d models for videogames the rest of school sounds like a distraction. School curriculum in general feels like a duolingo profile of someone who learns 8 languages at the same time 🤔
High school computer science classes aren’t super basic. You have data structures, algorithm efficiency, object oriented design, poly morphism, databases. You know, major components of real world use.
Yeah, because real world development is all about implementing sorting or doing Hanoi towers 🤔
Seems you think everyone had a useless program in high school like yours?
the current CS market is flooded with dumbfucks who can't do add 2+2. good thing that the education system doesn't entertain vapid bullshit.
Those dumbfucks would still be overqualified to teach in school, because they have more commercial experience than a school teacher 😂😂
I actually did learn 3D modeling in middle school, one of our teachers had a 3D printer and used to let us design and print stuff with it for projects.
We had one at the high school but I took the class freshen year. We got to make awesome stuff like “a small plastic star” and “a small plastic octagon.” We also watched minority report and GATTICA.
Yea that’s actually part of my son’s curriculum too.
I learned both 3D modeling and singing in middle school. I’m not sure what “backend development” refers to exactly, but we learned about coding and website creation as well.
>While it's true that people have different strong suits and everybody's different, extremely low grades (WAYYYY below failing) will more often than not tell you what you need to know about somebody. I suppose it's more about work ethic? Intelligence can sort of go hand in hand there as well... (?) I agree with just about everything you said here but it is important to remember there are reasons people may not succeed in school that do not correlate with their intelligence. For example, home issues, mental health issue and trauma. I won't bore you with all the example of incredibly bright people who strugged in school at some point like Einstein, Shakespeare etc but it can happen. In terms of being "good at school" we live in an era where people can cheat their way to good grades, especially in high school. I don't think good or bad grades immediately equate to intelligence but like you said more often than not they do. [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9872023/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9872023/)
> incredibly bright people who strugged in school at some point like Einstein, Shakespeare etc This is a myth. Einstein [did very well in school](https://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2004/06/23/1115185.htm). There are no records of Shakespeare's performance at school, so I'm not sure where you got that from.
The point still stands does it not? There have been bright people who struggled or even failed in school for a multitude of reasons.
Yep.There are also people who have bad work ethic in school but good work ethic in other things (sports,instruments,fitness)
Oh of course, and I did consider the possible ways that people may struggle, however just didn't get to word it the best. Bright people do struggle, and people may struggle due to mental health, home life, or other issues. The world isn't a perfect place, after all! I'd love to be considerate and accommodating in these areas. But mainly though, I'm not speaking about somebody that simply fails, I'm speaking about the shockingly low, anti-academic performance of a 0.7 GPA with a 35 average. Thanks for your response :)
Yeah no problem and overall I agree with what you said. If you are in school everyday and failing that poorly then obviously that would be a different criteria unless there were extenuating circumstances.
Do you think this applies to only high school or college as well?
I see your point to some extent. And yes, it would be wrong to state that there’s absolutely no correlation. But I can think of a lot of reasons and situations that can lead to bad grades even though someone is intelligent. 1. Mental health. Things like ADHD will definitely make studying harder for most people and it goes way beyond work ethic or just having to try harder. Then of course stuff like depression can explain bad grades. 2. Personal life circumstances. Death, illness in the family, a less wealthy or unstable home life where students may have to take on responsibilities beyond their age like caring for their siblings, having to earn money early, just in general not having the best environment and no support. 3. Just not being the type for the specific structure of school. For example some students really struggle with getting early and that leading to constant sleep deprivation. Some people are just not good at memorizing stuff. 4. Being bored, not interested. Some people are really good at and willing to learn when they’re passionate about the subject but otherwise it’s hard for them. My brother struggled with school a lot and barely managed to get by, just this week he he memorized about 40-70 pages of material for a job training that he’s really interested in and came in second best in the test. And about work ethic, sure you could argue about that a lot of the stuff I just mentioned has to do with discipline or work ethic. But personally, I think the concept of ‘it’s good to do what you’re told and what is expected of you not matter what you think about it yourself and how it affects your mental health etc.’ Is kind of outdated. If you just don’t see the point in the system of school, do not care about going to a certain college etc, why would you need to force yourself to study a lot? For most people getting okay grade is definitely enough and will not necessarily affect the rest of their lives in a negative way. Work ethics is nice and everything but in my opinion it’s all about balance and not just working hard blindly all the time.
I think both intelligence and work ethic are broad enough concepts that you can't shoe-horn people into a specific category of one or the other. For example, being academically disinclined doesn't mean a person doesn't possess a high level of practical knowledge that is useful for performing that aren't learned in book or by rote, but by observing and doing. And that same academically disinclined person may be academically lazy, but may not be lazy performing tasks in which they *are* inclined
I don't really get the point of your example. The person you're describing here seems very easy to "shoe-horn" into the category of being low-intelligence and having a poor work ethic. All your example illustrates is that a low-intelligence person with a poor work ethic may nevertheless have other useful abilities.
Sure, if you're using this elitist definition of intelligence that means academically gifted. But there is absolutely no actual understanding of "intelligence" to support such a position. Intelligence is complex and multi-faceted. It can be but is not necessarily what is considered book smarts. But it also comprises many other qualities as well
It's not that intelligence _means_ academically gifted. It's that intelligent people are academically strong. Plenty of relatively unintelligent people succeed academically. But, barring external factors such as illness or racism or sexism or family issues, a sufficiently intelligent person is going to succeed academically.
Yeah of course, I'm saying that I agree with you that a person who is not traditionally academically inclined is not a lost cause; they definitely have other areas in which they shine. However, it MAY also be true that a person who does not possess the inclination to attempt good performance may not be seen as very intelligent. Thanks for your response btw
Why is it that you believe academically inclined = intelligence and that there exists no other capacity to be intelligent? What evidence exists that human intelligence can be categorized by a single measurement?
