"It's not that I'm lazy, it's that I just don't care."

As most of us have experienced and have mentioned at the last TF meeting, classroom behavior, distractions and lack of focus seem to be the largest barriers to effectively communicating, well, anything. This lack of focus and motivation also seems to be reflected in the class grades and district graduation rates. That said, I wondered if the students in Ms. Hardy’s classes were aware of these two significant indicators and what their general attitude toward school was. I was half expecting a response resembling the line from Office Space I quoted in the subject of this post, so put together a small survey to try to get at the answer. A sheet with the following questions were distributed to all of Ms. Hardy’s chemistry and physical science classes (not just the ones I’m in):

What grade are you in?
What is your favorite class?
Do you think doing well in school is important?
Are you happy with your performance in school?
What percentage of students do you think graduate from YPSD schools?
Do you think you’re going to graduate from high school?
Do you want to go to college?
Do you know the difference between a bachelors, masters and PhD degree?
What do you want to do after high school / college?
What’s your favorite song?

The answers and much, much more.