"Don't Blame the Player, Blame the Game": An Exploration

of Performativity and Rationality in Education

Amy H. Bu
Department of Education, University of British Columbia
EPSE 501 Seminar in Human Development, Learning and Culture
Dr. Barbara Weber
December 8, 2022
 Table of Contents

1. Introduction

2. Performance and Rationality

3. When Value Devalues Values

3.1 Value versus values

3.2 Grade-value as currency in the educational marketplace

3.3 The dehumanizing and totalitarian power of grade-currency

4. The Emperor Wears No Clothes

4.1 Participation under duress

4.2 Defining education: Bildung versus Erziehung

4.3 Instrumental means for instrumental ends

5. Revisiting the Concept of a "Good Student"

 Introduction

This paper was motivated by a personal reflection on the various instances of bullshit I was
made to deal with throughout my secondary education. These were activities typically auxiliary
to our actual learning, such as the filling out of self-assessments, pledging of effort in class, or
tokenistic fulfilling of volunteer hours. Frankfurt (1986) conceptualizes bullshit in part as
activities "that are pointless in that they have nothing much to do with the primary intent or
justifying purpose of the enterprise which requires them". Yet, it was evident that many such
activities, despite their bullshit outcome, had at least been conceptualized with the goal of
facilitating some kind of learning, motivation, or development. Thus presents a paradox
wherein activities with non-bullshit goals nevertheless appear to be bullshit, and elicit
responses accordingly.

Anecdotes over the years corroborated my experience, and it appeared that the phenomenon
of bullshit activities occur not only in schools, but more widely throughout the education
system. Here, I hypothesize that social forces incentivize bullshit, particularly in situations
where a powerful audience is present and the stakes are high. A prime example of this is in
university admissions, for which high school students work diligent to amass an appropriate
balance of leadership experiences, artistic or sporting ability, and community service. A quick
search online reveals countless forum questions and college-prep articles dedicated to the
importance of extracurriculars, and many sites skip to the point with headlines like "Best
Extracurricular Activities for Ivy League". It would be cynical to think that no student pursues an
activity for the joy of it alone, but the current state of affairs suggests that many such
endeavors, having served its primary purpose of decorating the applicant, are soon given up
thereafter. After all, university applicants are already willing to devise family calamities and
false accounts of their childhoods1 as part of their strategy to gain admittance; details
embellished (or bullshitted) could hardly jeopardize them as liars.

In a recent conversation, an experienced schoolteacher found it disheartening that their

students saw parts of their education as "hoops to be jumped through…they were [not
concerned with the spirit of the exercise], only with what they had to do to earn full marks"
(Sahdra, personal communication, October 2022). This complaint, which echoed those I heard
and resisted as an adolescent, renewed my intrigue. If we are to reject the cynical view that
students are avoidant of effort by nature, such an enduring pattern of behavior suggests the
presence of forces that shape it.

To explore this phenomenon, I will primarily draw upon the scholarship of political economist
Max Weber and sociologist Erving Goffman. Together, Weber's theory of behavioral rationalism
and Goffman's dramaturgical metaphor of the student as a performer will elucidate the
structural position of the student in the education system. Using this framework, I consider
some consequences of the rationalization of higher education, and the strategic actions
students take to cope with them. I reflect on the genesis of these systems and offer a defense

1
For instance, see this story: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/16/us/college-admission-applications.html
of the student, arguing that instrumental rationing of effort and an overall instrumental
approach is pragmatic in such a bureaucratized system.

Performance and Rationality

In The Performance of Self in Everyday Life (1959), Goffman offers an extensive analysis of
everyday social interactions through a dramaturgical metaphor. Individuals are transformed
through interaction into actors in a performance routine. Here, the term "performance" refers
to the various tasks associated with impression management. Each actor presents a front, "that
part of the individual's performance which regularly functions […] to define the situation for
those who observe the performance" (p.22), which implicitly requests that their audience "take
seriously the impression that is fostered before them" (p.17). An appropriate front must be
carefully curated and managed for each situation to avoid an embarrassing breakdown of the
performance. Social fronts can be divided into components such as setting, sign-equipment,
appearance, and manner (p.29), all of which can credit or discredit a performance. Thus upon
going to school, students must contend with the expectation of presenting a front reasonably
befitting their role in that social setting.