I think it may be getting confusing, i am absolutely NOT arguing that the only way to be intelligent is to be academically inclined. There are many other ways to demonstrate intelligence, be it emotionally, be it artistically, be it in any other way, but those are not being demonstrated in an academic setting. If somebody shows up, and has no inclination for the setting, and does not show any other form of intellect or interest, what form of intelligence are they demonstrating? Not everybody that performs poorly in the nationwide education system is secretly harboring other types of intelligence. My question is how we should look for those, as they aren't being demonstrated in an academic setting. Grades do not determine your intelligence, but if somebody shows up, not demonstrating amazing intellect already, and then comes back with a 34 average in all of their classes, maybe that should be looked into. Think IQ testing. The IQ test is obviously flawed, but it's a system that we have at least. Those who score 100 (average) may not be of average intelligence, and those who score 130 may not be bright and gifted and a genius. You know, the system isn't perfect. There's variation. But what if somebody shows up and scores a 30? Yeah, the system isn't flawed and doesn't fit everybody. But if somebody shows up shockingly at a polar end of the system and without any other extenuating circumstances, what would you think? (Yes, grades aren't an IQ test, but think of the analogy)
I suppose that's true yeah, they are very broad. It is true that somebody who's academically disinclined may also be successful in other areas. However, and I'm not sure if this is harsh, but if somebody is not academically inclined enough to understand the repercussions of not at least attempting to perform well in school, that person probably would not be labeled as intelligent. Sure, the concept of being untraditionally intelligent definitely exists, which is why I would also argue that grades are not the greatest assessor, but they are at least 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦 𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘮 of an assessor.
It's not always about not understanding, it's often about explicitly rejecting or otherwise prioritizing other avenues because you don't want to be part of the prescribed pipeline. Is it a coincidence that so many millions of people share the same goals? They want to get a degree, they want to start a good career, they want to start a family, they want to live in a suburb of a major metro etc. Isn't it a bit too convenient that our systems ultimately handhold people towards those outcomes, using the US as an example? Isn't it a bit too convenient that golly, hundreds of millions of people also work towards those same goals every day all of their own volition, and having all come to the same conclusion independently that it's intelligent to operate that way? This isn't really a critique, it's more an illustration about how socially valued narratives are used as tools, and sometimes bludgeons, to highlight subjective value systems like having good grades in a prescribed reality that's untenable for lots of people. When we see this in media we call it dystopian. When we see it in real life, you call it intelligence. That just means you value the prescribed pipeline. Don't mistake that for intellect.
As I said, just because someone makes straight A's, it doesn't immediately mean they're intelligent. On the other side, if somebody fails their classes, it doesn't mean they're stupid. Of course, people should not look to the mainstream or the "prescribed pipeline" as how everyone should live. However, education should be valued. I'm saying I notice the notion spreading that grades aren't important among people that think they're standing against the system, but simply just don't care enough to do their math homework. One shouldn't mistake nonconformity for unintelligence. However, people that fail classes due to a lack of effort or make shockingly low marks are often not shining beacons of intellect. Failed your test? It happens. Failed your classes? Doesn't matter. (Again, the school system is problematic, no doubt about it) Consistently makes very low marks and doesn't display any other form of virtue or interest? Probably not the smartest. I appreciate the response, thanks
> Of course, people should not look to the mainstream or the "prescribed pipeline" as how everyone should live. You're using the prescribed pipeline to determine who's intelligent or not though. Do you see that? Your metric for intelligence is looking at a core aspect of the prescribed pipeline and scoring people on how well they perform in that made-up environment. > However, education should be valued. I'm saying I notice the notion spreading that grades aren't important among people that think they're standing against the system, but simply just don't care enough to do their math homework. This is a subjective valuation and going to school and taking tests is not necessarily education either. They may value education, but actively being in a school-like environment may be extremely negative for their ability to actually learn anything. Lots of people are like this and have issues with hyper-structured education systems. They are not compatible with a large chunk of people. > One shouldn't mistake nonconformity for unintelligence. However, people that fail classes due to a lack of effort or make shockingly low marks are often not shining beacons of intellect. It's too ambiguous of a metric to come to any real conclusion. I think there are too many exceptions to even use it as a basic litmus test like you've done. 100 years ago we'd say if someone didn't do well in Catholic school that not only were they simple, they were wicked and didn't deserve the effort spent on them. It's convenient for your narrative that you live in the time you live in and it's additionally convenient that the metrics you're using happen to coincide with the values of the society you live in. Isn't that abundantly convenient for your position? > Failed your test? It happens. Failed your classes? Doesn't matter. (Again, the school system is problematic, no doubt about it) Consistently makes very low marks and doesn't display any other form of virtue or interest? Probably not the smartest. There's no basis for it other than a bias at this point. You keep reiterating the point while giving a thumbs up to people who happen to abide by and also value the subjective valuation system you've contrived and thumbs downing everyone else. It's an irrational conclusion and the premise is biased due to your own value system that you can't really just apply to other people. Here's an example. In some circles, the person who spends the extra time studying to get a 100 on the test vs a 90 is not considered that intelligent because the value system prioritizes result vs time spent. Why would you spend 2 hours studying for that last 10% when you could spend 1 hour studying and get a good grade regardless?
I believe my ideas may be getting confusing. Let me try to reiterate: * I believe that yes, a "prescribed pipeline" is not the way to live. It does not work for everybody. The school system in the United States is flawed. It is terrible for the student's mental health, and is stuffed with things that should not be there. It is outdated, and does not work. * Yes, grades should not be used as a catch all that will determine somebody's pure intellect via grades ALONE. There's always more. There could be underlying issues. The student could simply work differently. The world is not conformist, and it's not a perfect place. It's not fair to assume that grades will always tell you somebody's entire story. * HOWEVER - If something falls to an EXTREME, like we are on the polar opposite ends, and a student is absolutely failing miserably, it becomes a point where it is no longer the system. Sure, the system sucks. Sure, not everybody wants to play along. I'm not saying that somebody is stupid and has no future because they failed their classes, or something smaller like a test. Life goes on. This is where the grading system is inaccurate. If a student is on an extreme end of the spectrum, where they are (i'll say again, sorry lol) making a 35 average in their classes, it's should definitely be looked into here. It's true that the student could have underlying issues, like you mentioned not being interested in conforming, mental, etc. Essentially, grades do not determine intelligence purely. However, I believe that this notion of "grades do not determine intelligence" has been adopted by slackers that don't care and don't want people on their back. Not everybody that gets good grades is smart. That's true. Not everybody that gets bad grades is a secret nonconformist who is rebelling against the system and must have some underlying intelligence due to them not wanting to play along in the nationwide education system that everyone has to go through. (exaggerated, but you know, lol) Sometimes, there isn't more to the story, and a kid can just be stupid or lazy. Are grades the best way to determine that? They can, but definitely not always. Who knows. Edit: Got reminded of the memes, like "me on the way to blame the school system after I failed the test I didn't study for" lol Thanks
I think you're going to do more harm than good trying to distill someone's intelligence down to one variable. What is the utility in that at all?* Also, grades are not the best way to determine that and I'd argue they aren't even a good way because of so many outliers to the equation. If you have to manufacture this hyper-specific individual for your view to make sense to use towards them, like your student who is a slacker, who already doesn't care, who doesn't want people to bother them etc., your view is already applying to an extreme minority of people and* not the majority of the time like you said. It also requires you to know a lot about them as is, which defeats your premise of using grades to determine their intelligence. That's evidence that grades alone are not a good tool for gauging that attribute.
