Great Expectations or Just Unrealistic?

                In our age of higher education standards and helicopter-parenting, do we pressure our students to unnecessary extremes to reach what we believe is the modern definition of success? Never before have we given our young learners so many opportunities to learn at a higher level, but never before have we expected them to soar so closely to excellence. New queries and studies revolve around a central question: Is this newfound stress thrust upon those enthusiastic, overachieving and approval seeking students the right way to create a future?

                Not all students fit the bill of the adjectives used above, but every student who enrolls in one or more of these higher level classes has a drive to succeed. Some quake under the pressure, while others find alternate but not always healthy ways to deal. A lucky group finds itself motivated by the atmosphere of demands and difficulty. Avoiding anxiety is virtually impossible for any human being, especially a teenager.

                Our modern and ever-changing methods of testing and how we define achievement have exceeded reason. In some cases, they may create unhealthy environments for our youth population.

                For example, an article entitled High-Stress High School documents the specific rigorous and Advanced Placement courses a private school offers. Parents spend an average yearly sum of ten thousand dollars so their children have opportunities such as sports, music, student government and SAT Prep all while attending the top schools.

                The article quickly moves past listing the benefits of the schools, stating this about these "best options": "'These experiences can cause kids to burn out by the time they get to college, or to feel the psychological and physical effects of stress for much of their adult lives,' says Marya Gwadz, a senior research scientist at the New York University."

                How can we say that we are only providing our children with the best if we put their future successes on the line to do it? For what is a college admissions essay backed by the perfect SAT and ACT scores if less than 2/3 of all college students graduate? The intensity that high school students work at today has the potential to destroy their functionality by the time they try to decide their future. This is what Gwadz means using the term "burn out" when she describes the effects of our all around attitude towards this issue.

                Today we define success as working as hard and as long and at the highest level we can without failing to meet the standards of a system. The flaw is, this system is built upon how everyone around an individual manages. Instead of success being weighted by understanding of concepts as a whole, it's weighted through tests and lining up grade by grade in comparison.

                Students should have high expectations and challenges at all times because, without these in life, they do not know how to learn, especially in the face of a challenge far greater than what you learn in school. Expecting perfection in every area of a student's life is not the same as this though. It is essential for our future that we learn this early on, so students don't continue developing bad habits that harm their learning more than help it.

Citations:

• "High-Stress High School." N.p., n.d. Web. <http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2015/10/high-stress-high-school/409735/>.
• "College Dropout Statistics." N.p., n.d. Web. <http://www.collegeatlas.org/college-dropout.html>.