Given the power that accompanies the social role of a teacher, it is advantageous for students
to regard them as the primary audience in school. A favorable impression made upon teachers
can open opportunities and privileges influential to a student's educational journey. Thus, to
appear disciplined and motivated (impressions desirable to teachers), students must refrain
from behaviors such as over-relaxing in the classroom or using profane language. Appearances
and manners incongruent with the desired impression discredit the front and endanger the
audience's willingness to accept their performance as sincere (Goffman, 1959). A front is only
complete with the accompanying sign-equipment, however: Additional symbols are needed to
clearly establish the "definition of the situation" and cue people into their expected role
performances (Preves & Stephenson, 2009). Sign-equipment for the front of a "good student"
may take the form of public recognition for academic achievement, leadership positions in
student organizations, privileges in their relationships with teachers and staff, and so on.
Student prefects, who are often selected for already having a combination of those
achievements, are often given a pin to wear – a literal symbol that highlights their prestiged
status.

Teachers similarly engage in a performance which demonstrates their understanding of their

social rank and associated responsibilities. As foot-soldiers of the educational system, they have
the power to – but also endure the pressure of having to – enforce policies and behaviors.
There are therefore higher stakes associated with the success of their performance. Teachers
are hence even more careful than students not to let down their front. Preves and Stephenson
(2009) noted that teachers must constantly endeavor to maintain the impression of one who is
credible, knowledgeable, and worthy of respect. While this paper focuses primarily on the
performance and role of the student, it is important to note that other performances are
simultaneously ongoing within the school setting and wider education system.
Having established the general character of the front and sign-equipment that allows students
to give off a desirable impression, we now turn to Weber's theory of rationalization to explore
different ways of characterizing the motivations behind the performance and its ultimate goal.
Weber theorizes in Economy and Society (1968) that all behavior can be characterized using
four typologies (p.24). Only two will be considered for the purposes of this paper: the concepts
of value-rational behavior and instrumental-rational2 behavior. Value-rational behavior is
characterized by an underlying "conscious belief in [the activity's] value for its own sake
[…], independent of its prospects of success" (p.24); instrumental-rational behavior is
concerned with just the opposite: such acts are oriented to their "purpose, means, and
associated consequences" (Tribe & Weber, 2019 pg. 102).

Most actions employ both value- and instrumental rationality; those which are purely principle-
driven or solely outcome-focused constitute a fraction of cases (Tribe & Weber, 2019, pg. 103).
Consider the performance staged by the student: the vast majority of behaviors encouraged in
students, such as honesty and sociability, are also generally held in high moral regard. In fact, it
is precisely the social importance of those values that causes them to be enforced as common
behavioral standards. Therefore, students likely identify sincerely with those aspects of their
performance from a value-rational standpoint. It seems far more plausible that they espouse
the respectful treatment of peers simply because it is right, rather than emphasize instrumental
ends such as avoiding retaliation themselves. As the example illustrates, motivations which are
value-rational do not necessarily suggest the absence of any instrumental benefit.

Let us thus consider the student's impression management through the lens of these concepts.
For many, the core outcomes achieved through a successful performance in secondary
education is a set of symbols, some examples of which have already been outlined, which
ultimately allow the student to gain entrance to a desirable university (the action which, too,
carries a set of value and instrumental motivations). We can thus assume that all achievements
obtained through that process were guided by the hand of instrumental rationality. After all, if
a student were to pursue their education for purely value rational reasons, some activities
would inevitably fail to align with those values, costing them symbols deemed instrumentally
valuable. I can hardly recall any examples from my experience where a student chose to forego
a desirable achievement out of principle.

