Reply to Silver Spring's Eastern Middle School gets slammed for rewarding good students

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]DD's MS had this same type of party a few years ago when she was on the honor roll. She wasn't even interested in attending. Possibly this is yet another issue that is more important to the helicopter parents than to the kids.[/quote]

Or perhaps more important to tone-deaf administrators than the students they are trying to reward?  Our DD didn't want to participate in these reward systems and complained to us that she was being hounded by teachers to do so.    Her attitude was basically, "Why won't they leave me alone?  I don't want to go to that stupid, lame party." [/quote]

While I completely understand and empathize with your daughter's feelings since I felt largely the same growing up, might I suggest an alternative approach or way of looking at the situation? This might be a good opportunity to teach kids (in general, not just your DD) how to graciously accept invitations to events they may not want to attend and get through said event with poise anyway, or to graciously accept not reviving an  invitation to a long-awaited event, as the case may be. I know that this is an essential adult skill with which I can see my kids potentially struggling (don't all kids that age - it's not exactly instinctive, after all  :-) ) so that's the approach I intend to take towards such situations. This might or might not work for your family, just a thought off the top of my head.[/quote]

Actually, my DD repeatedly graciously declined the invitation these events at school.  It was the school staff who (ungraciously) repeatedly insisted that she attend.  She never said to anyone but me, "it's a stupid, lame party."  She tried to get away with a polite, "no thanks, I think I'll hang out here in class...."

FWIW, we raise our kids to consider not participating in events that they think are unfair or discriminatory, not just to blindly accept these invitations "graciously" because they must "get through said event with poise anyway."

[/quote]

In that case, great job to your daughter for her polite response (and to you for teaching her) and shame on the teachers for being so pushy - that seems quite tacky and ill-mannered from those charged with helping to educate our children, UGH. I did't mean to imply anything negative about your child, I was offering a potential alternative view that the party is one of many rewards Eastern seems to offer students for different achievements not some sort of offensive class-based system and as such is something some families might choose to encourage their children to attend as a means of practicing the social skill of handling a potentially boring social obligation rather than because the party is going to be particularly fun or really anything other than slightly cheesy and perhaps a bit lame. From what little information I have based on your post, it looks like your DD has been well raised with excellent manners so it probably is more beneficial to her to do as the last line of your reply suggests and practice the relatively advanced skill of discernment in accepting invitations by not attending if she would prefer not to. I apologize if my first post read abruptly or seemed in any way to pass judgement on your DD or your parenting; that definitely wasn't my intent  :oops: [/quote]

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