We are all marked by a number throughout out school career. Some have the number of 4.0, 3.5, or maybe 2.68. All of us in school are identified with a number 0-4, and possibly past four with AP classes, if you didn’t catch on I’m talking about GPA. Each of us has one; some may even have the same one. This number identifies us, it tells people who we are, not personality wise but academically. The number either helps or hinders us in a great way. Help us by getting into the school of choice, or keep us out of our dream school.

A College, let’s say Harvard, now I’m still in high school and have very little knowledge of the selection process but I am just portraying a scheme, so if it is not what your knowledge of the selection process is…then just bear with me, has one slot open for one more candidate to enter into their school. They do not know the race or sex, so they cannot be bias in any way. Both have similar essay, including the basic jist of a college essay, got the same score on the SAT, and do all the same activities, but there is a one thing separating them. One has an average GPA of 4.16 and the other has a 3.96. Immediately the college will pick the one with the higher GPA. Why you might ask? Because obviously they think the one with 4.16 is ultimately smarter because of their higher GPA. You might even have though that once I stated the GPA difference.

A higher GPA doesn’t mean higher intelligence; it just means you have the ability to do what the teachers ask without going into a deeper state of thinking. For some odd reason the world thinks like this, and we all are get so panicky about our GPA. When was the last time you said to yourself that you didn’t don’t care about your GPA and you just wanted to learn the material? If you’re like me you will say never, and look at me, I’m writing about how GPA’s are so horrible but I still care about it. Why?

Everyone knows why. Money… We are all so afraid about money; we all want to have enough money to live the way we want. We all have this very similar equation in our head when it comes to getting a lot of money the legal way. High GPA + High SAT Score = Good School = High Paying Job = $$$$$. So we all have this equation in our head about getting lots of money, and we figure out that our GPA is the source of how much money we get.

Only thinking about our GPA takes away our ability to learn, because we just want the high grade to get the high GPA. So we shovel all the material into our heads for the test and don’t care about learning. All the smart people in your school aren’t technically smart in the way of thinking; they just were smart enough to figure out a way to hold the information for a long enough time period.

In those past 499 words, I was able to say just one thing; even though I might have accomplished saying many things I was just trying to say one. The ultimate message I was getting at is this; everyone, when measuring intelligence, looks at how high your GPA is, and not your ability to show a higher knowledge, so we all turn to our GPA’s and forget learning, which in irony takes away why we go to that place of learning we call school. So if you are lazy and do not wish to read 640 words then just read the words 537-582, and my message will be quiet clear.