Muruganantham 1

Kaaviya Muruganantham

Professor Adrienne Cassel

English Composition II

21 June 2019

Research Proposal

I would like to talk about competition and how it relates to the academic performance of

high-schoolers because I’m in high school right now as well. More specifically, the school I go

to, William Mason High School, is notorious for the amount of successful individuals it contains,

whether it be in sports, music, or academics. This leads to an increase in competition between the

students to be the best in every area. I have felt the brunt of this competition and it is not fun.

The competition is present everywhere from just casual talk to winning awards. I would be

having a conversation with my friends and it would somehow lead to which person got the least

amount of sleep the night before. Of course, no one is bragging about how they are sleep

deprived but they are bragging about what it implies: they’re hardworking. It is routine to hear a

peer say “Dude, I went to sleep at 3 a.m. because I was studying for the chemistry test today”.

This is just a single example of the petty competition that occurs in our schools.

I want to find out if this banter between students actually helps them or hurts them. I

sometimes feel motivated by others when I sense how hard they are working, but I also

sometimes feel useless because I don’t think I’m doing enough to reach my potential. Do the

pros or cons outweigh the other? My school just got rid of the title “ valedictorian” and “

salutatorian” to address this problem. While this only affects the top 5% of my class of 800
 Muruganantham 2

people, this is progress to decreasing the competition. But is it a step in the right direction? This

nagging question in the back of my head is what lead me to want to explore this subject.

I feel pretty strongly about this topic because it affects me directly as I continue with my

high school career. There are millions of high-schoolers in our country that deal with the same

problem that I endure every day. I think this topic will invoke a lot of discussion about how this

could affect students in the future. There are many opinions that can be shared, whether it be that

competition will toughen students up or maybe worsen their mental health. I believe that there is

truth to both sides but I’m leaning more towards the side that thinks less competition is better for

academic performance. Personally, the way it affected me and my friends makes me want to see

a better and improved future for incoming high-schoolers. I know that competition can lead to

some mental health problems in teens as well as lead to pressure from parents. I also know that

this topic affects almost every student in our country. With the increasing percentage of people

wanting to attend college, the qualifications are becoming more extensive and a lot of kids are

fighting to make it to the top.

There are many things I need to learn to gain a better perspective on the subject. I would

like to learn more about the specific mental health effects that students experience and the

statistics of how such has increased or decreased. I also want to see how this compares to schools

in the 90’s or 80’s, and what has caused such a surge in competition. Some potential research

questions I could ask is “How does competition affect the mental health and academic

performance of high-schoolers” or “How has the structure of school changed over the decades

leading to the present?”