FROM THE EDITOR:
DEAR READERS: In the course of a research I found this excellent article that deals with a hidden truth behind the current educational system. Written in 2004, the content of this piece may enlighten many who still believe our current schools curriculum is far away from what, we as people, need to learn and acquire knowledge, and to make us independent and develop our highest potential to make a better world. You be the judge. This is PART OF A SERIES
Advice for anyone still in school
by Montalk.net
from Montalk Website
“School sucks”
Most students will agree, and many have voiced their disgust concerning this abomination we call public education. They spite the good students who obey like little sheep, frown at imposed conformity, and laugh at the hypocritical nature of the system.
The same will be done here, but there is a big difference between these defiant students and me, the author. I was one of those good little sheep. I graduated high school with a 4.0, perfect attendance record, two years of student council under my belt, and a host of top scholarships to get me through college.
Teachers loved me, students both feared and respected me, and the principal knew me better than I knew him.
It’s enough to make you sick. I know it made me sick. So here I am, biting the hand that feeds because it’s been feeding nothing but propaganda and sour grapes.
I’m not writing this article because of envy or spite against system-indoctrinated valedictorians, nor am I trying to put blame on my school for all my academic failures. In fact, I cannot because I was that valedictorian and had few if any academic failures.
I’m writing this article because the system itself is messed up. Having been to many different public school systems over the past 15 years, I have more than adequate credibility to make this claim.
What is taught is random, useless, and meaningless
In class, too much time is wasted on useless topics.
The quality of education has been sacrificed for quantity, and as a result, academic inflation and the devaluation of information has turned intellectual ambition into apathy and bright minds into gray mush.
In an effort to be multicultural and eclectic, class curricula have become shallow and disorganized in their effort to teach students a global viewpoint. Topics are taught piecemeal, and never do teachers spend time to help students integrate the pieces into a coherent picture that can be used or built upon. And even if within a class the ideas are put together, between classes the grand education still remains compartmentalized.
For example, both geometry and physics can be mastered by the average student, but the connection and communication between the two often are not. When physics is taught in a junior high or high school physics class, it involves only the most elementary of geometry concepts, and vice versa. Without synthesis of the two, each remains without purpose or effectiveness.
Such synthesis between topics is neglected in the school curriculum, and consequently one’s experience in the public education system becomes a vague memory of random, meaningless, and useless facts, just as a disassembled engine is just a junk heap of random metal parts.
Most school subjects themselves aren’t even real knowledge.
History books are full of purposely engineered inaccuracies and distortions for the sake of corporate gain and political correctness.
Much of school is wasted time
The purpose of education is to make one an independent, competent thinker, one who can make a difference in the world for the better, and one who has the best chance for survival and success in the world.
So what the hell are we doing with such profundity of pep rallies, football and basketball games, proms, crazy hair days, sex education, death education, quiz bowls, and student council meetings?
Sure, without them, school would be dull.
But, school is supposed to be an incubator of young humans to prepare them for excitement in the real world. School is doing more than it’s supposed to and has instead become a surrogate provider of such excitement, turning it artificial and socially harmful. Is your vacuum cleaner also supposed to do the dishes, trim your hair, balance your checkbook, and be your Friday night date?
So much in school concerns extracurricular activities that time which could be spent on real world activities is instead being wasted in these trivialities. The effect is the amassing of students dependent upon the system and isolated from the real world. Social, financial, and academic dysfunction result.
Once again, quantity over quality has prevailed, because there is no profit for the supplier in quality. Quality only helps those in the demand, but when consumers of education have themselves been dumbed down to primal levels, discernment and appreciation of quality disappear.
Despite these problems, almost everyone is happy.
Parents are happy. Moms get to watch their soap operas and dads get to work while their kids are being babysat. They don’t have to worry about teaching morality or ethics to their children because it’s being done for them in school.
They don’t have to entertain them or spend genuine time with them because these children are too busy being entertained in school functions. Moms just have to drive their girls to soccer practice, and dads toss the football a few times.
Perfectionist parents keep their child competitive not by guiding them and helping them on a daily basis, but by yelling them once a school quarter when report cards come out.
Teachers are happy, as they have a secure job from 8 to 5, and the more they work, the more they get paid. The more school programs there are with federal or state funding, the more money they get. The more schools have the programs, the more funding and perks they receive from federal benefactors.
Everyone is happy, that is, except for the students.
But who cares? Who are they to complain?
Those with the gold make the rules, and all students have is some pocket change for cookies and milk. As is well known, in school, you spend more time learning how to obey and what to think, instead of and how to think and think for yourself.
Fact of the matter is that at least 3/4 of the time spent in school is waste.
