The Problem With School

Have you ever wondered why the way they teach you in school has never helped you out in the real world?

Well I believe the problem is that they teach us just so we pass the school test rather than the test of life,

School puts way too much importance on our grades,

Now, I get it, school IS important, it also teaches us how to behave, work with others and pushes us to be around people but there is too much weight put on the number you get on your report card.

Now okay, if you're studying to be a lawyer or a doctor I get it, you need to get good grades, that's a given.

But school cares more if you got a good mark than if you actually understood what was being taught, isn't that backwards?

I think first you understand THEN you get good grades, you get good grades CAUSE you understand what is expected of you and what you need to do to get there, not cause you remembered the method.

Shouldn't that be the way it works?

I think it's in America, let's say there's a test on Tuesday, the teacher gives them the test results over the weekend and then they take the test normally. So over the weekend you have kids remembering the answers of specific questions.

What is that promoting? That you don't care if the kids understand the subject, they don't care either, they just want to get good grades to make the grown ups happy.

(I'm not hating on teachers, they are some of the most important role models a kid has in his life)

I have a special appreciation for the teachers that stop for a moment in the middle of the lesson to tell stories or share their experiences with the class,

The teachers who understand that they will have an impact on their students,

Those are the teachers I appreciate.

Understanding vs Memorization

The school system values our grades, not how much we actually learned, that's the problem.

When facing life's problems (cause we all eventually do), we need to be able to look, think and come up with a solution or the best course of action, we need to be good at problem solving and critical thinking which through the school testing system we don't learn.

School punishes us if we make a mistake so we grow up our whole lives thinking that making mistakes is wrong which is completely false,

It makes us scared of making mistakes.

School Makes You Robotic

Something else about school, it wants us to sit there, listen and obey, no questions asked,

It doesn't like kids who have a lot of energy, are always bouncing around, always take the initiative, disagree with certain things and so on, but then you see that these kids outside of school are actually growing up to be good, well-functioning citizens.

Imagine you told someone like Steve Jobs not to take initiative, or someone like Usain Bolt to just 'sit still'. Imagine they listened, we would have lost 2 great, very influential people.

There's a quote I saw somewhere that goes;


In school first you learn the lesson and then you're tested on it,

In life first you're tested then you learn the lesson


Now don't get me wrong, I'm not hating on school, it's obviously very important, but it does hold students back in some aspects and vilify certain qualities which are important to possess in all walks of life.

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