Bloody Prize giving

[AllienOlliemum]

I have 3 DC in the same school, it's a grammar school and tends to achieve very good results. Every year they do prize giving. There are two award categories, Excellence and Effort.
Last year I queried what exactly excellence is in this case and was told "The excellence awards are decided by each department as a whole and considering attainment, attitude, progress and effort" the second award category is simply for effort.
In the upper school (Y10-13) 3 students are selected for each subject and ranked 1st, 2nd and 3rd for excellence, and 3 students (if enough uptake of the subject) are given effort, not ranked). In Lower school (Y7-9) 5 students are selected for excellence, not ranked and 5 for effort not ranked.

Today the upper school prize giving awards list was sent out. The actual ceremony is at the end of June but I guess it's because some leavers will have to plan around it. My eldest DD is in Y11, sitting her GCSEs and for the 5th year running not a single award. She has fantastic predicted grades and we are frequently told how hardworking and diligent she is. As per usual though it's the same kids as always. In fact one girl has an award in every single subject she must have taken, 7 Excellence awards and 3 Effort! With 1st in 5 of those! She also seems to have won the award for an essay writing competition and the award given by the historical society!
My other two children (Y8 and Y9) have also never received an award to date but the lower school awards aren't announced until middle of June.
Last year I queried how it is possible one child wins all the awards and was told the departments select their own winners and can't know who the other departments have chosen.
There are also non academic awards such as Integrity, but typically it's always the same students who get these too.

AIBU to be massively pissed off with this bloody system which is centred around favouritism!
It's every good damn year!

With love - your DD just isn’t excellent enough. This girl is. And jealousy is a bad look.

I question the whole prize giving self congratulatory school milarky in first place
luckily most of my kids school didn’t do this- state schools. Just the odd couple that were trying to act like they were private schools.

The real question is “what is the point of it?” If the school believes the prize will motivate kids during term time then dishing out awards to a gifted child who receives them all (or nearly all) is going to have the exact opposite effect.

kids are rarely motivated all the way through term or year of working by the promise of “if you are exceptional you’ll get a £10 book voucher at the end of the year ”

if they really really think annual prize giving could be motivated, at least it should be based on a continuing merit system. Kids get merits in real time as they achieve or do certain things. Merits are clearly defined in terms of effort, school participation (volunteering, etc), engagement, and attainment. Merits are totted up and prizes given at end of year to highest ranked students. But merits can also be recognised at each term, that way it drives actually progression. Doing after the event won’t drive continuous improvement

This is effectively how performance “awards” work in a lot of companies. People get recognised at time for specific things. Either then get a reward (vouchers, wow point etc) at the time and/or it counts to performance e related pay at pay review time.

why can’t schools understand this simple principle?

as for prize giving events, seems all too self congratulatory for the teachers and staff - boring as shit for parents if your child’s not won anything. Even if your child has still an hour or 2 you’ll never get back for the 3 mins of your child getting a pat on the head. And £70 frazzled on one child that could have gone onto much needed resources for the entire school population.

They have a merit and demerit system which runs year round and is unrelated to prize giving.

Wow, not judgemental much about state schools comp system

i went to state comp school. My kids went to state comp schools. All first at university - in my case in STEM subject. Eldest son supported by “gifted “ child scheme through school.

They are well rounded, well paid professionals. I retired at 55 as result of my career achievement nets.

maybe check your assumptions that comp schools are full of mediocrity and lower attainment. But then that’s what grammar school and private school system rely on- scaremongering that comp system in the state is full of shit attainment and support.

Probably because of nasty girls like your dd rather than because she isn't a nice girl.

Leave it - not every pupil can excell.

So why even do they bother with prize giving

im all for a school doing an end of year “review”…a chance to showcase events, successes of school as a whole. Sports team successes recognised, performances recognised , and some stuff reflecting the schools aims and vision. Fair enough- good to take a step back and say “wow that was good year for the school “….but prize giving is just such a crap useless performance.

it is highly unlikely this girl winning all the prizes is even motivated to do this by these prizes. She’s going to be a high flyer whatever school does or doesn’t do- that’ll come from her own natural talents and mindset and her parenteral support.

I think that rather than worrying that another teen has got the awards and if that's unfair or not, you'd be better chatting to your daughter about why it dents their confidence. The school are not saying she's not doing well and trying hard by not giving an award - most students will not get one. I think it'd be good to build up her self worth. It's unlikely she's always going to be the best in life so being able to say I did my best and am doing OK is a incredibly valuable tool to learn.

