AIBU to think school giving out awards to exceptional children is unfair?

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Year 6 leavers assembly, some children were invited beforehand to a private invite only special awards ceremony for exceptional achievements. They then stood up and showed their awards at the general leavers assembly. Does this seem unfair? I felt for all the children who didn’t get a special award.

YABU - this is normal for a leavers assembly
YANBU - this is unfair

As long as there were rewards for a variety of things art music sport and not just academic and awards for improvement too I think it’s fine. At my granddaughters gymnastic class everyone got a medal, even though it was for six year olds it was ridiculous, kids that just wandered around doing zilch got an award . My little granddaughter had practised for ages , even at her young age she knew the medal was pointless and worthless ! Last seen lying in her sandpit!!

load of bollox. nearly every school does awards for "exceptional" kids. but given every school does it, they ain't exceptional at all. it's meaningless, just a load of noise.

I am all for children receiving awards for exceptional achievement. But they didn’t need to get the recipients to show their awards at the leavers’ assembly which is an occasion to focus on celebrating everyone.

The special children had already been celebrated separately, they should have left it there.

I actually think that it’s gone so far that the high achieving children often miss out. I feel sorry for them - whilst others are quite rightly rewarded for their efforts, those who are lucky enough to be naturally gifted or work extremely hard to achieve high results are overlooked.

My DD school does this, it’s quite an academic private school. They argue that competition is good for children and if they see their peers/friends doing well they will push themselves harder. I didn’t initially agree with this but seeing the children in the school and some of the incredible adults they have produced has really made me think they might be on to something!

This is a nice change. Mumsnet is usually full of posters complaining that their exceptional children don’t get enough recognition!

I think if it encourages the high-achievers, great. They might go on to have stellar careers.

I have always gamed the system and enjoyed it. '

• can you expand on this? How did you 'game the system' at school?

This mentality really infuriates me. Children are not all the same. If someone works hard, has a special talent or achieves something amazing, of course it should be recognised. Medals at sports day, certifates for music exams, swimming awards, representing the school at cricket, netball, drama, art, maths challenges, spelling competitions, coding, science or dt talents. Why not celebrate?
OP - kids with SN can still have talents and still get rewarded for these things. In fact it is often the less academic subjects that get the most acolades in schools like sports, drama or music.
If a child is an amazing athlete or footballer, do you want it ignored because your child isn't good at those things? We need to teach our children to be graceful loosers and at the same time proud of their and others achievements. Not hide talent because someone might be upset. Life isn't fair, it's no good hiding them from it, it would be a very bland boring world if we were all the same!

Why? Those who work well,good behaviour etc should be rewarded.

Of course high achievement should be recognised and rewarded, ridiculous to think otherwise.
Rather this than the current climate we seem to be in where we reward/celebrate kids for managing to behave for a period when previously they have disrupted the learning of everyone else.

Why is this bad?? One of my children is 'exceptional' academically as you put it. I feel sorry that his achievements are never recognised as it's taboo yet his friends get awarded sporting trophies and medals as it's socially acceptable to celebrate sporting achievements...

As the parent of a high achiever, no not really unfair - but maybe just have their names on a list/or read them out rather than get them up again.

From what my eldest has said, the mediocre students get praise for every little thing they manage to achieve. The high achievers don't because they get it...so they have 0 incentive.

As a high achiever myself I can tell you it sucks as your expected to just 'GET' things, whilst Billy gets a sticker for not eating his bogies for 1 day.

What if it were older students and athletics? Do you think it would be wrong to acknowledge exceptional achievements then?

The purpose of awards is to highlight or celebrate individual students who excel. In most cases I know of, it's not only natural ability but hard work and responsible behavior that lead to awards. For a school to fail to recognize that would be a real shame.

DS1, one very good academically, some sporting ability , the other son is dyslexic, tries very hard, quiet and diligent but doesn't achieve sporting or academic. DS1 got award after award. DS2 nothing.

I don't know what was achieved by giving DS1 awards. He knew he was good. He didn't have to try at all and he still did very well. He was just born like that.
You might as well give someone an award for being very tall or having ginger hair.

I think you'd be better off giving DS2 the award to encourage him and applaud the effort. Because that effort is a conscious choice and shows who you are, and at the end of it there isn't necessarily the reward of good grades and the opportunity that brings.

Our Primary school do awards, 2 per class and then a couple of others for the entire school. Not sure if every school is the same but some are for the high achievers. Others are more for effort and biggest improvement etc
I think it's nice and gives the kids incentive to work hard

When I was in school we had a merit system and each full card of merit stickers gave you £5 in the form of a voucher for WH Smith’s. I worked my SOCKS off and I got about £60-80 a year for books and then one year got a £10 extra for the biggest rewards anybody has ever got. This was 1990 so £5 was a very decent reward in its own and I was delighted and it actually encouraged me to be more engaged, to work harder and read a whole lot more. Of course that should be celebrated and you know what? Any other student could have tried the same 🤷🏼‍♀️

It's fine. During school my child always worked hard, never in trouble, always top of the class. Never got star of the week as this is always given to naughty kids who behave for 1 day. My son and others like him where finally recognised in year 6 and given awards, quite rightly so. I'm sick of trouble makers getting awards because they stop being little shits for 5 minutes.

Life is competitive- children need to understand this, pretending the things and people are not ranked multiple times throughout their lives does not help them.
What do you say to your child that has been protected from everything competitive and they don't get the university place they want ,or the job they want? They will never
have been exposed to the idea that they are in competition with others for the things they want, ultimately this is not kind.

Well said.

I wish I had realised it was all quite meaningless - well behaved, not amazingly creative or academic child never got anything. He didn't stand out at secondary school either...but 25 years on he passed those exams (still not the 9's and A's everyone wants) he's happy, settled, copes well with all the ups and downs in life and is in a well paid job. The prizes are meaningless.

I see no harm in recognizing exceptional performance..Unless so many children are getting the awards that a few are being pointedly left out- then I'd agree with you, but otherwise I think YABU.

I wish my kid's school would do more of this. When the football team win a match they get to stand up in assembly to soak up the applause. When a child gets a bunch of 115+ scores in their SATs they're told to keep it to themselves lest it make other children feel bad.

I would like to see kids being awarded for effort. Some are able to effortlessly be top of the class and so don't need to work hard. In our primary these are the ones being awarded. Whereas I think the ones who improve the most or work the hardest should get the prizes.

I say that as a top achiever all through school who won loads of prizes. I'm not sure they were deserved really as I wss just naturally academic.

Not in the UK but in Sweden where you get GCSE (grundskoleexamen) results in an envelope - at my kids' school they were handed out at a leavers' breakfast on the last day of school. Then the whole 13-16 school attends an assembly in the park with the leavers arriving in their classes on wagons pulled by tractors to celebrate.

At the assembly 2 awards are given for each boys and girls - so 4 in total
Award #1 are the academic achievement award to the boy and girl with the highest grades (in Sweden you have to count 16 subjects at GCSE)

Award #2 "Fighter of the Year" - awarded to those who have had to overcome obstacles.

Then there was the "Classic" award to everyone who took part in 3 optional physical challenge events during the GCSE year - you didn't have to be timed, just participate

• 20km hike
• School's WASA-loppet - 25km of cross country skiing on the famous extreme skiing course
• School triathlon (400m swim, 20km cycling, 5 km run)