Gone are those days when those who were opportune to go to school were regarded as heroes because of how scarce it was to have that opportunity, only a few knew the value of going to school, and for some, even if they knew, they didn't have the resources to meet up with their school needs, such as school fees, buying of textbooks and other school supplies.
But today, the story is different, almost every child now has the opportunity to be in school but the level of seriousness of students in this era differs compared to those days, in fact, it has gotten worse to the extent that some students now believe that going to school is a scam therefore you see them not taking their studies serious. Then arises the question, of whether should there be a monetary reward for excellently performing students, and to what effect will it have upon the students?
For me, I think rewarding students who take their studies seriously and come top in class is a welcome idea, but when it involves cash I think the level of education, ate, and some other options should be considered, imagine handing over a huge sum to a pupil in primary school, what difference does it make to the child who doesn't really have the knowledge of what better thing to do with the cash than buying junk, in this case, it is best to hand over the money to his or her guardian or parent, but at the end of the day it's not the child that gets the full motivation to keep his excellent spirit on. Better options like awarding such child scholarships as long as they keep doing well or buying them books or gadgets that would aid their learning give much more boost to their learning capabilities.
As for the case of a student in the tertiary institution, without any doubt this level of student has much more need for money and is already mature enough to handle money as they know their financial needs and most of them are even independently sponsoring themselves in school which often causes the distraction from their studies, rewarding this set of students in terms of monetary reward would definitely give a boost to their learning spirit, because the distraction to earn more sacrificing their study time would be reduced.
In the long run, as to every good side of an implementation, there will sure be a bad side to it, while some average students would be encouraged to become better, some not-so-good academic students would rather give up as they believe trying harder would be if no use because only those who come top would be rewarded, so rather than being fixated on cash rewards only, other enticing rewards like scholarship, sure employment or capital for business ideas even before graduation should be considered and I believe this would put students on their toes to do better, one of the school scam belief is due to not having something tangible to do after school having a reward seem like the light after the tunnel, in this case, school, would definitely help in upping the excellent study spirit in students.
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