“This student is such a pleasure to have in class.”

As I glanced at report cards, concerned about how poorly the students who attended my after school program for academic help were doing in school, I kept coming across this comment: “Pleasure to have in class”, “…such a pleasure to have in class”, “…such a joy…”. At first, I ignored the comment. After all, the teachers were just trying to say something nice, and what could be so wrong about being nice to these children and their families?

The problem was that I’d see the grades and I’d read the comments, looking for information on what to do about the grades, but my only takeaway was that the students weren’t grasping the material and that they created a sense of pleasure in the classroom. I didn’t have any actionable items from the report card and neither did the parents of these children. I began to view this comment as dangerous for the community of families and students that I worked with.

Imagine being from another country or a member of a culture that doesn’t question whether or not learning is happening when children are at school. For you, this comment essentially means that you have a good kid who is learning. So, in your mind, (especially if you don’t know how to interpret the grades — more on this on another post), everything is fine. If, as this parent, you see this comment from elementary until middle school, you truly believe everything is fine. Then at some point when your child is at a school or has a teacher that gives grades and comments that show that your child doesn’t know how to read, how to do math, how to write, or your child performs far below standard on an exam, all of a sudden, you wonder where things went wrong and who is to blame.

Who indeed.