Comments on: Do you pay your kids for grades?

By: Jasper

Jasper — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 19:25:22 +0000

If you do pay your kids, I think it should reflect effort, not grades. You want to encourage your kids to put effort where it is needed, not where it has the highest return.
My parents would do something extra at the end of the year if I did well, but it never was linked to a numeric value. That’s just setting expectations for a year over year increase, and reality is that you can only give out a bonus if the family as a whole is doing well financially. Much like a business bases its bonus system on not just individual but also company performance.

By: mfd

mfd — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 12:59:52 +0000

If your job as a parent is to teach your kids how to live in the real world then they should be paid for grades. School is their job and there should be monetary compensation (aside from room and board). I like the concept that they should pay you for bad grades. There are a ton of lessons to be learned from that especially if at the end of the report card they end up in the negative.

They’ll know that sub standard work will cost them and they’ll learn some debt management. Maybe even charge them interest on the money they owe you :)

By: Debt Reduction

Debt Reduction — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 18:35:24 +0000

Llama Money took my thunder. We were not paid. They were expected of us. (Although MSMomsmoney’s idea of the kid paying you for bad grades is an interesting twist.)

By: Llama Money

Llama Money — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 02:34:32 +0000

I don’t pay my son for good grades. Good grades are required – he’s a smart kid, and he’ll only get bad grades if he’s lazy. I don’t want him to do the right thing ( getting good grades ) only because he’ll get paid – I want him to do the right thing because it’s the right thing to do.

Teaching him that money is the only motivator is a bad road to go down, in my eyes.

By: MSMomsmoney

MSMomsmoney — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 18:50:29 +0000

I pay my son for grades
$10 = A
$5 = B
0 = C
He owes me $5 for a D
He owes me $10 for a F

By: Writer's Coin

Writer's Coin — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 11:54:34 +0000

I don’t have kids but I strongly believe it’s a bad idea. I was never paid for grades but had friends who were and I hated it because here I was getting good grades and had nothing to show for it.

But now I’m glad I wasn’t rewarded for simply doing my best. I think this could lead to entitlement later on in life. Especially if you’re paying your kid for a B. I mean, that’s Good right? So kids are going to expect something in return for “good” work? I don’t think that’s such a good idea.

Granted, I don’t have kids so maybe I’m speaking from an ignorant point of view (how else can you motivate them?), but that’s how I feel right now.

What motivated me when I was a kid? My dad would get very serious if I got anything below a B. Otherwise I was fine. Plus, it just felt like the right thing: to work as hard as I could and do my best (cheesy and cliché, I know).

And as for having one standard for one child and another for another: how do you get away with that one? My sister and I got different kinds of grades but since we didn’t have an kind of reward system, it didn’t really matter. If we did….boy would my parents have heard about it.

By: TStrump

TStrump — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 05:49:44 +0000

It might teach kids to work hard for what they want.
It also shows that education is important.