buying into credentialism

i'm reading the vancouver sun today and come across an article about how some grade 12 students are going to private schools after school to get better english marks to ensure they have a good mark on their transcript for university entrance applications

students are allowed to replace their public school mark, which is often lower, with this new mark yet when these same 'A' students fail their provincial exams

i see this as students and their parents buying into credentialism, described by jane jacobs in her book dark age ahead

this ties into something else i read about the masters degree being the new bachelor's with respect to the work place; it's ridiculous how you needed a high school education, then a university degree, and now it's a post-graduate degree - that's a ridiculous way to judge a person's ability to work and think because from my personal observations of university students, they don't seem to have learned much

student's are so focused on the credential they forget to learn; it is in part why plagiarism rates are increasing; student's are so pressured into performing well that they will do almost anything to get a good mark and they forget that part of the purpose of going to university is to actually learn

aiming for good grades is a commendable goal but to cheat to achieve that goal defeats the whole purpose; one should aim to actually learn something rather than going through the motions because if you didn't actually learn anything from a class why did you take it in the first place?

i think what this rant is about is go to school for yourself and learn something; don't do it to impress future employers or your parents