RESOLVED: Intelligence should determine grades more so than Effort in School

Though I agree with my opponent on a personal level, ie. it would have been better for me personally, I don't agree with his position when applied to students in general. "School was designed to increase the mental capacity of its student body." -This statement, though true, is not complete. This is one of the reasons modern public schooling was developed the way it was, but it is also designed to enhance one's social skills. School is also designed to prepare students for life after school- the real world. "As it stands, homework, class work and projects account for more of one's grade than tests do." -If my previous statement is to be considered true, then consider this- I get paid to work, not to know. The reason grades account for 30-50% of your grades (depending on where you go to school), and WORK accounts for the remainder (sometimes the majority of the grade) is because other socially necessary attributes are being measured, calibrated, and tested on a daily basis (I know education is not perfect, but we are arguing the purpose). I can almost guarantee that a high school student who does not complete homework, class work, and projects will be a slacker in the real world. Knowing is not an excuse for not completing a task, and it is the teacher's job to ensure that you can pass the test in the first place. Homework, class work, and projects not only build social skills, but they tell the teacher what the class needs to learn. They also help you exercise your knowledge (yes, the brain is a muscle that should be exercised). This also maintains some uniformity amongst schools, and provides a simple way to enhance methods of teaching, allow for uniformity in teaching based on grade level, etc. "School is based on Intelligence, yet effort is impacting grades more so than intelligence." -Effort is a good way to measure actual intelligence. Intelligence is not simple knowledge and/or recollection, but cognizance and understanding. You can have all the intelligence in the world and know nothing. You can know all the data in the world and lack intelligence. School teaches you to acquire knowledge, explore your intelligence, and apply both through effort. School prepares you for the real world, and intelligence will not carry you through every job interview, promotional review, etc. You must have a habit of work in order to work effectively, and your proposition would probably give rise to a breed of lazy memorizers who know how to cram for a test. Your proposition would lessen the quality of education, and all the intelligence would soon be lacking from school in it's entirety. Another thing that would be lacking from schools, and students is practice. In your definition of school you state "Any place of education for 14 year olds and above". Your definition not only applies to High School, but to institutes of Higher Learning. How would a doctor perform at his first surgery if he never practiced? How would he respond if all he did was memorize jargon and test answers, but never put in any effort to complete homework, class work, and projects? Would you want that doctor operating on you? There are many other fields that would be affected even if we limited this discussion to High School. Most people in the military join right out of High School. The greatest culture clash would be for someone who traditionally refused to do homework, class work, and projects to now be thrown into a situation in which EVERYTHING is homework, class work, and treated as a project! These people would not survive a day in bootcamp, let alone in a real world military situation. Intelligence can get you out of a lot of situations, but effort is something you condition yourself to put in. Intelligence without effort is empty...