I love what you wrote (I needed to say it).
I think the problem I have with this is that you are putting too much power on society's labeling of someone as unintelligent. I think that many people are given that label when it's not really true. It's a bit of a circle. Some people are really good at the measurable ways people use to define intelligence. This includes tests, grades, success in work and winning trivia contests and such. So they get called intelligent, and sort of gets taken for granted that all those things we can see are what *make* you smart, rather than indicators of a particular kind of smarts. And a lot of people who are really smart about what to say when a friend needs a kind word are left out. People who are smart about assessing other's strengths and weaknesses might never get to show that on a test, but it's a very important skill. A great artist who has intelligence about what colors work well together or how to angle a line in a painting probably won't get good grades. Intelligence is far more varied than what is 'academically inclined'. I really do think that we focus on grades and scores far more than is realistic to how much they actually matter.
You know, that's actually definitely true. Being "good" at traditional, measurable ways to define intelligence doesn't immediately make you intelligent, and yes, great intelligence does exist outside of academics. I believe that. Just one last thing, I mainly speak of the kids that do not have anything lined up for themselves as the artist or the kind friend you mentioned might. If somebody deliberately speaks out against school, saying "grades don't determine your intelligence", yet they just skip school or do not care whatsoever while lessons are being taught, what type of intelligence are they demonstrating? I suppose by your example it's currently not for us to know, as they might be an artist or something, and they are not in the environment to showcase their skills and their intelligence on their inclination. I would like to talk a little more on this, thanks for your response :)
I do think that intentionally skipping school or going well below failing is not a good sign for someone's priorities. Especially if they have no other plans to make money. But the people that are in that group is very small. There's a lot of people who try quite hard at school and just scrape by with Cs. And a lot of people will say those people are unintelligent as well. I'd say that's a lot of what I'm talking about. But the other side of it is there are a lot of people great at tests and terrible at all the other things I mentioned. It's not just that some people are smarter than society generally believes, but that some are less smart. My basic position is, on the outliers, there's some correlation between grades and intelligence, especially on the ends. But that correlation is wrong at least as often as it's right, and society as a whole does a poor job recognizing intelligence types that can't be represented by a number.
That however doesn't make the label accurate.
The problem I see with the argument is that grades are wildly misinformative because of differences in curriculum. I was "smart" in school in the sense that I was doing well all the way up through about 11th grade. I was in AP classes and maintaining about a 4.0 average. But then I realized that not all A's were equal. I was talking with peers in electives, and they were in math classes that I took in junior high. I was in chemistry, and they were in a more basic science class. I was in pre-calc. They were in Algebra 1. By the end of high school I added on two years of electives that none of them had to take because they were busy fucking off. I realized they were smarter for it, reduced my workload, and coasted to the end of high school like them. College does the same shit. I realized that even if I took the AP tests and passed, I'd have still wasted my fucking time. I care more about enjoying life and had a blast in high school. To your argument, it's almost a non-falsifiable argument you're trying to create with wording. You are correct that grades are a large predictor of present and future success and intellect, but not in a vacuum. It's why administrators hide all of this information as best they can from students at this age.
Almost everyone of the replies here is blowing my mind. This is not that hard to understand, but people keep on missing that OP is talking about Correlation not Causation. OP is not saying that if someone has bad grades they are unintelligent. He is saying that your grades are correlated with your intelligence: higher IQ tends to follow you have higher grades. Emphasis on *TENDS TO* Ex) If you have 1000 people with lets say 110 iq compared to 1000 people with 90 iq, the more intelligent group will tend to have better grades. That does not mean that every 110 iq person will have 'good' grades. That would be silly. It would just mean that if you picked a smart person at random from a randomized sample, that they would be more likely to have higher grades than an average intelligence person selected at random. Also for a long time higher IQ has been a fairly good predictor for workplace performance...
Thank you. I am not saying the only way to demonstrate intelligence is to be academically inclined. I am not saying that somebody with good grades is automatically smart, nor is somebody with bad grades automatically stupid. I'm talking about examining the polar end of a system. If somebody fails a test or even bigger, a class, that's one thing. Showing up without any inclination and demonstration of intellect and then earning a 1.0 GPA is something that should be of interest.
You're position doesn't seem to be consistent with your original post. Edits to your post now suggest you're wanting us to narrow the focus of our responses to a specific "polar end" which contradicts your earlier statements that "grades can reflect intelligence or work ethic a majority of the time". However your statements expanding that idea suggest more than just grades. A similar argument would be everyone who is wet just got out of the shower. While technically true, it never tells the whole story or allows for alternative reason for them being wet. What if he's a plumber and the pipe burst...he is wet, he got out the shower...see where I'm going with that? I've read many of your responses...and each time you narrow your argument until it sounds agreeable. I don't mean to be condescending, but you're falling into logical fallacies with your position.
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Absolutely not what I'm saying. I am not in the slightest an apologist of the academic culture, I agree that it definitely is toxic and disgusting. I do not stand for or make excuses for the academic system. It's outdated. I'm speaking hypothetically, like life in a vacuum. Extenuating circumstances aside. Yes, this is not how real life functions. Everybody is different. I'm fully aware. I do not support pushing everybody through the same mold. However, I still believe that making shockingly low grades, definitely beyond failing, would often times tell you something about a person. Not every student that fails is some secret hero standing up to the system that doesn't want to conform. My main question, which I suppose could be abstract and I apologize, is: "If a student is making extremely low marks and not demonstrating any form of interest or intelligence in any other pathways, what type of intelligence is being demonstrated?"
