Funny you should ask.
You know what I did? I watched more or less the same 21 kids (out of a couple hundred) get award after award after award. I am all for rewarding hard work. Made the honor roll? High five, here's your certificate. Clap, clap, clap. But every individual subject created an award to hand out. For example:
English: "These students have shown an extra ability to use words in both creative and critical thinking."
Science: "These students have adeptly handled beakers and gone on field trips."
Art: "These students have shown extra skill in art."
Math: "These students have demonstrated a working knowledge of equations, as well as strong computation skills."
And that literally only scratches the surface. I'm not positive, but I'm fairly certain that I heard awards for such skills as "showing up at school", "high lunch attendance," and "having a pulse." And of course there was a main body of about 21 kids who received one of every award. Each award then had an additional 10-20 recipients randomly peppered in with the overachievers.
*My son received no awards. Slacker.
It felt a teeny tiny bit like overkill to me. Kind of like the "every kid gets a trophy" at the end of parks and rec soccer season. Ummm... what did they win, exactly? I'm not necessarily saying we need to make everyone feel like a poo-bag for not coming in first,but does anyone even know what it feels like to lose anymore? This past year, at the Cub Scout's Whinewood Derby, when my 10 year old realized he was going to come in just about last, he said, "Can we just leave before they give me some stupid certificate that says my car is the most red?"
He's catching on.
