Top Middle Schools Must Take Struggling Students

This is one of those things that I feel are well-intentioned but aren't the right idea. Although it's a good idea that perhaps the most academically challenged should receive the best education, these schools aren't intended for remedial education. They're meant for people who have already been succeeding and have met a certain requirement. I'm not complaining like some parents who say the overall quality of the school will deteriorate because of this. I'm just saying the students wouldn't be prepared for such an environment and I'm not certain that's going to help them.

Let's take my middle school, Fieldston. I remember having to write a five-page essay every month in English class, research papers every three months in history, lab reports in science every month, and they expected for you coming in to know a musical instrument since almost everyone graduated from the elementary school. Now let's imagine a kid, who doesn't know English that well, be told they're gonna have to write five pages of that due in four weeks for one of their classes. And another one in the four weeks after. Spelling counts, by the way. There's no way you're going to pass. You're going to fail, you'll have to attend summer school, and the kid's self-esteem may collapse. That's what happens to a lot of people who leave their small high school pond and enter the huge lake that is college. They're suddenly just one valedictorian of many and it's overwhelming. And you're expecting the same won't happen to middle schoolers?

I feel the right thing to do is not the middle school, but starting earlier. You should be hitting up the ABCs in elementary, not in 7th grade. Although middle school isn't too late, you're already pretty behind by that point. Puberty is a cruel time, and being an outsider with less education isn't really the greatest position to be in.