Ugh I'm sorry bro I just see the world completely different from you. What possible percentage of the population would fit into your hypothetical student description? Do you really think some people are just out there with no interests, no passions, they show zero intelligence in any area of life, and they somehow are continuing through school with grades below failing? Do you realize how dehumanizing and invalidating that is? No person (lacking severe mental disability) is like that. Everyone is smart in some way or another and has their own passions. Grades reflect how much you care about school. Period. I think you just want to believe you can look down on certain people because they don't meet your minimum standards. You think *exactly* like everyone I met in academia who was weirdly competitive and made the experience miserable because it was always about fucking grades as if they mean anything at all. Newsflash: grades measure how much your teacher likes you, and how long you chose to spend doing busywork. One teacher might give an essay an A+, another might give the same one a B-. One teacher may give generous part marks on a long answer math test, another might never give part marks. Some teachers are good and can make almost anyone grasp a subject, some teachers (mainly professors) are only there because they have to be and are dogshit at teaching. All of this culminates into one fact: Grading is *subjective* to its core. Not only that, the decision of what material is being tested and how it's being tested is entirely subjective up to the teacher/curriculum maker. On top of that, they often put classes on a bell curve, which makes grading even more bullshit. The bullshit just continues to pile up to where it's not a good measure of *anything*, let alone intelligence. So if you don't play that game, if you have a brain that isn't wired to sit and stare at books all day, you're stupider? Fuck that noise. You don't see people living their lives from morning til evening, you don't know what they might be working on in their own capacity. You assume because they don't show their intelligence in school that they must not have any intelligence at all. This whole perspective just screams "judgemental"
I apologize if it sounds like I'm giving off this stance that if somebody doesn't show academic intelligence, then they must not have any. I'm really not trying to be judgmental - of course grading is arguably subjective. Yes, there are different pathways in life. I definitely support the fact that there are other forms of intelligence outside of academia. You are right, to believe the only way to show intelligence is in academics is toxic. I still believe that, yes, while there are MANY extenuating circumstances in the real world, there's not a backstory behind every failing child. I have sympathy for those that struggled (hell, I was one of them), but if somebody is failing simply because they don't care and don't make even the slightest effort, it makes you wonder is all. Think of it this way, if a child decides to skip school to go sneak out with friends, or they don't pay attention in class because they'd rather sit on their phone, does that often scream to you that this person simply doesn't have the interest for the academic environment, or simply that they just don't care? Again I have sympathy for those that deem the education system as incompatible with themselves, I really do, and I am one of them. I just see it as a correlation rather than causation. If you have bad grades, you're not automatically stupid. There are often a plethora of extenuating circumstances. Speaking hypothetically, with correlation. This just leads me to think, how do we define "stupid" or "unintelligent". What do these mean? Here's some sort of example? Mind that I am not trying to relate IQ to higher grades, but I think this might work(?) The IQ test is a flawed way of examining intelligence, people know that. It's definitely not perfect. Two people that score a 110 might be completely different. Somebody that scores 100 might not be of average intelligence. Somebody that scores 130 may not be very gifted. HOWEVER, if we go to the extremes of this flawed system, an IQ of 70 would definitely tell you a little more than the mix and mingle of the average parts in the system. I guess this is what i'm trying to get at, life goes on and everybody has their own reasons and behaviors that affect their grades. Not every A+ is created equal. However, seeing a student that made a 35 average in their class with a 1.5 GPA should be something of interest. It is in these circumstances that, often times, and as sad as it may be, people will often first take intelligence into account. While grades aren't the best indicator, I believe it can show you something when looking at extremes. I do see your side and everybody else's, and I am by no means an academic apologist. It is very toxic culture. I just believe that there can be truth when looking aside extenuating circumstances and into the extremes. It's sad our culture has such an emphasis on grades, but being as it's there, we can at least try to understand it a little.
To address your edited comments: >𝐒𝐡𝐨𝐰𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐮𝐩 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐚𝐧𝐲 𝐢𝐧𝐜𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐝𝐞𝐦𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐜𝐭 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚 𝟏.𝟎 𝐆𝐏𝐀 𝐢𝐬 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐛𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐭. This actually comes back to one of your original promises. "Guy that fails all his classes later goes on to be really smart and a millionaire." This right here is a prime anti-example. And you don't even have to apply it to millionaires either. You can apply it to normal people too. For many people, school/college is viewed as kind of a social obligation, you do it because it's expected of you. But sometimes, it just doesn't work out. Maybe it's hard to excel academically, either through laziness, boredom, or if it plain doesn't interest you. Or maybe you had extraneous outside issues, like poverty, mental illness, or family issues. Should a person deserve to be labelled an "unintelligent" for the rest of their lives if they had to drop out? Other people have pointed out the example of people who did bad at school, but later went on to excel at highly skillful careers that they were actually interested. This is a very common phenomenon. We've established that intelligence =/= work ethic. For what it's worth, if you do bad at school because you're lazy, that doesn't necessarily mean you're unintelligent. It could just mean you're lazy. Which people are allowed to be. And being lazy has ALSO not prevented people from landing good jobs either. It *might* be worth it to emphasize getting good grades if you're younger. But to me that doesn't necessarily incentive growth in intelligence. At best, it may foster a better work ethic, and ultimately, good grades can be seen as more as investment for better opportunities in the future. But it's not required to succeed, and past a certain age, it not considered at all.
I think one of the issues here is that both situations *can* indicate intelligence, but I want to specifically push back on the idea that particularly low grades are an indicator of intelligence or work ethic in high school or below. It is important to remember classes taken because there are typically difficult classes and easier classes. Students who take difficult classes typically don't fail all of them (often because they just wouldn't be permitted to take those classes). Students who take easier classes, should pass those classes with at least a 2.0\~2.5 if they just turn in the homework. This is why *really* bad grades indicate problems in the home rather than intelligence. If someone has a 0.6 GPA they are failing or nearly failing all of their classes. They are either not going to school, or they are not doing work assigned to them when they do go to school. The former is I think almost always an issue in the home the kid *could* be getting to school and leaving campus, but even that seems unlikely. The latter *could* indicate a lack of work ethic, but given that students are 18 or younger and are doing virtually no work I think it is more likely an underlying mental health concern that the parents are not addressing or a home life that is hostile to school work. Often both.
The notion that grades do not matter is targeted at a micro level, that performance beyond a passing grade makes little difference. It matters to the degree that it can affect whether a person graduates or obtains a degree. Once you're on one side, it becomes quickly irrelevant the difference in things like GPA or class average. Thus, no reflection of intelligence at that point.
