In today’s society, there’s mistaken belief if an average high school student doesn’t have a high GPA, they probably won’t get anywhere in life. This idea can lead many students to feel pressured into getting high grades.

When I was younger, I remember thinking that getting anything other than an A meant that I was not as good as the girls I saw on TV–I was a failure in my eyes. There are many who could relate to how I felt back then, and some haven’t quite grown out of that mentality.

Just because one student has a 3.3 GPA doesn’t mean the other student a few points above them is automatically better. Most colleges will still look forward into letting students with a similar GPA enroll in their classes and as long as they have some type of prior valuable experience, certain jobs will gladly hire them. They won’t lose friends for not being apart of the top 15 of their grade or not getting into Harvard.

Grades do not and will never define a person. Actions, personality, and drive to accomplish what matters to a person is what defines a person. Grades are the results of a student’s work but not a reflection of their worth.

Students aren’t obligated to cry over mountains of AP homework that’s due in 30 minutes. Students don’t have to prove their worth by stressing over a 99 percent not being a 100. Everyone has strengths and weaknesses, and everyone handles them differently.

In the end, grades are nothing but numbers that merely represent how well a student does in a certain subject. Getting a lower grade than someone else did does not make a person a failure.