Rescuing Children from Grades and Tests: Building a System That Cares

I recently watched a lecture that Alfie Kohn gave at the Deming Institute, titled The Schools Our Children Deserve: Rescuing Children from Grades, Tests, and Data. Alfie Kohn has written several books on the topics of parenting and education. Many of his writings focus on the detrimental effects of rewards and competition and relate those theories to current educational philosophies. His ideas align closely with what we believe and practice at the CARE Society — that real learning can only flourish in an environment of curiosity, compassion and community.

The System Problem

In his talk, Kohn draws on the work of Dr. W. Edwards Deming, who applied systems thinking to industry and management. Deming emphasized that to create consistent quality, we must examine and improve the entire system rather than blaming individuals for its failures. Instead of focusing on who made the mistake, Deming encouraged leaders to ask what in the system allowed the mistake to occur.

 “A system view helps create a long term focus. Rather than seeing incidents as isolated (and often looking for the person to blame for a bad result) a system view allows managers to focus on the systemic drivers of results.” John Hunter gives an overview of this theory in his article “Appreciation for a System.” https://deming.org/appreciation-for-a-system/ A very interesting exercise to illustrate systems failure that Dr. Deming used to do in his workshops is called the Red Bead Experiment. A video can be found here. https://deming.org/explore/red-bead-experiment/ 

This concept translates powerfully to education. As Kohn points out, schools too often blame students, teachers, and parents for poor outcomes — students for not trying hard enough, teachers for failing to engage, and parents for not being involved. Kohn posits that we should be looking at the system of education, specifically the fact that it is based on incentives, rewards and competition, in the form of grades and test scores.

The Hidden Costs of Achievement-Based Schooling

Kohn identifies six major problems with an education system focused on grades, test scores, and external rewards. When we focus on “How Well” kids are doing in school, instead of “What” kids are doing, or the learning itself, the effects on attitudes about learning and long term learning are overwhelmingly negative. “We should be focused not on mindset, but on what kids have been given to do and whether it is worth doing.”

1. Learning loses its joy. When school becomes about performance, children stop learning because they want to understand. They learn because they have to “do well.” Curiosity fades, replaced by anxiety and avoidance.

   
   

2. Success feels uncontrollable. Students who are praised for being “smart” or “talented” come to believe that success is about innate ability, not effort or process. This undermines resilience and growth.

   
   

3. Students play it safe.Students tend to pick the easiest things to do if the emphasis is on results and achievements. Because children are rational, use of achievements will lead students to avoid challenges. This can lead to grading on effort, or on a curve, which is also a mistake, because now students can be a failure at trying as well.

4. Failure becomes personal.

There is a real emotional cost when success and achievement are overemphasized. Students can be devastated by a bad grade, seeing it not as feedback but as a personal failure. From an early age, children learn that there is a sharp dividing line between acceptable and unacceptable performance. To soften the blow of a poor grade, adults often try to convince them that it still falls “above the line,” or we simply move the line altogether.

But as systems thinking reminds us, the problem is not where the line is—it’s the existence of the line itself. When a child’s sense of worth is tied to staying above an arbitrary standard, education becomes a source of anxiety rather than growth. Many students who have spent years defining themselves by high performance struggle deeply when they reach environments—such as college—where that consistency is no longer possible. For younger children, one low grade can be enough to convince them that they simply aren’t “good at school.”

5. Peers become competitors.There is a serious effect on social interactions and how children look at their peers. The more students adopt performance goals, the more likely they are to view everyone around them as obstacles to their own success. When students are focused on achievement, they tend to defend their competence by showing that their peers are wrong instead of listening to see if they had a point or were correct.

   
   

6. Thinking becomes shallow.The more you focus on “How Well” kids are doing, the more shallow and superficial their thinking tends to become. The more the focus is on achievements and test scores, the lower the quality of the learning by meaningful indicators (not test scores). Students are less able to think deeply, understand problems from the inside and generalize and be able to transfer knowledge to solving problems in different situations. The smart kids are the kids who are good at “doing school.”

   
   

These statements are not theories, but results from studies and research done with students in traditional educational systems. We objectively know that the current mainstream methods in education are ineffective at best and harmful at worst. 

From Systems of Control to Cultures of Care

At the CARE Society, we take Kohn’s and Deming’s insights to heart. We believe the issue isn’t where the line is drawn between success and failure — it’s the existence of the line itself.

Our approach is to remove artificial measures and replace them with meaningful experiences. Students at the CARE Society don’t chase grades; they create projects. They explore their interests, express their ideas, and share their discoveries with others. Instead of competing, they collaborate. Instead of performing, they create.

Every project is seen through the lens of being original and valuable, not perfect. Students are encouraged to take risks, reflect on outcomes, and turn unexpected results into new learning opportunities. In this kind of environment there is no such thing as failure — only feedback,  growth and discovery.

A System Rooted in CARE

Our goal is to shift education from a system of control to a culture of care. When children are trusted to follow their curiosity and supported by a caring community, they rediscover the natural joy of learning — the same curiosity and creativity that come alive when they play.

When students are free to pursue meaningful projects, they don’t need grades or gold stars to stay motivated. Their work becomes personal, their learning purposeful, and their growth self-sustaining.

At the CARE Society, we’re building what Alfie Kohn calls “the schools our children deserve” — learning communities where care replaces competition, curiosity replaces compliance, and every child learns not to meet a standard, but to become a capable, compassionate, and creative human being.