Cutthroat academics: that's what Oak Ridge's success as a college prep high school is based on. No student can argue convincingly that the competition here is "friendly" or even 'healthy." The school's reputation as a topnotch institution full of highly intelligent scholars is due not to the fact that we love to learn, but that we are obsessed with trampling our classmates underfoot.
             I have no problem with students who genuinely are interested in learning. How many times have you been denied a class (prime example: AP U.S. History) because enrollment had already reached its maximum? And how many of those students that had signed up before you really wanted to take the class? My guess is that 99 percent of the students enrolled don't really give a damn about history; they just want the extra weighted class. (By the way. what was your goal in signing up for it?)
             If you're not really interested in the class, do us all a favor and sign up for something you might enjoy learning. Don't waste our time just to prove you can get an A in a subject you don't care about. Why do people even come to Oak Ridge if they aren't interested in knowledge? Well, that's simple: they do it because of the prestige, and probably because their parents want them to. Oak Ridge is, in many a parent's mind, the first step toward a degree from Harvard and a successful career as an attorney, doctor, or engineer. With goals like these, the entire educational process is relegated to the position of a mere stepping-stone to prosperity; unimportant in itself In other words, the knowledge is infinitely less important than the money.
             Can anyone wonder, with values like these, why students, or other "successful' people in this country, are so often characterized as unethical?
             Case in point: the girl who begs her math teacher at the end of the semester to raise her grade from a B to an A, offering to do anything if he'll on...