Progress is truly the key here, and I do agree that IF you want something bad enough you should at least try for it. And if you don't make it it's not a bad thing, it just means that there is room for you to improve, whether or not you did or didn't do something. BUT I still find it wrong to give out awards to everyone, when only 3 or 4 (usually most competitions have 3 if not 4 places that "give" awards) did well enough to earn them. It makes the ones who DID do all that work, training and/or studying feel like bittersweet that they even tried that hard.



And as for the Olympics, I used that as a reference since the discussion on hand was about medal awards. i could have used the Nobel prize as well, but they only give ONE award per category and those are usually very specific as to what field they are given in. as for me participating in the Olympics, I did try to place in order to have the honour of representing the U.K. exactly 3 times starting when I was 15.And Yes even thought I never placed high enough to make it into the U.K. Olympic Team, I still continued to get better as with each time I tried. BUT alas My forte is and has always been in academics, particularly History, I have 2 Masters and am working on finishing up my Ph.D. To be perfectly I tried out for a spot on the team because of my professors had noticed my excellence in my extracurricular activities and advised me to try out to which I did, but it was of my own terms.



And before you ask, Yes I did start college when I was 15. I mainly did the extracurricular activities to relieve the tension from intense studying.