Thanks to the No Child Left Behind law we have an educational environment here in North Carolina that is myopically focused on our students achieving good scores on standardized tests that are used to measure their academic performance.  In our kids’ schools they literally have weeks dedicated specifically to preparing for the tests, with some time being spent on such intellectually stimulating tasks as test taking strategy.

Since the schools’ federal funding is put at risk if the students don’t achieve what is considered adequate academic progress there is a great deal of incentive for administrators and teachers to get the maximum number of kids to pass.  In fact the book Freakonomics has a chapter that explores how some teachers in Chicago gamed the system (i.e. cheated) to make their students’ test results seem better than they actually were. 

What amazes me is that no one has thought of inspiring the kids to succeed on their tests in the most typically American fashion: by paying them.  Since each school district is looking at losing millions of dollars if they don’t get the students’ test grades up wouldn’t it behoove them to set aside a percentage for student incentives?  Any parent who has watched their kids open their birthday cards before their presents, not out of politeness but because they want to see how many gift cards they’ve racked up, can tell you that cash is king with America’s youth.  That’s why I think you could stoke the desire for "education" in the kids by merely promising them cash or a Target gift card if they achieve a certain level of success on the tests. The little kids would come cheap since their economic valuation system is based on the amount of candy the money represents.  The middle schoolers and high schoolers are more jaded and quite frankly they’re a bunch of money-hungry ingrates, so I’m thinking that you’re probably looking at a hefty price to get them interested.  That’s why I’m thinking you can give them a choice: cash or a special exemption on their drivers license that will lower the drinking age from 21 to 18.  The next step would be to earmark for education all the taxes on alcohol sold to these kids which would make the proposal revenue-neutral, and would help get it approved by our conservative representatives.  Those conservatives really don’t like anyone to have fun unless there’s money to be collected from it.  That would give North Carolina a healthy chunk of education revenue from gambling (the "education" lottery) and booze.

Of course once this type of incentive system is established it will have to be continued indefinitely. Some folks in the UK discovered the hard way that when an incentive is offered to one graduating class, those that follow expect to get the same treatment.  I don’t see a problem with that; I think we’d be paying cash to about 5% of our kids since the vast majority would opt for being able to drink the same year they could vote or be drafted. 

There is one potential fly in the ointment: the teensy – weensy problem of losing federal highway funds by lowering the drinking age, but since we’re already billions in the hole and NCDOT is as dysfunctional as a Hollywood marriage I don’t think it would make things much worse.  In fact I’d say we could split the earmarked taxes between the ed and transportation departments and both would come out ahead.  In case you didn’t know teenagers tend to enjoy their beverages of choice.