Extra Credit: Seldom Up to Standards

By Kathleen Kennedy Manzo

Slackers in Steve Armstrong’s class get little compassion from the veteran social studies teacher when report cards come due. Despite that reputation, his students at Manchester High School outside Hartford, Conn., still plead for a chance to earn extra credit once their apathy toward schoolwork is overtaken by panic over grades.

Mr. Armstrong has become all but immune to the begging and cajoling that confront teachers everywhere from students looking for a quick academic bounce. He has held to a strict policy of offering extra-credit assignments only to students with legitimate excuses for missing classwork.

"I generally am not sympathetic to people who slide for the entire semester, and at the last minute, attempt to do a prodigious amount of work that will put them over the...