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When I was in elementary school we had a man who worked at the school named Placido. Every report card day he would come to school with bags of quarters and would give each child a quarter for every A they had earned even if they only got an A in conduct or PE. He also gave a quarter for perfect attendance. (Note a quarter was a lot back then, it was in the day of penny candy.)

Placido was like Santa Clause on report card day. Looking over every child's card giving them praises and quarters and soliciting promises to do better next time should a child have a poor report card. We had six subjects, so with perfect attendance and conduct it was possible for every child to earn $2 for a perfect report card.

Placido was not a teacher and I think he believed by giving quarters, he was doing his part to better our education. He was in fact the school janitor. The way he dressed showed that he made little money and he lived alone in a shack (literally) on the wrong side of town. He didn't have much of a formal education and spoke in broken English. Report card day must have cost him a fortune in his eyes, but it was his was of contributing to our education.

That after a half century I can still remember his name, his face and his words of encouragement and praise attests to fact that Placido had an impact on me and my education.

That is a wonderful story. Thank you for sharing it.

I'm on the fence with this issue, however. I think that it's the Teacher's job to teach and the Parents' job to reward. It's the Government's job to get the heck out of the way.

In our house, good grades (read achievement) and chores are not rewarded financially. Those things are called responsibilities. Taking initiative to do extra things (ie doing the chores voluntarily for a sick sibling or an extra research paper that is not assigned or mowing the lawn of an elderly neighbor at no charge) is what is rewarded in our home.

Probably why everyone calls me old-fashioned.

That is a beautiful story. Parents and/or individuals choosing (out of the goodness of their hearts) to reward students with payment is fine. (Btw, I think that’s a story you should send somewhere to be published, like the Chicken Soup series, for example.)