Goffman notes that "it is apparent that care will be great in situations where important
consequences for the performer will occur as a result of his conduct" (1959, p.225). In other
words, performers are forced to give precedence to instrumental rationality in high-stakes
circumstances. Given the social and class mobility a tertiary education promises, the successful
completion of secondary education may well be counted among them.

Ball (2003) describes the demoralization teachers in England suffered when reforms to the
education system required them to "organize themselves as a response to targets, indicators

2
A newer translation of this work refers to this instead a "purposive rationality". (Tribe & Weber, 2019)
and evaluations", which stripped them of the freedom and confidence to teach in a more
intuitive, personal way. Such bureaucratization for the benefit of efficiency, predictability, and
quantification (Ritzer, 2013) is a clear example of what Weber termed rationalization, which he
theorized would result in impersonality, objectification, and enhanced control (Kim, 2022). The
"targets, indicators, and evaluations" are the direct result of the government's rationalization of
educational values, for ease of evaluation and control. The rationalization of education is, of
course, not unique to England: stories abound of American public school teachers who refuse
to teach low-performing students for fear they drag down their class average and affect their
employment. The teachers in Ball's (2003) study, understandably upset, described facing a
decision to either leave the profession or enact those reforms. Yet, even if they chose to leave,
a different teacher would simply take their place. Ultimately, it falls upon the students who
must re-organize themselves to meet those targets, indicators, and evaluations, for any
evaluation a teacher faces is predicated on the results they produce from their classrooms. In a
rationalized system, it is thus only a matter of time before students realize that instrumental
outcomes of their learning are prioritized over the value of education itself.

Consistent with Weber's delineation of value and instrumental rationality, Graeber (2001, 2018)
outlines two ways the word "value" has been used in both value theory and colloquial English.
The next section will expand on these concepts to outline how hypocrisy in education
disillusions students, and how students adopt the most pragmatic course of action in response.

When Value Devalues Values

Value versus values

What is the value of an education? And what, exactly, do we even mean when we talk about
value? The anthropologist David Graeber notes that, although scholars have historically failed
to unite behind a systematic theory of value (2001), patterns emerge in the ways we use the
word in both academic and colloquial English:
“We tend to make a distinction between 'value' in the singular, as in the value of
gold, pork bellies, antiques, and financial derivatives, and 'values' in the plural: that
is, family values, religious morality, political ideals, beauty, truth, integrity, and so
on. […] Just as commodities have economic “value” because they can be compared
precisely with other commodities, “values” are valuable because they cannot be
compared with anything. They are each considered unique, incommensurable—in a
word, priceless.” (Graeber, 2018, p.351-353).
Through a Weberian lens, the difference between "inherent values" and a "calculable value" is
the process of rationalization and instrumentalization. Calculable value, a rationalized product
of inherent value, is fundamentally instrumental: The primary outcome of reducing the
essential goodness of a commodity into a number is the ability to make precise comparisons
with, and thus "fair" trade for, other commodities on the marketplace.

Grade-value as currency in the educational marketplace

The metaphor of the marketplace can easily be extended into the educational sphere, where an
"economic agenda, characterized by the mastery of subject knowledge or expertise,
increasingly dominates higher education" (Kahn, 2017). Students peddle their performance in
school – both dramaturgical and academic – to an evaluative audience who decides whether
and how much they can advance. Everyday behaviors and learning assignments alike are
analyzed for their quality and "market value" by teachers, who assign them a quantitative
grade-value. In a traditional marketplace of goods, the market value of a commodity is "the
degree to which it can be compared to (and, hence, exchanged for) something else" (Graeber
2018, p.354).

