“Students for Educational Equality” aims to help level the playing field among college students so that everyone has an equal chance at graduation. They plan to do that by taking the grade point average (GPA) from the top 10 percent of the student body and redistributing those points among the bottom 10 percent. Oh, and the group – and its plan – is totally fake.
Members of the Young America’s Foundation (YAF) at Davidson College cooked up this fake student group and drew up a petition for redistribution of GPA points. They then took their effort to the streets – well, sidewalks – of Davidson’s campus.
Students were less than enthused by the scholastic socialism proposal. One reacted immediately, saying “I kind of like people to work for what they get.” Though the participants aren’t identified by their political leanings, it’s impossible to miss that he’s thinking like a capitalist.
Other students reacted similarly saying that the Robin Hood: College Edition scheme sounds unfair. The top 10 percent of the class worked really hard to earn those grades. Shouldn’t they be allowed to reap the benefit of their efforts?
Now, apply that thinking to people who earn high salaries. Should they, too, be allowed to keep what they earn? Or should the government raid their paychecks and redistribute to make things more equal?
Opponents will be quick to note that the best students aren’t always the hardest workers. Some people have a natural knack for things. In every school, there are students who work tremendously hard and still don’t make it to the top of the class. The same is true of the job market. In a free market, people aren’t paid by what they put in, but by what they get out – in other words, the value they create. Education, too, judges people by outcomes. Papers are graded by how good they are, not by how much work went into them.
Not everyone at Davidson turned down the GPA petition. One man eagerly signed and identified himself as a professor. Two bros were game to sign on. They gave a little shrug-laugh about it, seemingly figuring out that it was a joke.
The notion of taking GPA points from the top and distributing them to the bottom is not exactly socialist, though it’s in line with socialist thinking. True socialism would likely involve unionized students, picketing for the right to do less work for better grades. Redistribution of wealth is something we do right here in America.
The students who rejected the redistribution scheme understand that “equal” does not mean “fair.” A slacker kid getting points from a great student brings us closer to equality, but farther away from fairness. It increases the incentive to sleep through class and decreases the incentive to show up and learn.
Millennials, compared to older generations, are far keener on socialism. But as the results of this social experiment show, socialism sounds great… until someone wants to make it happen to you.
