There’s no small irony in the fact that writing and publishing this excellent analysis now elevates you above your peers in the competition for admission into Famous University. (Stanford should be kicking themselves!) Given the spread of blogs and Internet Presence in evaluation, we are likely approaching a period in which this kind of thing (followers, likes, traffic) becomes another metric. Congratulations on being ahead of the pack and producing work genuinely indicative of worth!

Speaking of competition. The competitive model is the lifeblood of the American education system. Teachers feel it too. Some of the metrics of a good teacher include rigor, toughness, popularity, student test scores, obedience, order, and adherence to the curriculum and Standards through the metric of thorough lesson plans. Thus we teachers all too often find ourselves running the classroom accoring to the metrics rather than the student. We assign homework because everyone else does, feel an urge to be unyielding because others are, focus on order and obedience and silence because that is the measure of a good class. Likewise, parents are caught in the same spiral: the value of our children is measured in their grades. And volunteer work. And test scores.