Dysfunctional Incentive System

“Do I get a reward for going to school?” asked a student from the Vons Middle School. “ You can get a reward, but only if you get good grades,” answers the student’s parent. Students usually get awards for good grades, but what parents don’t know is that paying a child can lead to a number of problems. It can create a dysfunctional incentive system in which students will forfeit their intellectual integrity, long term motivation to study conscientiously, and create an unsustainable promise from cash poor schools. In other words, paying students is a horrible idea because it tempts students to cheat, robs their motivation to study in the long term, and can bankrupt schools that have little money.

First of all, schools should not pay students
for good grades because it will tempt students to sacrifice intellectual integrity in order to receive financial compensation. The N.E.A says that practical problems may arise including “...pressure to inflate grades….” Students will not feel guilt since they will only focus on the money. Students may also work in tandem to cheat since they will not think of anything but the money. By doing so, they will lose integrity, and this will hurt them in the future. Unfortunately, they will also lose motivation to learn.

Second of all, schools should not pay students for good grades because they can lose their motivation to learn.
Edward Deci says, “Most children are by nature motivated to learn.” By paying kids, students will substitute their natural instincts to learn with a dysfunctional incentive system. Carol Dweck claims, “... paying students only helps them in the short run.” This can lead to decreased interest in learning. While paying children may help in the short term, in the long run, students will work only when schools increase their pay rate. Like a drug, they will need more in order to sustain the same feeling. To sum up, kids will ultimately lose natural motivation in
learning. Lastly, schools should not pay students for good grades is because it is not a sustainable solution in the long term. This means that over time, paying a student won’t work for long. It can also mean schools start to go down hill once they run out of money. The effect of this is lower scores in the long run. Students will try less and less unless the schools can come up with more money that they currently may not have. To sum up, it will only help in the short term.

Some districts prove that paying students helps by making students study more and the increase in grades.
Although it might help students it will only help in the short term, but in the long run students start to lose motivation and they will demand for more money to get motivated. They may also cheat. Also, when schools are paying students they also have to pay the teachers and the teachers might ask for more if they have a tougher class. This will cause the school to lose a bunch of money and when they lose money the school starts to ‘die’. In other words paying students for good grades won’t last long because eventually they will lose their motivation in learning and schools might start to lose more and more money. After the short term kids will start to ask for more money to get motivated. For the reason above, schools should not pay students for good
grades.

In conclusion, schools should not pay students for good grades. When considering the choice of paying students for good grades, the choice should definitely be not paying students for good grades. Students start to get lazy and ask for answers from friends instead of learning themselves. If people don’t listen to this they won’t know the bad side of paying a student. Students also get mad because it is not fair to other students why they don’t get an award or why the school is robbing the natural motivation of learning from the students. A few schools can’t afford most people a reward so if 50 people earn it, but one person doesn’t get it they can start to get mad. These three reasons why schools should not pay students for good grades could help schools in the future and present or schools can pick the choice of falling into a dark hole where they can lose everything.