Posted by So, I came across this Ted Talk of Seth Godin That addresses the question “What is School For?” and I am really fascinated by it and the ideas that he shares in the talk. I highly recommend you watch the video below.
I haven’t asked this (extremely fundamental and obvious) question before and I bet many of you haven’t either. And it surprises me when I think about it that I have been doing this ‘School’ thing for the last 20 years of my life without asking this fundamental question in the first place.
“What is used to be for was to produce obedient factory workers, working 10 hours a day, in a dark room for a paycheck once a week” Says Seth Godin.
I totally agree with it!
I feel like I have wasted 20 years of my life which I could have used in achieving great things. Things that matter to me the most. Things I crave about.
I want to pose this question “What is college for?”
I think it is for two things:
- To tell everybody that “I am a graduate”. To escape the embarrassment of not being a graduate. And to breathe peacefully in front of 4 people who would throw abuses at you if you are not a graduate.
- To get a Job
That’s it! It is none other than that.
From the present educational scenario, I can confidently say that it is definitely not for gaining knowledge. It is definitely not for promoting learning and critical thinking.
It is only there to make us get that degree which is becoming more and more worthless as we progress in time. It is there to promote conformity and compliance.
So, What is the solution? How will we fix it?
What I think is that our present education system does not need to be changed because over time it will collapse by itself without us doing anything. (Charles Darwin Law of Survival)
More and more brilliant people will drop out of college and learn things from the internet. They will form companies that will hire people based on their knowledge, their abilities to present ideas that will solve problems and their critical thinking rather than their academic achievements.
These are my thoughts on the foregoing question and I would like to know yours.
What do you think about our present education system? Do you think it is effective? Do you think it is working? Have you asked this question before “What is school for?”
P.S. More articles for reference:
Wow this is amazing and one of those articles that I so much relate to… Thank you for sharing your enlightened view on it.
Thank you so much Sweta for commenting. I am glad that you found the article useful. ‘What is school for’ is such a basic question but we forget to ask it in the first place. Even after doing my high school and college I don’t have anything to show for it except some pieces of papers. I didn’t learn anything from it which would be valuable in my life. I feel like I wasted all those years!