Celebrate academics
Those of us at Central who are concerned about the high schools trend away from recognizing outstanding academic performance would like to thank the Record for their editorial support for our position.
Although the elimination of the Valedictorian/Salutatorian designation is one of our concerns, perhaps an even larger issue is the elimination of the departmental awards at the Academic Banquet. Historically, one top student in each academic discipline (i.e. math, English, science, history, etc…) was acknowledged for each of the four high school grades. These academic awards have been replaced by recognition for Character, Service, and Leadership. While I have no issue with adding these new awards, they should not be substituted for recognizing academic performance.
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If you attend an athletic awards ceremony, you might reasonably expect the students to be acknowledged for their athletic abilities. The same would be true for an awards ceremony in music, art, or theater. While Central continues to acknowledge and reward individuals in these areas, as they should, they are apparently uncomfortable with doing the same for their student scholars.
Like high achievement in music, athletics, and art, academic success is rarely the result of sheer God-given talent, but rather the combination of a degree of natural ability plus a lot of hard work, self discipline and sacrifice. With or without awards our high achieving students have demonstrated the work ethic and dedication it takes to succeed in life, but I don’t understand Central’s decision to single out academics as the one area they are not willing to celebrate.
Kim Klein
York
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