"I love you 2% more today than yesterday..."

I received a request for tutoring from a family whose child wanted to get into an honors language arts program at his school.

His semester grade was a 93, and the minimum required for the honors program was 95. Would I be able to help him get his grade up?

I knew I could help a student improve his reading, writing, grammar, analytical ability, vocabulary, and other language skills.

But could I raise his grade 2% within a specific window of time?

In order to do that, I’d have to figure out as quickly as possible what the teacher is looking for, and then align my work with this student to optimize for that. It can be a fun challenge, if you know that’s the game you’re playing.

But what made me sad was the arbitrariness of the requirement. What is the difference between 93 and 95, in terms of a student’s potential, study habits, and language skills?

Nothing that can be clearly identified and cultivated. Nothing that teaches the child to get excited about writing and literature.

What if the requirement were something tangible, like reading a handful of books from a list and sharing what you’ve learned, choosing from a few different presentation formats? Or studying Latin roots and learning a variety of words that incorporate those roots, explaining the etymology of each one?

What if the requirement were to share a portfolio of your writing in a few different styles (or based on specific prompts?

I suppose it could be argued that a student’s aptitude and accomplishment in this domain is reflected in their regular language arts grade. Okay. Then show me the difference between a student who scores 93 and a student who scores 95. Show me the meaningful difference in the quality of the work they produce. Show me the rubrics that the teacher is using to score the assignments and how they emphasize the aspects of each student’s work that would need to improve in order for them to be considered for the honors track.

The difference between a student who scores 93 and 95+ is probably that the higher-scoring student cares more about grades. If that’s what they’re looking for in the honors class, fine.

I hope the student was able to bring up his grade in order to get into his desired class — or that someone decided to be a human and let him in even though he was a couple percentage points off.

I regretted not being able to help him myself, but I know my limitations. I stopped caring about grades when I realized that the difference between 93 and 95, which happened to be the difference between A- and A at my high school, made no difference in my happiness as a person, my ability to be of service to others, or my impact on the world. I can’t go back and pretend to care about it now, now matter how noble the cause.