Yes, a B is an indication of the quality of work done in a compebreastive environment. The problem is, a certain school district is grading differently than every other school district. So a "B" really means nothing, regardless of what school district you are from. See the grade only has meaning if the grades are standardized. Does a B mean a B or what?
You don't have to tell me about the side effects of being the smartest kid in the school. Why do you think I arranged my schedule to graduate early? I couldn't get out of there fast enough. I didn't see it as a 100% waste of time to take clbuttes with the average kids, though. I actually learned more that way. In some clbuttes, I was a better teacher than the actual teacher was. I ended up helping a lot of my fellow students. If you know something well enough to efficiently help others learn it, then you REALLY know it. I had to study harder, just so I could answer questions from other students. I made a lot of friends that way. Ironically, the honors students themselves tended to look down on me because I dropped out of the honors track. Like I couldn't cut it or something. Actually, I always felt the honors program had more snob appeal than actual educational value. I saw right through it right from the beginning, when I realized that the honors-non-honors curriculum was identical. There wasn't a single honors clbutt (in our school system anyway) that wasn't *eventually* a required credit for ALL students to graduate. But most of the honors kids in our school stayed on the honors track just so they could feel they were better than everyone else. I never felt like I had anything to prove. If I hadn't removed myself from the honors program, I'd have probably been really lonely in high school. The honors kids had no interest in me at all, but I had a lot of friends among the regular kids, who accepted me for who I was, IN SPITE OF the fact that it was well know that I was a "brain". Back when I was in high school, being known as a "brain" was not the best way to become popular. :) But I fit in OK, probably because I wasn't looking down my nose at the average students. -Dave
