I’ve said it before, and most teachers feel it, that the side comments made by students are often among the most telling. We’re gearing up for the end of third quarter and I’ve got five groups preparing submissions for the FPAC compost competition. Students have their self-selected projects as well. We were talking about next quarter where I hope to engage in researching an event from Philadelphia’s past and writing a feature article of some sort on it followed by the writing of a play based on that event for submission to the Philadelphia Young Playwrights Contest.

The usual moaning, wailing, gnashing of teeth, rending of garments occurred when I mentioned this plan. And one student in particular was incensed that we were involved in another contest. (We did studentcam during second quarter and sadly none of our films were among the top 150.) I asked why and here’s what he said:

“Because we have to work off of their timetable.”

Exactly.

Bundled into that comment is also the fact that we have to work off of someone else’s criteria and standards of excellence. As the teacher, that’s what I want — an understanding that life doesn’t revolve around what the teacher says but that there are real standards for all sorts of work. These are standards that you need to have internalized if you want to do real work in the world. And while there are grades (we are a school after all), I do everything I can to underscore how the work we’re doing for grades actually supports the projects going out into the world. It also makes me wonder what would happen if I simply set up a contest and let the students back plan the process. For some, they’d have careful timetables and would set their own deliverables. For others, we’d have a last minute rush. (Wait, that’s what we have now and I structure this project block. Hmmmm.)

Several students also mounted the “life isn’t a competition” argument. I wish this was true and twenty years ago I would have agreed with the students. There are problems with seeing work as a competition, particularly when it erodes the culture of the community. If we had students wrecking each other’s projects to ensure their own success, then I’d be worried. If competition fostered individualism as opposed to deeper community, then I’d be worried. I’ve only seen the opposite, where kids have supported each other as they get close to the finish line, and where kids have helped to raise each other up. Where I need to do more work is once we’ve finished is circling back one final time to the external standards and grade again. In other words, I loved elements of many of our CSpan films, but we as a group have to know why we did not crack the top 150.