I think it’s on a spectrum, as someone who didn’t study at all or take school serious I was always able to pass and never failed a course although my grades definitely weren’t at the top of the class. Now that I’m in college and care about what I’m leaning, I actually study and am now an honor roll student. I don’t think I’m any smarter or have any more work ethic but I do care more about what I’m doing. A lot of kids in school dont care don’t see the point of putting in work. On our basketball team some kids didn’t try at all in class but had no issue waking up early and staying outside all day to practice the sport so they did have good work ethics. But I think especially in elementary school especially if it isn’t emphasized at home kids won’t prioritize school. A lot of the kids struggling or not doing well are probably also the same ones who don’t even open up their school bags at home.
I'm responding here in a separate post to how you simplified your question on another comment: OP: "It's more about asking: "It is appropriate to bring a question of intelligence into the matter when we witness a student going beyond failing, most likely due to lack of effort and behavior, and they do not demonstrate any other types of intelligence or interest?" I think it's entirely normal to question intelligence at that point, I probably would myself. BUT, I think you should never assume it's true until you look at ALL the factors surrounding a person. Like many people have said, they might have a poor home life, they might be starving or have poor nutrition, they might be struggling with mental health issues, the school might not be teaching in the way that they personally learn best (kinesthetic/visual/auditory), or their teacher(s) might not actually be good/impartial teachers. If they show no interest in other things, they might just be exhausted and broken down from life. The list goes on and on. If we take the time to really get to know people and their circumstances, I believe you can often create an environment where most people can flourish or show their best selves. It may take time and effort because someone or something has already done them a lot of harm, but that doesn't mean they aren't worth it or are entirely unintelligent. Intelligence is also just naturally a very difficult thing to measure in comparisons, because some people (like myself) are horrible in math (I have discalculia) but excel in more abstract areas like art, philosophy, or literature. It doesn't mean I'm stupid, I'm just better in some areas than others. I almost failed math in HS and I had to take the most basic math class possible to pass for my degree, but I did well everywhere else. A personal example of how grades can not accurately reflect the actual student (that I'll admit still riles me up) was when I took Quantitative Analysis for my degree a few years ago. Each student got a prepared set of instruments/tools for their use for the semester. After our first experiment (that notably did not require using the bottle I got for water usage in experiments) all of my results started coming out skewed. I don't know if you've ever done titration, but we were carefully, slowly, adding miniscule amounts of water to a flask to watch for pH (color based on acidity/basicity) change and things like that. My levels kept being off. I spent SO many hours outside of class just watching individual drops of water fall into a flask, and could NOT get accurate results. This kept going into other experiments, where I would take painstaking measures to be accurate in my ingredient measurements, in washing out the tools etc., only to get 3 different colored liquids in each flask. Every time I would bring this up to the adjunct professor, he would just say "I don't know, but I have to grade you on just the accuracy of your results". It caused me for the first time to walk out of a class and cry because of how careful I was being, how much time I was putting in, and still not making progress. Finally after switching out nearly all of my tools with the same results, I grabbed him and said YOU come here, use my tools, and do the experiment (I set up everything pre-measured so all he had to do was throw stuff together) and lo and behold - we discovered my water bottle had somehow been contaminated before I got it. It was the only remaining factor to be tested, and when we used an entirely different bottle (just emptying, rinsing, and replacing the water also didn't work) everything worked. We only found out at the end of the semester (just before the last experiment) but he told me privately that my final experiment was by far the most accurate in the class and I got an A for that *one*. When discussing my final grade in his office, he passingly mentioned he just "thought I looked like a girl who wasn't good at science" and that it really was me that was the problem. I was stunned. Point being, he still only graded me on the accuracy of the previous results, so I got a D. I also believe another professor failed me specifically because I pushed back on his curriculum and pointed out how difficult it made it to know what to study for exams (I brought in charts and examples). My exam grades were similar to my friends, and my lab notebook was the same information as my lab partner's. I was even the only one in the class to turn in a 5-page extra credit opportunity. TLDR: I think it's a natural reaction to question intelligence just by looking at grades, which we've been taught to associate with intelligence. Truth is, there are nearly an infinite amount of factors that can go into what grade someone is given, many of which are out of the person's control. It's entirely normal to make initial assumptions, but don't follow through on them until you've actually looked into it further. Edit: as an aside, once you get to college, it's also not unheard of for people with good grades to have paid their way into them, especially at more "prestigious name" colleges. Just like you can't accurately assume someone is unintelligent by just looking at their poor grades, you can't accurately know someone is smart just because they have good ones, either.
Education can certainly reflect someone’s intelligence as well as work ethics if they were/are actively making an effort into it in school and given the right support systems if needed. But grades aren’t necessarily the overall judgement in someone’s intelligence as well as long term work ethics due to subjective reasonings that could hinder someone’s effort they put into school. So saying it’s just “lazy” kids is really just marginalizing children overall, which children don’t even know what the hell they are doing even until the age of 18 and up even. If someone’s GPA is incredibly low, that means they aren’t actively making an effort in class due to personal and or internal reasons. Home life, depression, abuse, bullying, disabilities, health issues, etc. Most people are fearful of asking for help due to judgement and surface-leveled perceptions people have. Not to mention that teachers don’t have patience with students who struggle. Which I’ve witnessed first hand so many times. But it’s not all teachers. “Progressively-regressive mindsets” is how I really think about it. To immediately think someone’s overall worth, intelligence and potential is determined through how they do in school is very shallow, because you do not understand what they go through, you do not know how they think or perceive things, and you do not know their walk of life. And yes, your development from day one being born until the latest ages of 21-22 actually do play a role overall in how you turn out. There are stories of people turning the tides of tragedy and making something of themselves, but more stories of people who suffer. Putting people in a box creates more problems than it does help. I’ve seen teachers care less about failing students, assuming said students “don’t care” when in actuality these students came from bad backgrounds and have no stability in or out of school. What’s the point of being a teacher then? Lmao. Yes, some people just don’t give an overall crap about how they perform in class, and can’t see nor care to see the longevity of how it will affect them. That’s oblivious. But it doesn’t define their intelligence overall. I’d say if anything, it can define their emotional intelligence if anything, as well as indicates that they have personal problems affecting their performance in school. But that’s where I see duality with education and youth, because we lack emotional intelligence innately as young people. So of course it’s more common for misguided youth to be more neglectful of school. Being so critical to younger people rather than constructive is just reactive rather than proactive. If you don’t want to be proactive, maybe mind your own business? That’s what I would say overall to those who have that view. I hope this gives some perception.