In the capitalist system we currently live in, financial currency mediates the exchange of goods
and services. The education system mirrors it: grade-value, the educational currency, is
valuable in its ability to be exchanged for status-markers (e.g. awards and distinctions) and,
ultimately, entry to selective and "elite" experiences (such as programs for "talented youth",
high-ranking universities, and scholarships) that promise upwards class mobility. Just as
capitalists have the power to set the asking price of goods and services in the financial market,
educational institutions have the power to set grade-value prices in the educational one.
Examples of this include the (increasingly opaque) existence of a minimum grade-point average
or standardized testing score required for admission. "Elite" programs market their status
through carefully preserved selectivity, in which grades play a central role.

On its surface, the rationalization of education merely forces teachers and students to
"organize themselves as a response to targets, indicators and evaluations" (Ball, 2003, p.215).
In practice, it does much more. Under a façade of objectivity, rationalization offers authorities a
method of reducing inherent values into quantitative value. When an essay is given a grade, for
example, its inherent value (the quality of the student's thoughts, depth of their thinking, and
the wonder and curiosity embedded within) is lost – compressed into a single grade-value
statistic. Additionally, despite the subjectivity embedded in grading practices, grade-value
enjoys the veneer of impartiality and objectivity associated with quantitative metrics. Grade-
value as a currency and means of evaluation thus allows students to be reduced to a metric and
categorized into a hierarchy of worthiness based on academic performance. This simultaneous
dehumanization and commodification of students ultimately allows institutional authorities to
comparatively evaluate students not unlike how merchants might survey their inventory.

The dehumanizing and totalitarian power of grade-currency

Students, however, do not have the privilege of separating their student identity from their
grade-value or "market value". Instead, they are made responsible for their own value as
products of their education. Once a grade-value is assigned to a student, it often becomes their
defining academic stereotype. This phenomenon is clearly demonstrated in the nomenclature,
where students are described using labels such as the "B-student", the "valedictorian", and the
"dropout". Predictably, this results in far-reaching consequences. Due to the halo effect, a
phenomenon where one attribute impacts overall perception (Nisbett & Wilson, 1977),
students' grade-value can contaminate overall perceptions of their moral behavior (Dawes
et al., 2017) and personhood. In other words, high-achieving students may not be seen only as
better learners, but as better people. Cases that challenge this perception are met with
incredulity: On the rare occasions a "bad student" is lauded for their accomplishments, the
juxtaposition of labels is reported with outsized enthusiasm3.

Not only are students harmed by their commodification, but they also learn to identify with it.
Tragically, students internalize their own grade-value dehumanization. Research shows that
students interpret academic disappointments as personal failures (Jones et al., 2021): In doing
so, they perpetuate the oppression of grade-value supremacy and achievement-based
stereotyping upon themselves. Predictably, this has negative consequences for students' self-
esteem and self-concept, which negatively impact academic performance in turn (Purkey,
1967). The structural disempowerment of students, however, makes it difficult for them to
break out of this vicious cycle.

Rationalization conveniently concentrates power into the hands of authority, leaving little room
for dissent. As the teachers in Ball's (2003) study realized, their continued engagement with the
system both entails and is contingent on an unavoidable degree of compliance. Teachers who
fail to comply imperil their own employment and livelihood; students who fail to comply imperil
their educational trajectory by risking devaluation, retention, and expulsion. These
consequences are not only stigmatizing, but also linked to various class-coded adverse effects
such as lower lifetime earnings, reduced employment options, and poorer physical health (Lee-
St. John et al., 2018).

In an educational system that pits students against each other for opportunities designed to be
scarce, grade-value holds tangible and totalitarian power. It allows schools to do what
industrialization and rationalization allowed factories to: Evaluate, threaten, and discipline their
workers on the basis of output.

