Reggie has convinced himself that middle school is stupid and therefore not worth his time. His avoidance of any effort towards his schoolwork is MOST likely protecting Reggie from:

feeling like a failure.

Explanation:

He try to avoid any kind of shame and resentment, so he actually try to get escape from this feeling and to give satisfy his ego he convinced himself that middle school has no worth in his life. To satisfy his mind conscious, he try to escape from hard work and fear of failure.