Coach Brown of A Passion for Teaching and Opinions is fed up with the sense of entitlement kids possess today, especially in the classroom. He believes early schooling is part of the problem:
Apparently in 1986, California actually created a task force that focused on getting better self-esteem training for kids in schools. So began the "everyone's a winner" situation that we all dread. Kids would do awful in certain situations and constantly be told that they were doing fine. I find this constantly at the high school level, and it isn't all the parents fault.
How can kids get all the way to me (Senior year) and still not understand that doing the work isn't enough? "What do you mean I got an 'F'? I did all the work!" Yeah, but you did it wrong. Then I get the call from the parents talking about flexibility, a call that I had more this year than any other. One parent told me "You have a reputation of being inflexible." ... What I find is that parents don't like that I don't accept the same crap they accept, and I feel that self-esteem is built when a student actually accomplishes something. That means that an "A" student needs to do excellent work, or it isn't an "A". ...
Like it or not, this generation is the most entitled ever in the United States. Kids have more independence, more money, and more control over their environment than ever. They are also more intelligent than ever, which we often confuse with wisdom. They have the brain to make great choices, we are just giving them too many outs when it comes time to use it.