Hence the grammar school system OP is happy to send her kids to…

Let it go love. Save your energy for something worthwhile. I genuinely can't believe you even went to the effort to type all that guff.
I tell my kids life is a long road and ultimately, the race is only with yourself. I'm sure you are boring everyone and only making your own kids feel bad.

so if this one kid is getting the top Excellence prize in multiple subjects, surely it's because her marks over the year are the best in the class
Yes, if awards are made on entirely objective criteria like that it is fair. But are they? "Effort" certainly can't be measured objectively can it? So having some awards that have a more subjective elements does give teachers the flexibility to reward more pupils.
And it's not necessarily very good for a child to win virtually everything anyway. My DD has been that child at her dance school awards and it was very uncomfortable. Sure, nobody can argue about the trophy for "Highest Exam Marks" but things like "Performance Quality" and "Endeavour" are subjective and could justifiably go to different people.
Obviously it would be ridiculous to give an Effort prize to a pupil who is disruptive and has poor attendance but recognising the efforts and achievements of young people who are doing very well but maybe don't quite get first place is not a bad thing in my eyes. As many have said, such awards don't really matter in the great scheme of things, and paradoxically they probably matter least to those who win lots. But they have the potential to motivate and to demotivate other pupils.

hmm, a lot of people are really down on you but I think it sounds unfair at your dd’s school. Sure at some other schools they would try to limit it if it seemed like one kid was going to get everything, it makes the other kids think ‘why bother’!

it really doesn’t make 16 year olds think or indeed any grammar school student think “why bother” because they don’t get the school end of year award and £10 book voucher

You misunderstand me @Dartwarbler - I'm a product of state schooling and worked in state schools for all of my teaching career. My point was about the stupidity of choosing a selective school for your child, then being pissed off when they don't appear to excel.

This is the sort of thing people like about grammar schools. "None of this molly-coddling woke "all shall have prizes" nonsense."

Sod self esteem. Devil take the hindmost.

A school prize is nice, but it doesn't mean anything in the real world. Not worth getting upset about it.

Believe me you certainly can be good at everything. I'm a general swot, enjoy studying and am naturally academic. I raked in the £10 book tokens at any school prize giving. Means absolutely nothing in the real world besides the fact I have lots of books aimed at teenagers.

Whilst life isn’t fair and we all have to come to terms with that these awards should have been banned before they got out of the box. It’s cliquey, elitism and just makes teachers look shallow. I am sooooo glad that my children have finished school.

You can be good at everything - I was - but I have to say I won the "attainment" awards so didn't get the effort ones as well, as they were the subjective ones to be spread out a bit.

I went to a high achieving grammar. I was never in the running for any of that stuff, I never pushed myself /wasn’t pushed at home and didn’t really care for it. Classic coaster. But I can tell you it was the same 7/8 kids that got all the awards every year right through the school. They generally were fabulously bright, hardworking all rounders.

I would suggest that maybe the effort ones could go to kids who aren’t winning the excellence awards. It’s unlikely the kids winning excellence won’t be putting in effort, but their effort is clearly already recognised in the excellence of you see what I mean.

I don’t suppose they’re playing favourites. But I would imagine for the kids (including OPs daughter) who are possibly just a shade below the top handful who win everything, it’s incredibly frustrating not to be recognised. It’s hard to see your kid doing that well and not be recognised. Although it sounds like the feedback from teachers in reports is good.

Any award, prize, job or accolade that only goes to the top performer is by definition elitist. I don't think that makes it wrong. I do think that the effort prizes should probably be somewhat more spread about (I keep a list of who I give it to each term so the same one doesn't always get it) but achievement are for the top exam mark and that's it. We certainly have 3/4 kids in each year who tend to sweep most of the board - they get 95-100% in every test, never miss a deadline, are on the first teams for multiple sports, run clubs, do charity stuff - why shouldn't that be recognised?

I remember just after I left school finding out later that our school had done something similar where they’d given awards to some pupils for ‘excellence’ and only invited those pupils and their families to the ceremony and not told anyone else.

The girl who told me had got an excellence award for getting a B in French because she’d been predicted a C, I remember feeling really hurt because I’d got an A in French and I’d been predicted an A because I had always worked hard in French, not because I’d last minute put some effort in, but also because she was the attractive, sporty, popular girl and it was so clearly just a popularity competition, which once again reminded me it didn’t matter what I did, or how hard I worked I could never win.

Do you feel the same about sports prizes/medals? Secondary schools should be doing what primary schools do and just give everyone a sticker for taking part, presumably? No recognition of first place or setting a new school record. Might make the other kids feel bad and damage their self-esteem, after all. In fact, my son is so small compared to his peers that, even though he’s really fit, strong, coordinated with excellent balance, he’ll never be in the first team or win races at sports’, so the whole thing is completely discriminatory and shouldn’t happen. I can’t believe schools actually consider running sports days and have sports competitions and awards. It’s so elitist and cliquey. It’s always the same kids on the first team for all the sports. The PE teachers are so shallow. They should at the very least let all the kids have a go at being in the first team. Perhaps just draw names out of an hat. But much better to just ban the whole lot, right?

It dents your kids' confidence MOSTLY because it dents your pride.

Sorry, school/work/high performance environments aren't about being liked and making friends... They are, you know, about actual performance and delivering under pressure.

Maybe they need to create an award for 'most friends' if that's what one considers an achievement now?

I was a high performing student but I went to school with 'Liz' who aced every single subject apart from PE. She was neurodiverse, quiet and had unusual interests, so not many friends. I was pretty damn pleased for her because she was so clever and brilliant. And she motivated us all to work harder and set a higher bar in all subjects. And also made us appreciate diversity.

She's a top scientist now and using her talents to improve life for us all.