The Emperor Wears No Clothes

Participation under duress

An inconvenient truth threatens the powerful veneer of grade-value. Despite the totalitarian
power grade-currency commands within academic and educational spheres, it is almost
meaningless outside it. Grade-value statistics are of little use to the vast majority of employers,
vocational schools, and other non-academic institutions within society. Educational institutions,
obviously, see no benefit in advertising this reality. Moreover, students are forced to participate
under the threat of socio-economic exclusion and have no real choice to exit the system. The
activist and educator Paolo Freire presciently noted that “it is not systematic education which
somehow molds society, but, on the contrary, society which, according to its particular
structure, shapes education in relation to the ends and interests of those who control the
power in that society”.

3
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/high-school-dropout-community-hero-meet-swanie-nelson-satherley
Institutionalized education is a systematic means of reproducing existing power structures to
cement their position of authority. Although schools appear to concern themselves only with
issues of education and student outcomes, they play a crucial role in training and supplying the
greater capitalist marketplace with workers indoctrinated to its processes. Having endured the
processes of dehumanization and rationalization, the pliable and disciplined educated
[students] are "deposited" (Roche, 2018) into capitalism's human archive.

The education system simultaneously entices students with promises of class mobility and
threatens them with socio-economic exclusion. Classist messaging reinforces the norm of
staying in school and pursuing higher education, even at great financial costs. Similarly,
structurally classist forces heavily discourage the exit from the educational system. In North
American school systems, students are dissuaded from choosing vocational schooling – an
escape from grade-value despotism – over universities. From all angles in society, students are
inundated with classist messages which demean "non-intellectual" jobs and careers. As a result,
students are under-educated about those stigmatized pathways, rendering them unable to
weigh those choices as legitimate options.

Societal attitudes towards those who exit at un-sanctioned times are even starker. The negative
connotations of the term "dropout" are telling: it implies that the person was abandoned
("dropped"), and therefore excluded ("left out") from the activity. A "dropout" suggests having
been of such little value they were no longer permitted to participate. Given the conflation of
grade-value with general value, students who drop out lose not only their claim to grade-value,
but their claim to value as a person. They risk the stigma of being considered a conspicuous
absence of the value expected of them – in other words, worthless. The resulting social-
economic exclusion is felt through discriminatory hiring policies and gatekept high-wage jobs,
which directly impact their chances of survival in capitalist society.

An inescapable education system that reduces students to meaningless numbers can only be
described as predatory. Yet, teachers are often far too committed to the performance of their
faith in the system to acknowledge their complicity in perpetuating the classist status quo 4.
Students, of course, incur the cost of their dramaturgical commitment.

Defining education: Bildung versus Erziehung

Given the state of affairs, it is imperative to question the purpose, or the inherent value, of
education in the first place. The Oxford Language Dictionary offers two definitions for the word
"education" (Oxford Dictionary, n.d.):

4
In recent years, scholars and teachers have grown increasingly concerned about the emotional toll that high-
stakes testing and grade outcomes place on students (Jones et al., 2021). In response, many have adopted the
practice of reassuring them that grades are less important than they seem. We now hear the common refrain that
"grades aren't everything". However well-meaning, underplaying the dominance of grades in the educational
marketplace is a short-lived solution to a systemic problem. If a student receives grades that fall short of their
goals, be it to pass or to excel, it is ultimately that student who faces tangible and irreparable consequences in the
next steps of their education. The advertisement of a reality so discrepant from and intentionally ignorant of
students' lived experiences is not only irresponsible, but insulting.
 "1. the process of receiving or giving systematic instruction, especially at a school or
university, [e.g.] 'a new system of public education';
2. an enlightening experience, [e.g.] 'a day with those kids was an education in patience
and forbearance'".
Yet, these two definitions describe fundamentally different ideas. The first describes education
as the process through which knowledge is transferred by an authority figure (instructor) to an
obliging recipient, thus characterizing it by the achievement of this instrumental goal. The
second refers to an unquantifiable, transcendent experience which is meaningful unto itself,
thus presenting it in value-rational terms. The inherent contradiction within the definitions of
the word presents a documented challenge (Benner, 2017).

