Long conversation last night about schooling. My neighbor's child is 5 and she is struggling with the constrictions of the public school system. In preschool, her child was encouraged follow the interest of the moment, create his own art, and write in any secret script he could imagine. Now, he is penalized for not rounding his "b", caught out for too much white space in his coloring book, and told that some of his efforts are merely "satisfactory" rather than amazing, astounding, and magnificent. Soon, he will be required to take the MCAS every year, further narrowing his concept of valuable knowledge.

This discussion turned into one about Mount Holyoke, where we both attend college as "non-traditional" (ie OLD) students. There is a peculiar phenomenon at MHC, though perhaps readers from other East Coast and East Coast-type schools will find it familiar. For the students here, an "A" is considered average. A "B" is something akin to failure, losing a limb, being condemned forever to a purgatory of temping and jobs at coffee shops. I am somewhat used to this culture of perfectionism, having attended private school and private boarding school all my life. However, after inhaling a dose of the "real" world over the past 10 years, I find it confusing and nerve-wracking to get sucked back into such a pervasive system. I can't tell to what degree the college, and its faculty and administrators, are complicit in this. Though I have not seen any blatant displays of expectation on their part, I feel they must be part of the problem. For instance, when one espies a small child running amok, one knows that their parent is somehow involved, either through direct encouragement or neglect. The women at this college, at the earliest stage of their adult development, have not created the cult of perfectionism themselves. They have inherited a rich (in all senses of the word) and full tradition. I am not impervious to it. As soon as I received "A"s, getting more of them became if not a focus, then a primary goal for my future college career.

I am teaching myself Greek over the summer, at least that is the plan. The issues stated in the above paragraph have influenced my summer study to a strong degree. Finding the motivation to study without benefit of grading, comparison with other students, and professorial expectation seems impossible. When did I get so far from my own goals and self-interest?