I raised my children in the Federal Way School District, they are grown and have children of their own now. I moved out of the community so I have not been following the happenings around here.

I just recently started working in the area and am now volunteering at one of the grade schools in the district. I am confused as to why we are now referring to the students in Federal Way schools as “scholars”? I clearly missed out on that conversation.

Every time I hear that or see it printed I cringe. Scholar is a titled earned, what I see happening in the school I help at is far from scholarly.

My father was a chemical engineer with his PhD — he was a scholar. The child running down the hallway tearing other kids’ work off the wall is not a scholar, that child is a student.

There is nothing wrong with being a student. We all were at some point, and some moved on to become scholars, but not all and that is OK. There is no study or theory that can convince me that this is OK. I think we do our kids an injustice when we give them things that they haven’t earned, but that seems to be the trend.

I wonder if that is part of the ongoing problems we are all seeing around us.

Alice Phillips

Kent