The German words Erziehung and Bildung, however, offer a clear conceptual distinction
between the two definitions of "education": Where Erziehung refers to the act of "educating
someone through pedagogical interaction", Bildung refers to "an individual’s educative
formation that happens through interactions with the world" (Benner, 2017). These correspond
to the first and second definitions in the Oxford Dictionary respectively.

When we talk about "education" in the context of schooling and institutions, the conflation of
definitions evokes the romantic process of Bildung. Educational institutions themselves go to
lengths to give off the impression that they are safe, caring places where meaningful personal
development and transformation is achieved. In reality, "a sustained and heavy policy emphasis
on accountability and demonstrations of effectiveness has placed pressure on educators to
perform in certain ways, and to care about things other than caring" (Walls, 2022, p.289).
Where students are systematically treated as human embodiments of their grade-value and
punished holistically for failure to attain it, the process of their education can no longer allow
the freedom, unpredictability, and joy inherent in "educative formation […] through
interactions with the world". It is instead reduced to performative grade-value maximization for
survival. Under the pretense of offering Bildung, the education system enacts Erziehung. It is
class-coded vocational training that aims to produce white-collar office workers who learn to
navigate a capitalist marketplace.

Instrumental means for instrumental ends

As players in a game with no exit, the only way out is through. Mounting anecdotal evidence in
popular media shows that students are indeed internalizing lessons from their Erziehung: The
need to compete for grade-currency as a means of survival. A perfect example can be found in
a widely circulated meme of a student's high school yearbook quote: "it is not enough that I
succeed; others must fail".

In a system that glorifies grade-value, it is only logical that students pursue instrumental means
to obtain it. This proves unpopular with the general public, who tend to harbor a rosy view
towards the education system as Bildung. Inevitably, when those instrumental means
contradict the public appetite, they elicit moral panic and hand-wringing. When students take a
perfunctory approach to their learning, engage in academic dishonesty, or use mental
stimulants to assist their focus, they appear to violate the inherent values of Bildung. They are,
however, goal-directed behaviors that have proven to be effective. As a result, students
continue to employ these methods despite tightened disciplinary measures.

These behaviors reflect not a moral crisis, but a desperate cry for help. Cheating and shortcut-
taking are a symptom of a greater malady: it is no coincidence that stimulant use and plagiarism
increases during stressful examination periods. After all, these actions would be meaningless in
the absence of overwhelming pressure to meet grade-value targets.

Revisiting the concept of a “good student”

The current education system mandates participation in a race measured by grade-value.

Students are forced to perform the role of a "good student" through academic excellence for
their future survival in society, which so exhausts them that they end up having to make
strategic trade-offs with genuine curiosity and learning. In this sense, they are not unlike "the
pupil who wishes to be attentive, his eyes riveted on the teacher, his ears open wide, so
exhausts himself in playing the attentive role that he ends up by no longer hearing anything"
(Goffman, 1959, p.33).

When the instrumentally-rational quality of a goal is minimized or forgotten, its sense of

importance masquerades as a value-rational one. The pressure to perform the role of an ideal
student and the pressure to obtain grade-value, therefore, can transform into a value-rational
end unto itself. This is exacerbated by the fact that, as previously mentioned, the conflation of
grade-value with the value of a student's personhood casts those deemed "good students" not
only as those who perform well in school, but as superior people intrinsically.

This cycle needs to be disrupted, but change must come to all levels of the system. Students
attempt to earn high grades through whatever means necessary, treating learning activities as
box-checking and hoop-jumping exercises, because the structure of the educational and system
demands it. Even in BC, where younger students have been transitioned into a mastery-based
evaluation system, those in their final years of secondary school are nevertheless given
traditional numerical and letter grades due to university admission requirements. What they
lose is the experience of, and what they might have gained from, truly engaging with the
material or task. So long as that is what educational institutions model, students will be forced
to value the performance over the spirit of education.
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