Preaching to the Choir here, but I'm afraid to report that our society is well on its way to becoming the 'Everybody gets a trophy' morass that you fear.
A few years ago I went back to school to get my Masters at the University of Washington. I assume it's a good degree since it was very expensive. When we started my class was told that anyone whom slid below a 3.0 GPA would be dropped from the program. But we found out there was nothing to fear since the average grades for each class hovered around 3.6. I noticed that when this became clear to myself and the other participants the quality of our work declined rapidly. From what I've read about brand-name schools like Harvard - the situation there is about as bad. A majority of graduates have an 'A' average. Can't have them feel bad about themselves after they spent all that money, can we?
My Former employer, Boeing, was even worse in some respects. We used to refer to the annual raise pool as the "Peanut Butter Spread". Why? Because no matter how good you were compared to your coworkers - everybody got the same annual raise. Okay maybe that's not 100% correct, but the difference between the highest and lowest raises was marginal. In fact, if you were making more money than your co-workers you were penalized in the next raise period. You can't earn a higher salary than your peers! It doesn't matter if they sleep in the toilet all day!
Then there is my eldest daughter and her adventures with the 2nd grade teacher who would hide and cry in the teachers lounge whenever my wife stopped by to find out why she wasn't assigning any homework. But, I think I've ranted long enough...
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Preaching to the Choir here, but I'm afraid to report that our society is well on its way to becoming the 'Everybody gets a trophy' morass that you fear. A few years ago I went back to school to get my Masters at the University of Washington. I assume it's a good degree since it was very expensive. When we started my class was told that anyone whom slid below a 3.0 GPA would be dropped from the program. But we found out there was nothing to fear since the average grades for each class hovered around 3.6. I noticed that when this became clear to myself and the other participants the quality of our work declined rapidly. From what I've read about brand-name schools like Harvard - the situation there is about as bad. A majority of graduates have an 'A' average. Can't have them feel bad about themselves after they spent all that money, can we? My Former employer, Boeing, was even worse in some respects. We used to refer to the annual raise pool as the "Peanut Butter Spread". Why? Because no matter how good you were compared to your coworkers - everybody got the same annual raise. Okay maybe that's not 100% correct, but the difference between the highest and lowest raises was marginal. In fact, if you were making more money than your co-workers you were penalized in the next raise period. You can't earn a higher salary than your peers! It doesn't matter if they sleep in the toilet all day! Then there is my eldest daughter and her adventures with the 2nd grade teacher who would hide and cry in the teachers lounge whenever my wife stopped by to find out why she wasn't assigning any homework. But, I think I've ranted long enough...