Remember the good ol' days of school. The days when you would actually look forward to going to school. If you have never looked forward to going to school then it must be one of two things: you hate school or you did not have any friends. All jokes aside, school used to be something meaningful, especially at a young age. Our brains were essentially a clean slate and knowledge would be something new to us. I don't know about any of you who are reading this, but I actually looked forward to learning because it was a way to progress and show that I am capable of performing tasks laid out to me.
Some of the more useful subjects felt like I have learned was English, P.E. and basic Mathematics and basic Earth Science. Let's go through the list one by one then shall we? English should be obvious. It taught me how to communicate in today's world and allowed me to peer into the mind of some genius and innovative scholars in the world. If I wasn't taught how to read, write or communicate I would be able to even write this post right now. P.E. taught me to love the outdoors and to realize the benefits of exercising. It also taught me to the art form of basketball. I still remember to this day, my kindergarten teacher would always complain that I did not know how to dribble a basketball and was always slow in learning. Little does she know, I grew up to play basketball all the way up until high school. Basic mathematics taught me how to add, subtract, divide and multiply. These skills would be needed for counting money in the future and just for everyday purchases. Basic Earth Science taught me a simplified, but sufficient amount of information needed to understand the place we humans live in today.
And that's about it folks. Those were the highlights of my entire education career. I am presently 20 years old about to go into my final year in University. How does University and even high school education compare to the one I received in elementary school? It doesn't even compare. Instead of incentivizing the students to learn something applicable, interesting or valuable in relation to life, school after elementary school was almost like a program to enforce the importance of grades.
In high school Instead of valuing the importance of knowledge, every student in high school would memorize facts, formulas, equations in order to better the next student. Some friends and classmates would spent countless hours studying for AP Physics or AP Chemistry for the hope of passing tomorrow's test. What then after that? We would forget all the information we spent countless hours studying for. People spent 4 years doing this, including me? Then during graduation we all respect and stand in awe of the valedictorian. A valedictorian is no more than someone who followed the program of getting good grades set forth by institutions at a young age.
Once the valedictorian reaches University, they then begin to see that they are not the "smartest." There are countless other valedictorians who are even better at memorizing facts and getting straight A's. Then once the first class in Uni begins, the 4 year process begins. Four years of learning pointless facts, pointless competition to stay above the curve and even more sleepless nights. Then after 4 years of paying for education we get the piece of paper we worked so hard for. Then what happens when unemployment hits?
All I can say is everything we learn in University can be self taught online, without the punishment of receiving a bad grade from a course. Instead of going through the motions of getting a good grade, one should pursue something they are actually interested in.