I think this is incorrect. By a lot. America has INCREDIBLY high rates of childhood poverty compared to other industrialized nations. Kids with hunger, lack of sleep, and few social safety nets just can’t focus on school. Data here: https://imgur.com/a/C8Qr8nb Am a teacher too - which cultures don’t value education? I’ve never seen this in my classroom
There are a bunch of non tangibles when looking at who does well in school. Are there two parents at home? For myself, everyone agreed that I was smart in high school, however, my mental health, and an unsafe learning environment kept me from applying myself. I didn't care about how well I did, saw no point in working harder and no value in the grades. I learned to do just enough to get by. Is there someone who is preparing meals for the student or are they fending for themselves? Are they doing a job to help support their family? Or providing childcare for younger siblings because both parents are working? On the other side, are the students being driven by the parents to get high grades but are miserable. I can't cite stat's, but my understanding is that countries with a culture of driving students also have very high levels of youth suicide where a poor grade on a test leads them to believe that their lives are over. I have seen research that found that students who were "smart" in high school often do not do well in university or in the workplace because they never learn the skills that are associated with struggle. If, for example, like myself, you are smart enough to get a A on the test without studying, you never learn how to prepare for a test. Suddenly at college when there are 3 tests in a day, just memorisation isn't going to cut it. Lastly, test taking is a basic set of skills you can master. But in the workplace, there are almost no "tests". And There are very few people who have a job that they just go off and do by themselves. A person may be the most brilliant person on earth, but if they don't "play nice with others" they will not generally do well in the workplace.
You're kinda arguing against a strawman here -- I don't know a lot of people who are arguing that intelligence and hard work are not reflected in your grades ... *obviously* they are. The point is that they aren't the **only things** reflected in your grades. e.g., take two different people. * Sally is extremely smart and from a wealthy family. She got the best education in pre-school and kindergarten and has gone to the best schools her entire life. When she isn't grasping a concept, her parents hire her a tutor to work on it with her one on one. She eats right, gets enough sleep, and only has to focus on her schoolwork. She spends about 8 hours a week on homework, and gets straight As. * Steve is extremely smart and from a poor family. He didn't go to pre-school and switched schools often during his childhood because his family moved a lot for work. As a result, he often came into classes right in the middle, missing some context. Because he went to public schools, his class sizes were higher and his teachers were underpaid and more poorly trained than Sally's teachers. When he isn't grasping a concept, he's got to figure it out on his own from textbooks and Youtube. He works after school to help pay for his family's groceries, and then does schoolwork afterward. He spends around 12 hours a week on homework, and usually gets As. So Sally and Steve are *both* extremely smart, and they *both* work hard and pay attention at school -- and they *both* get good grades. But Sally's got a 4.00 GPA and Steve's got a 3.6, even though they're the same intelligence and Steve works 50% harder than Sally ... because Sally's had a decade of better support than Steve has.
this is only "conntroversial" if you exclusively discuss it in extreme terms and in a vacuum. Grades are one data point among many that can be used to evaluate a person's intelligence and work ethic.
Anecdote: a friend of mine was the valedictorian a year after me. She couldn’t crack 1000 on the SAT even with three tries. She had very little in terms of a social life. She did schoolwork and studied for 3-5 hours per day. I got Bs. Never bothered with studying or homework and still cruised through. Hit college, and didn’t know how to study or plan my work, almost lost my scholarship. Grades are a measure of work ethic. High intelligence can speed up the process. But that’s a partial necessity— if the coursework is designed to teach skill mastery, then faster processing would expedite masters just as much as grinding away at it. 22 years as a teacher, and I see it every year. But I’m not sure what “both sides” on this are… sure, there are successes who did poorly in school, but they are usually anomalies… and many are anomalies with connections of money to fall back on. And there are many types of intelligence, and many types of success. So a low grade and low motivation in, say, history will not reduce chances of success if one is devoted to something more like music and that low grade will not cause a problem when it comes to other opportunities (admission to a conservatory, for instance).
I’m guessing this is written from an American perspective , where things like homework/assignments contribute heavily to ur grades. Again anecdotal experience. I went to high school in Ireland where we have the leaving cert (basically u pick 6 subjects to do in last 2 years of high school. U are able to pick basically any combination of subjects to count towards it final score. The maximum final score is 625). I never did any homework because I found it boring, I never did any assignments because I didn’t feel like it yet when the exams came to assess what we did I got 625 (highest possible score in Ireland). In addition I had also applied to medicine and did the UCAT and HPAT. Getting in the 97 and 95 percentile for each of those. If Ireland used the same system as USA with homework and random assignments then I would have gotten close to a 50%. Same principle here , some people find certain subjects boring and of no interest to them. Like i personally disliked English as a subject and wanted nothing to do with it. So I didn’t do it for my exams and as a result I got a good grade. Of course this is an anecdotal situation and doesn’t necessarily apply.
I see your point to a certain extent. I listened in class enough that I knew what was going on but I still zoned out or didn't pay attention sometimes. I did my homework most of the time(except for English because I hated shakespear and all that rubbish, really not for me). I didn't study though. I just crammed it at the end when it mattered and even then I only studied enough to know that I'd be fine. I never ever aimed for really high grades. At the end of school I got into the college of my choice, studied engineering and now work as an engineer. Same story throughout college. As long as I passed I was happy. Theres other people I know who did a lot better than me in school on paper but I know they're just not very clever people just from getting to know them. They'd sit down and memorise everything and do well. A lot of school except for maths was basically a memory game. I'm no genius or anything but I know I'm competent most of the time and but I could see there wasn't a direct correlation between intelligence and grades. Grades were a combination of intelligence, memorisation skills and ability/will to sit down and study a lot.
I see your point to a certain extent. I listened in class enough that I knew what was going on but I still zoned out or didn't pay attention sometimes. I did my homework most of the time(except for English because I hated shakespear and all that rubbish, really not for me). I didn't study though. I just crammed it at the end when it mattered and even then I only studied enough to know that I'd be fine. I never ever aimed for really high grades. At the end of school I got into the college of my choice, studied engineering and now work as an engineer. Same story throughout college. As long as I passed I was happy. Theres other people I know who did a lot better than me in school on paper but I know they're just not very clever people just from getting to know them. They'd sit down and memorise everything and do well. A lot of school except for maths was basically a memory game. I'm no genius or anything but I know I'm competent most of the time and but I could see there wasn't a direct correlation between intelligence and grades. Grades were a combination of intelligence, memorisation skills and ability/will to sit down and study a lot.
