Am I worthy? That is the big question students ask before petitioning to take an AP/Honors level class. After spending time defending and submitting their request, a few days later, the student gets an email saying they have been rejected. All the hard work and effort the student has faced goes to waste, as they can no longer take the class they wanted to. The main question is why can’t people take the courses they want, and why is the school not supporting the students to help them do their best work? I have interviewed students to see what they say about the petitioning process and the requirements for taking an AP/Honors level class.

Students have the right to take whatever class they want, and teachers should be willing to support their students and allow them to become successful regardless of the type of class they take. Students need a challenge. I know some people want it so it looks good on a college application, but others want to impress their parents and friends with the classes of their choice rather than the teacher’s.

School is a business. They aim to make money like any other business, which is no different from any other company. But how does that decide whether or not a student is worthy of attending a class? Well, I believe that the school takes a portion of students who are “smart” and a portion of students who have lower grades (not as bright) and classifies them as the people with the higher grades go into Honors classes, and the people with the lower grades go into College Prep. This allows the school to have a group of intelligent students taking the more challenging, most advanced classes and the students who are not as bright taking the more accessible, less advanced courses. This allows the students taking the more difficult classes to excel as they are more innovative, allowing the not-as-smart kids to do well in the less challenging courses. This makes the school look amazing, as many people excel and have excellent grades.

But how does this leave the kids? Kids feel dumb, sad, and unmotivated as they never had a chance to prove themselves in a more challenging honors class.

Sophomore Miles Rizor takes various honor classes, but Rizor believes that only some deserve to be in honors: “I earned my right to be in honors, whereas others haven’t.” Although Rizor thinks that not every student should be able to pick whether or not they deserve to be honored, he believes the petitioning process is bogus. “I believe the process isn’t fair as it tests you on something completely unrelated,” says Rizor. Rizor also believes that students should get a challenge but don’t believe they can go to honors if they haven’t earned it.

I also interviewed Neal Kohli, another sophomore in many honors classes. Even though he is present in Honors, he still believes that the system is unfair. “Anybody should have the right to have a chance to prove themselves in an honors level class,” Kohli said. He also believes the petitioning experience is stupid as he thinks it is “unfair.” He also believes that the school is only doing this to improve business towards their school.

The question for all students remains, “Am I worthy?” But I believe that that question should not exist as we should remove the petitioning system and allow all students to take honors classes regardless of other factors.