One standard set for students is the SAT test. Most Colleges use this single test score along with GPA to determine whether or not a potential student will be allowed enrollment to their school. An SAT test is based in two subjects, mathematics and English. By placing such heavy emphasis on these areas of learning, do we plan to grant the best higher education to those who are gifted writers and mathematicians? Perhaps we don't intend to do this, but an underlying social bias affects the way we value knowledge or what we think smart people know how to do. Students are encouraged to be doctors, lawyers, mathematicians, or engineers; they are encouraged to shoot for a high status occupation that will generate wealth. In America we like money, we like jobs that make us money, not jobs that make us good people. Our society values scientists. The scope of Western thought is based on reason and logic, everything

Each and every person has what some would refer to as his or her own calling. Some are scientific, some are musical, some mathematical, some poetic, all are vitally important. No two people think exactly the same way, and who would want to live in a society of drones? If you really think about it diversity is the reason that we have beauty in our world, it's the reason we love or hate things, it's the only reason anyone enjoys learning in the first place.

Somewhere along the line in our schools the goal of achieving for the sake of learning is lost and in its place goes the goal of achieving a grade. If students receive As or Bs on an assignment they are smart, if they get Cs then they are average, if they get Ds or Fs then they are dumb. It's not fair how simple that is. We forget how dangerous it is to put labels on people. When are we going to grow up and stop putting people over one another? We are all alive and we all have feelings. That makes us all worth so much. I argue that we shouldn't rate one person as being better than another. If the subject interests them and they want to learn more then they should be considered smart. If someone puts out all the effort they can for an assignment, learning more about the subject and it's relevance to their lives then they have won already and don't need to be evaluated.

Assigning students a grade can have some very negative effects on their learning ability in that subject. People don't naturally doubt their own abilities unless they get the impression that their work isn't on par with that of others, usually someone tells them this. By evaluating early we are teaching kids that they are only good at certain things. This can be a hard thing to shake even throughout a lifetime. I used to have the greatest problems with math; as far as I was concerned I was horrible at it. Those feelings came from elementary school where I had a teacher

Some common words found in the essay are:
Ds Fs, Standardizing Mind, Prize Philosophy, sat test, figure themselves, sometimes students, it's reason, money jobs, people capable, goal achieving,
Approximate Word count = 1281
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)