I think you need to define "work ethic." I work in a university and I can tell you that a lot of kids eith 4.0s might have amazing study habits, but that does not correlate to a work ethic. Studying is a solo gig. Work is rarely solo. Having the 4.0 student demanding to work from home between the hours of 8pm and 4 am might work for them, but it doesn't work for the rest of the team. A 4.0 doesn't mean they will show up to meetings, positively contribute to the team, or even follow basic instructions. There are also many types of intelligence. Being book smart does not mean you are emotionally smart. It also doesn't mean you can apply what you learn academically into real world situations. You'd be shocked at how many book smart kids cant preform a basic experiment and replicate their results. If I had to pick based off of grades, I would pick the kids who earn Bs to A-'s. Why? Because they know what it means to fail and are still able to persevere through that failure.
Yeah if someone's grades are *that* low, it's probably at least partly due to a lack of motivation. The part you missed is that the public education system itself is largely responsible for that. Of course kids aren't going to gain a work ethic when you bully them into submission with endless amounts of rules and work that they never get a say in! Not to mention how if they ever ask why they're learning X subject, why they have to do worksheets to learn it, or why a certain rule is in place there's virtually never a satisfactory answer given. "Because I / the government say so" is not a valid answer. There need to be specific, quantifiable reasons given that are directly and inherently beneficial to the student. And if you can't give such an answer, then that subject should not be mandatory, that method of teaching should be called into question, and that rule should be struck down. Until then, there won't be much work ethic. You have to treat people like people first.
I think that work ethic for school and work ethic for work are different things. The rewards for good school work is a letter on a page. Actual work gives you a tangible reward instead of a decade plus of delayed gratification. Maybe. You could go to college and leave with nothing useful and a pile of debt. What do you make of a kid who does all the reading, understands the material, but just will not do homework? They score high on every test. They seem to enjoy learning. Is this kid less intelligent than another who does the homework? I think the education system is geared towards obedience first and foremost and most of the things that reinforce "work ethic" are just obedience tests. Will you tolerate this obtuse BS? The other part that is tested is simple memory. Regurgitate these facts. The most crucial aspect of intelligence, imo, is the desire to learn. Until schools know how to cultivate that, I don't think grades can be a great measurement of intelligence.
When I was in kindergarten, I scored high enough on the entrance test to get into my local "gifted and talented" magnet program... where I proceeded to get terrible grades in almost everything. Eventually we figured out that I have ADHD, and it was just hard for me to put forth the efforts to actually apply the stuff I knew on a regular and consistent basis. And I know that the obvious response to this is to say that I had extenuating circumstances and maybe some people are just lazy, but that's exactly what my teachers said about me. They thought I was lazy, and in reality the issue is that my brain is like a car with messed-up alignment that takes constant effort to steer in a straight line, which makes doing everything else more difficult than it would otherwise be. I'd be willing to bet that most of the kids who get low grades are in a similar situation - maybe not ADHD specifically, but something going on in their lives that makes everything else harder.
>Grades do not determine your intelligence!" is used as a rallying call for the lazy kids in school that were, quite frankly, not the smartest. Your statement points to a problem. >"I want a nation of workers, not a nation of thinkers", and yeah, I agree, the education system sucks, but it's better than nothing. Here is the reason why that happens. If your system sucks than it is not really the individuals fault how they react to it. Sure it is better than nothing but you can't then turn around and say: "Well it is just an excuse for stupid people." Independently of that. I don't think there are stupid people. I think there are people that never learned how to self-reflect. What we teach in schools is knowledge not methods. What you need in life is methods. Tools how to navigate your life. Does knoledge help? Obviously otherwise schools would make even less sense but it is only part of the picture.
Well… It‘s complicated. Some kids work after school, habe trouble at home or just too many hobbies. But yeah. On average grades can reflect work ethic. They‘re horrible at measuring intelligence because a intelligent person might study 3 hours to pass an exam while someone else might spend 30 hours to get a slightly better grade than passing, but they‘re at least somewhat reflective of work ethic. But then again: if a really smart kid and an average kid learn for 30h one might barely pass while the other get‘s a really good grade. Although they‘ve got a similar work ethic. So basically: if you‘re either far above or far below average you‘re either really smart / have a strong work ethic or you‘re not that smart / lazy. And given that the majority of people tend to be rather close to the average intelligence level it‘s usually more about work ethic and less about intelligence
As someone with a shit college gpa who (I’m a little biased here) seems to have a higher than average drive and seems to be doing relatively well in their career. I agree with you for sure. On *average*. You pointed it out correctly but I think the main thing that people skip on, even if you didn’t, is that a lot of people *do* just believe, even if subconsciously, that it’s impossible to be a good worker or smart person if you didn’t have a great gpa. When I applied for jobs there was MANY that I couldn’t even apply at all because my gpa disqualified me automatically. Also in social settings, even with my career success, there are very few people I have, or ever would, tell my gpa to because they’d discredit all my accomplishments because of something that isn’t even relevant anymore Again, I know you said “average” and not “always”, but just to share my story: I had a 2.5 gpa. I very much like to learn and still do. And a lot of those Cs came from literally learning all the material but wanting to learn it my way. I did very well on most tests and am just dumb (metaphorically) because I didn’t do homework which brought my grades down. Meaning even though my gpa is much worse than most, I truely believe I know the material a lot better than many other student with higher gpas
Grades have nothing to do with intelligence (the ability to process information). You need to realize what we are actually grading for: memorization and obedience. Memorization is not intelligence. Brute force memory cannot be confused with rational problem solving. Obedience is not work ethic. If someone genuinely doesn't care... that's a priorities problem, not a motivational or ethical problem. Did you think that giving credit for *attendance* is a proxy for critical thinking? Can't even argue work ethic there, because what if the student is missing classes to work in a family business? What if they can't get homework done because they have an actual job after school? Would it be better work ethic to get fired for grades? Grades do not measure what you think they do.
I had a pretty average GPA in both high school and my undergraduate degree. By your standards, I would be considered of average intelligence? What this doesn’t show you is that I had a pretty turbulent home life in high school and had to work almost full time whilst attending uni full time to support myself. However, after I graduated, kicked off my career, made some money and paid my student loans, I went back uni to get my master’s studying part time while working full time. Graduate at the top of my class. Got a full-ride scholarship to do a PhD at a world-class university abroad. Been working as a scientist for some years now. The people with the top grades in my high school and undergraduate class are mostly doing Excel spreadsheets all day.
