Doesn't work for most in a large pool. If you're motivated by competitiveness and know that second-best in your school is the best you can hope for, why even bother?
I can see that. However, I am especially interested in the education of the person who is the best in the school. So much more progress is made by the top 0.1% intellectual elite.
Here's an internal dialogue I just had.
Q: How do we test rationality skills?
A: We haven't come up with a comprehensive test yet.
Q: Maybe we can test some part of rationality?
A: Sure. For example, you could test resistance to akrasia by making two contestants do some simple chores every day. The one who fails first, loses.
Q: That seems like a pointless competition. If I'm feeling competitive, why would I ever skip the chores and lose?
A: Whoa, wait. If competitiveness can cure akrasia, that's pretty cool!
Now we just need to figure out how to make people more competitive in the areas they care about...