Grades Don’t Define Us: Here’s Why
By Silvia Merello Franco (MYP4B)
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Edition 14 is the last edition of the 2025-26 academic year. See you next year!
Image generated by the author using ChatGPT
Imagine being judged by a single test. Sounds unfair? That’s because it is.
Yet this is something students experience all the time. A formative, a summative, or a report card often becomes the thing people focus on the most. One number can suddenly feel like it represents our intelligence, our effort, and even our potential, but the truth is much bigger than that.
Grades can be useful. They can show whether we understand a topic or where we might need to improve. Teachers use them as a way to measure progress and give feedback. In that sense, grades can help guide learning. But the problem begins when those numbers are treated as the only measure of success.
Think about everything a test can’t measure. It doesn’t show how hard someone studies for a summative they struggle a lot with the topic. It doesn’t capture the creativity of a student whose mind works differently from everyone else. It doesn’t reveal the courage it takes to ask questions, try again after failure, or help a classmate understand something difficult.
Schools today encourage us to be thinkers, risk-takers, and problem solvers, yet grades can sometimes make us forget that learning is about growth, not just numbers.
So, while grades can give feedback, they shouldn’t define our worth. They are just one small part of our journey. What really matters is curiosity, effort, resilience, and kindness, qualities that no report card can measure.
History and everyday life both prove this point. Many successful people struggled in school or didn’t fit neatly into traditional academic systems.
Just take a look at Bill Gates, who dropped out of Harvard to start Microsoft. Or Mark Zuckerberg, who left Harvard in 2004 to focus on creating Facebook. And Steve Jobs dropped out of college after one semester saying he found classes boring and instead went on to launch Apple.
What helped them succeed wasn’t perfectly handed in immense amounts of homework on the same topic over and over again. It was their determination, creativity, and willingness to keep learning.
School should be a place where we explore ideas, make mistakes, and grow. If we focus solely and purely on grades, we risk forgetting the real purpose of education: learning how to think, solve problems, and understand the world around us.
Let’s remember: we are more than numbers. Our grades do not define us; our passions, perseverance, and individuality do.
At the end of the day, a number on a paper doesn’t tell the story of who you are. And it never will.
Work Cited
Gentleman's Journal. “The most successful businessmen without degrees.” Gentleman's Journal, https://www.thegentlemansjournal.com/article/20-of-the-most-successful-businessmen-without-degrees/. Accessed 29 March 2026.
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