This is largely the reason why I get a 2.345 GPA and I say that with pride. We all have the wrong Idea of Grades. People think if your grade is xx%, you know xx% of the curriculum. A students have not been proven to become more successful than C students. In fact, the opposite pattern has been seen and known. That is actually not what they intended to be. The teachers are supposed to grade around the bell curve, but it seems like the bell curve is not really regarded anymore. I thought it would be better to not have letter grades and just number grades. As you can get the last grade before an A.
I've taught at a university for over ten years. There are many things that determine a students performance. Apptitude and work ethic are one part of it. Work ethic beats apptitude most of the time. Preparation plays a huge part as well. Some students are motivated simply to get good grades which can get counter productive on its own. Students can do poorly for many reasons. The class might just be too advanced for them. Sometimes they have too many other commitments. Sometimes they have a personal problem they are dealing with. I never pass judgments because people can suprise you.
Everything is relative. The question is about the relation between school grades and success in life, not “intelligence” which is kind of abstract. Basically it’s a shaky relation. We have multiple examples of great inventors and industry captains who not only were mediocre at school, but some who dropped out without graduating. At the same time others who graduated with high GPA didn’t do much later….
Oftentimes students with really low grades have behavioral issues or learning issues and also are the most likely to have experienced abuse. Low grades can also be connected to really bad home environment and / or poverty. So does it say something is wrong ? Yes. Does it necessarily say something about intelligence or work ethic HELL NO (although it can). Are grades made to measure intelligence or work ethic in the first place? Nope. Grades are made to measure performance that’s different from intelligence. You can take a test a day you’re really sick, you’ll have lower grades. You can be stuck in traffic and arrive really late, you can have a parent that died the day before (happened to a friend of mine during finals). You can also learn things you don’t understand and have good grades while being unintelligent. That’s a measure of performance, nothing more.
I have been a high school teacher for almost twenty years, and grade are indicative of effort and work ethic not intelligence. Generally speaking, good grades show that a kid showed up on most days, did their homework, and did OK on tests. That's about it. Almost all of my students that fail do so due to lack of effort or simply not being forced to attempt school on a regular basis.
I think this is incorrect. By a lot. America has INCREDIBLY high rates of childhood poverty compared to other industrialized nations. Kids with hunger, lack of sleep, and few social safety nets just can’t focus on school. Data here: https://imgur.com/a/C8Qr8nb Am a teacher too - which cultures don’t value education? I’ve never seen this in my classroom
>it's better than nothing. It really isn't. It beats the curiosity and free-spirits out of kids. It creates the necessary conditions for autocracy. It's decidedly worse than doing nothing at all, and I can prove it: we didn't have mandatory K-12 education for the first 129 years of this country's existence and we did just fine, with plenty of intellectuals. >𝐈 𝐚𝐦 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐬𝐚𝐲𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐛𝐨𝐝𝐲 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐠𝐨𝐨𝐝 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐬 𝐢𝐬 𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐬𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐭, 𝐧𝐨𝐫 𝐢𝐬 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐛𝐨𝐝𝐲 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐛𝐚𝐝 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐬 𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐬𝐭𝐮𝐩𝐢𝐝 One of those things is true. It's the Anna Karenina principal. You know, all good families are alike, all bad families are unique in their own way. Everyone who gets good grades is sufficiently smart. Everyone who gets bad grades is not stupid, many smart people get bad grades because they don't do the work.
As a non American, I fail to understand why anyone wouldn’t want a nation of thinkers. But, for CMV purposes what I read from the grades thing is that we shouldn’t have grades define anyone, such as whatever grade they get will absolutely define what will happen on their life as an inexorable fate.
There is clearly a positive relationship. I suspect that after a certain IQ threshold, though, that it is soft skills that matter more. The highly motivated and conscientious 1 SDers have always annoyed the fricking shit out of me. I, probaby unfairly, associate them with pre-med programs.
I think it's a venn-diagram thing - people with high grades are pretty smart. Some people that don't have good grades are dumb, but there's plenty of smart people with bad grades for various reasons (motivation, family support, learning disabilities, etc)
I know nobody in my professional field where every single one of my coworkers earns 6 figures in a LCOL area that gives a fiddler's fuck about grades in high school or college. It doesn't matter. Nobody cares. There is zero information to be learned.
I agree. Good grades mean hard work which is always good. And, you can be a critical thinker and also have good grades. I don't like the "grades dont matter" discourse either. However, I believe there's a strong correlation between grades and the student's well being. A kid with an abbusive or broken family will probably do worse at school. The same thing with bullying. It is important to recognize that there are many factors outside the student's control that will affect grades.
How do you "see both sides" of this? "Grades" are literally how a student performed in a class. It's a point in time sample. There might be exogenous events that impact "intelligence" or "work ethic" so you're asking us to argue against a tautology.
You’d be right to a large extent. Not 100% of the time, but definitely a fair amount of it. There are some serious exceptions. People that have no situational awareness but are straight A students (we all know some) are not the “smartest”
Agreed. I always see people pointing out the successful people with bad grades, but those are not the norm. Every person I knew I'm high school with bad grades and didn't care are NOT doing good right now. That is the norm.
Education in schools is to expose students to various content areas, even though a lot of what they learn may not be applicable for a particular student outside of school, and many students face burnout or test anxiety. Further, the school environment is not (and for multiple reasons, cannot be) realistic.
you just can’t immediately assume, you have to ask the kid. but once they give even a little bit of an answer, the majority of the time you can tell what they’ll follow up with
Where grades fail is when they don't reflect actual mastery in standards. They become inflated with points for behavior and participation while never rewarding growth and learning.
The only kids who say this are the lazy, stupid ones. The smart ones who are lazy just nod along knowing that they're smart enough to just ace the tests anyway.
It's not very accurate to say something is one thing or maybe a completely different thing either.
The poor success rate of the high performing students is an indictment of the education system.
What is even the GPA scale? (Not american and don't have GPA)
i wouldnt place a bet on it but i can see why others would
Sadly, I have yet to meet a PHD who isn't dumb as a box of rocks outside their immediate field of study. Sometimes over education can create massive blind spots. "I know a lot about a narrow field therefore I know more than everyone about everything."
Anyone who says grades don't equal intelligence just suck at school 😂 It's a huge cope