Simple multiple source essay.

I am quite terrible at writing, I am looking for some help looking for simple gramatical errors in my eassy.

Ethan Plymale

Professor Holbrook

English 100

November 12th, 2009

Modern Tradition:

Pay for Grades is a Good Thing.

We've heard it all before, "Honey, if you get all As on your report card, I'll give you $200.00 dollars for the semester." I heard this my entire high school career and it brought me to one solid conclusion: hard work brings greater rewards. To this day, I am still offered rewards to continue my success here at Morehead State University. Upon reading Steven Vogel's essay "Grades and Money", Stephen Ray Flora and Stacy Suzanne Poponak's essay, "Childhood Pay for Grades Is Related to College Grade Point Averages" and Liz Mandrell's eassy, "Zen and the Art of Grade Motivation", I felt a slice of confusion towards Vogel and Mandrell. I have never questioned whether receiving money for grades is wrong. Money for good grades brings a positive realistic way the jobs and careers work to a developing child or teenager.

In Vogel's essay, he questions "what exactly is the difference between a B- and a C+? Damned if I know"(445). To several different students, it the difference between their grade point average increasing or decreasing, their loss of a scholarship to a certain school, or the requirement of a remedial class. To some, grades control every aspect of their life, at home and on campus. Some students worry so hard about their grades, they literally break down and cry. As Flora and Poponak state, students that were paid for good grades in childhood, had relatively better GPAs in college: 3.29 vs. 2.88 (B average versus a C average). Vogel concludes that if grades are the equivalent to money, then learning would be the cost. I do not see it that way; money for grades encourages the student to learn more and strive for the better grade. Teaching our children that striving for excellent productivity in school deserves rewards and recognition will later benefit them when they are working that hard earned job.

Reducing the standards of grading will not help this matter either. In Mandrell's article, she concludes, through research, that virtually letting everyone pass a class doesn't really benefit the student. In her paper, she tells her students that they will be granted a 98% for the midterms and her experiment; however, her tests returned some disastrous results. The students became rather lethargic. I agree with her results from her studies. "Learning must be linked to a product." (439) Mandrell states. How many people would pass this class if money was offered in this ordeal? I believe grades and money have become tied into our society of learning. If I wasn't encouraged to get good grades in my childhood, I probably would have never made it to college. Vogel explains that grades are "an exchange relationship: they provide me with work of a certain quality and I reward it-- pay for it"(446). I agree with Vogel, but if he trades good quality work for grades, then isn't that the same practice parents are doing by providing money for good grades? No matter how we look at it, the grading system is a system of rewards, whether it be scholarships, money or a nice pat on the back with a congratulations. To me, receiving good grades in high school resulted in obtaining enough scholarships to take part of the educational processes here at MSU and a little extra spending money on the side.

After I graduated high-school, I picked up a summer job to help me pay for things I required for college. I found myself trying to complete my work to the best of my ability. This was, as my parents called it, a reflection of what they instilled into me during my childhood years. No doubt, my boss offered me two raises during the summer I worked. As I worked in this small store in Phelps, KY, I realized that there is no point in trying to achieve something if you are not going to try to the best of your ability. Parents paying for grades not only encourages their children to develop well in school, but it also enforces lifelong lessons. It teaches children and teenagers alike that working hard for something will always provide some sort of reward. I do not agree with Vogel, who states that grades for money eliminates the need for learning, I feel it develops a need for learning!

Works Cited

Vogel, Steven. "Grades and Money." Dissent Fall 1997: 102-4. Rpt. in Reading and Writing in the Academic Community. 2nd ed. Eds. Mary Lynch Kennedy and Hadley M. Smith. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2001. 445-48.

Mandrell, Liz. "Zen and the Art of Grade Motivation." English Journal Jan. 1997: 28-31. Rpt. in Reading and Writing in the Academic Community. 2nd ed. Eds. Mary Lynch Kennedy and Hadley M. Smith. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2001. 435-39.
Flora, Stephen Ray and Poponak, Stacy Suzanne. "Childhood Pay for Grades Is Related to College Grade Point Averages." Psychological Reports 2004. Rpt. in Reading and Writing in the Academic Community. 2nd ed. Eds. Mary Lynch Kennedy and Hadley M. Smith. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2001. 449-5