Alright, time to get down to business. First, let’s have a little briefing about this ‘ace’ system. I have no idea if it’s supposed to be an acronym or whatever but it was implemented with good intentions. Good intentions. Not good consequences. As we all know (most of us, except probably those watching the match now [awesome it’s 2 – 0 now!] [I think that might be a fallacious statement]), intentions have little effect on what happens in the end. For example, I shall use the classic situation of a test. Let’s pretend you want to get a nice grade for that o-so-challenging math test. So what do you do? No, you don’t say that was a rhetorical question, you attempt to get good marks by mugging (not stealing). So you see, there’s the intention there. However, how I wished getting good grades were that simple. No, see, you still have to take the test! And what do you get for that test? Wow, a whopping 14 marks out of a possible 40+3 (5 for some random bonus question because your teacher is feeling kind). This happens ever-so-often, and the poor soul who tried hard for that 30 ends up with a horrendous mark that should have been given to some other person undeserving of that A1.
You might scream, “I thoroughly don’t deserve it!” but does it make any difference? No; it looks like your intention and the outcome just didn’t match. Oh well. Luckily that test situation was hypothetical, unless the person whom I was actually talking about knows I am writing about him (sigh yet another fallacious statement).
Anyway, I had better steer back to what this post was originally about. Sorry, not soccer. Anyway, to really get this post back on track, let’s go back to the idea of ace. Ace (or was it ACE, or A.C.E. or whatever) was supposed to encourage students to be independent learners and the whatnot schools aim to impart in students. The politically correct (but fallacious) answer is that, yes; most students do bother to try for that ace. Gosh I feel really thirsty now. I shall get a drink.
*2 minutes later* (Do pardon the overtly random behavior.)
Oh that was nice and refreshing. So as I was saying, the ‘politically correct’ answer would be yes, it has worked to some extent. What I think, on the other hand, is that this system has largely failed. Yeah you read right. Spectacularly failed. At this point, if you were a teacher, you would probably stop reading this blog post and get all angry and upset and remain biased towards me for the rest of my life. Well I hope you’re not for my own sake. Let me explain the (potentially fallacious) reasons behind my idea.
You see, after all this time, ace has turned into some sort of horrible thing for students. Seriously, who would want to do extra work for no benefits at all? You might say the benefit of increased knowledge but I extol; hardly any students unless they have too much free time on their hands does ace for nothing. The main motivation students had behind doing ace was that if they did ace, they would get better marks at the end of the year, not because of ‘increased knowledge’. The school might have tried to solve this problem by implementing a new system this year. Ace would no longer affect the end-of-year score of students; rather it would affect something known as their ‘scholastic score’. This was supposed to emphasize that ace was supposed to be to ‘deepen the knowledge’ of students, or self-learning. However, this will not work. In fact, this new system has only worsened the situation.
Students do not even have the correct mentality when it comes to ace, and I myself can say that I am no exception from the norm. We do it not to ‘widen our sea of knowledge’, but to get a better grade. By changing to this new system, students will develop their strong dislike of ace even more as ace no longer affects the end-of-year Mean Subject Grade (or MSG, another disliked acronym). Yet we still have to ace. Imagine doing something and reaping a pathetic reward. It’s like spending an hour at night doing this blog post and (probably) getting no ace for it because of the fallacious argument I am fighting for.
Also, students have to even opt for which subjects they are going to do ace for each term. This was supposed to help students plan out which subjects they were going to do ace for each term but this has also brilliantly failed. Sure, you might say that the school just wants students to ensure they get the maximum ace at the end of the year. However, by doing so, the freedom of choice of students is greatly restricted. Each term, you have to do ace for a subject, whether you have time for it or not. Unlike the previous system, which didn’t really care when you did your ace as long as you accumulated the required 10 ace per subject at the end of the year, this system forces you to do ace each term. Yes, this might be to reduce the amount of stress students feel at the end of the year when they have to do ace, study for the exams and anything else. The truth is, students enjoy freedom. Not just students, rather everyone would like to feel free. Come on, who wouldn’t? This system reduces our freedom of choice, restricts it, and I know I know and you know that you know that I know that we don’t like feeling restricted!
Ooh, that was a rather long post filled with
On a side note: Cool it’s 7 to nothing at Stamford Bridge in favour of Chelsea and the title is Chelsea’s for the season! Chelsea completely reduces Wigan to a pile of demoralized players with dreams crushed by their empowering EIGHT goals to their ZERO. The hopes the redder half of Manchester had of winning the title have been effectively obliterated!
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