Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We give only for straight As. We might have decided differently if we thought the kid wasn't capable of straight As, but in our case, 5 or 6 As would be simple, it's getting all As that seems more challenging.

All kids are capable of straight 8s. Coming from someone with a learning disability who received special ed.

I meant As. Stupid autocorrect.

Anonymous wrote:We give only for straight As. We might have decided differently if we thought the kid wasn't capable of straight As, but in our case, 5 or 6 As would be simple, it's getting all As that seems more challenging.

All kids are capable of straight 8s. Coming from someone with a learning disability who received special ed.

I pay for As and nothing else. My son's job is school so he should get something for his outstanding performance just like I do. How many of us would work hard for free?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How about you teach your kids to be intrinsically motivated, and to experience the connection between working hard and doing well?
Ridiculous to pay a kid $500 for grades. WTH??

Doesn't basically every adult employed outside the home get financially rewarded for doing so? Many jobs also give performance bonuses. Nothe sure why this is such a strange concept.

The reward they get for good grades is opprtunity. The opportunity to go to the college of their choice. The opportunity to pursue their chosen interest. The opportunity to get a good job and have a nice life. They should be able to understand this. They aren’t working for you. They are working for themselves.

For many of us, who don't have "chosen interests", the opportunity is not of any value. Money are the only value, thus being paid for grades, getting merit scholarship and getting salary with bonuses are the motivators. I don't what I want to do when I grow up, in a meantime I prefer to be paid.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP -

My DD is a senior, taking double period AP chem and calc BC.

She will get B+s, and is working very hard and steadily.

She could have taken AP stat and Intensified Earth Science and gotten As in her sleep.

Which kid would you want to reward with money? Which senior year do you want to encourage?

You encourage whatever you decide is appropriate. Just like prizes for the first place regionals might be nothing, but placing in mating gets you something.

Well, I know how I would reward (monetarily, not), but I wonder what the "pay for grades" folks say. Point is, incentives work, so be careful what you incentivize.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How about you teach your kids to be intrinsically motivated, and to experience the connection between working hard and doing well?
Ridiculous to pay a kid $500 for grades. WTH??

Doesn't basically every adult employed outside the home get financially rewarded for doing so? Many jobs also give performance bonuses. Nothe sure why this is such a strange concept.

The reward they get for good grades is opprtunity. The opportunity to go to the college of their choice. The opportunity to pursue their chosen interest. The opportunity to get a good job and have a nice life. They should be able to understand this. They aren’t working for you. They are working for themselves.

^Mating is nationals

Anonymous wrote:OP -

My DD is a senior, taking double period AP chem and calc BC.

She will get B+s, and is working very hard and steadily.

She could have taken AP stat and Intensified Earth Science and gotten As in her sleep.

Which kid would you want to reward with money? Which senior year do you want to encourage?

You encourage whatever you decide is appropriate. Just like prizes for the first place regionals might be nothing, but placing in mating gets you something.

Anonymous wrote:This thread is making me ill. There are scores of studies that discuss what a bad idea this is.

Merit based scholarships shouldn't exist either.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We go out for dinner at the end of the year when there was solid evidence he worked hard.

We do this too, but each marking period if straight-As, or if not, evidence of working butts off. DC gets to pick the restaurant.

My parents did this, but more tied to getting as best a grade as they thought each of us were capable of. My mom was really ahead of the curve on this (especially as a young mom) - she recognized that even though my sister wasn't given a diagnosis of dyslexia (even though now she 100% would be because the understanding of it in the 80s was BS- "do you see letters backwards?") she knew there was a very real hurdle in her head to learning the only way that schools were teaching at the time. She was plenty bright but struggled so hard with school. So she got to pick a restaurant for her grade that she worked her ass off for and I got to pick if they thought I wasn't slacking. They never told us the other kid's grades, it wasn't a big deal, we were just interested in which place the other kid picked (we went as a family) It was little but pretty motivating, or nice icing on the cake to be recognized I guess.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How about you teach your kids to be intrinsically motivated, and to experience the connection between working hard and doing well?
Ridiculous to pay a kid $500 for grades. WTH??

Doesn't basically every adult employed outside the home get financially rewarded for doing so? Many jobs also give performance bonuses. Nothe sure why this is such a strange concept.

+1

OP -

My DD is a senior, taking double period AP chem and calc BC.

She will get B+s, and is working very hard and steadily.

She could have taken AP stat and Intensified Earth Science and gotten As in her sleep.

Which kid would you want to reward with money? Which senior year do you want to encourage?

Anonymous wrote:As a middle school teacher, this is on of my frustrations. I've caught so many kids cheating this week (quarter ends next week), because they NEED whatever grades at the quarter, or they won't get $$$$/phone/whatever.

The difference between an 89.4 (B+) and an 89.5 (A-) should not be worth $$$$.

As a parent it always freaks me out when teachers are posting on DCUM in the middle of the school day. All I can do is hope that the poster is just masquerading as am actual teacher for some bizarre reason. My sister is a teacher and I don't even bother to text her in the middle of the day, as she is busy as hell the entire school day. If i do reach out, i always get a response around 430.

Anonymous wrote:As a middle school teacher, this is on of my frustrations. I've caught so many kids cheating this week (quarter ends next week), because they NEED whatever grades at the quarter, or they won't get $$$$/phone/whatever.

The difference between an 89.4 (B+) and an 89.5 (A-) should not be worth $$$$.

Yep. These parents are not encouraging their kids to have the right attitude about school & learning, imo.

Anonymous wrote:I'm not inclined to pay for school work but if I did I'd pay for efforts not achievement.

+1

Depending on the kid & the class, a B can mean just as much as an A.