I’m writing from the midst of finals week in my last semester of college (hopefully) ever. Lately, I have noticed a lot of minimalist bloggers bashing schools and how they train people to be compliant and to become a faceless cog in the capitalist machine. I would just like to share my perspective as a fresh (soon to be) graduate on the topic of schools and what I got out of it.
As I prepare to graduate the “school phase” of my life, I find myself reflecting on what it is that I actually got out of the last 16 years of my life. At 21, I am about to, as everyone loves to say, get out into the real world. Has school really prepared me to support myself, and eventually a family, as a productive member of society?
This thought ran through my head while I sat in class getting lectured about where to put commas in sentences. I’m not sure what bothered me most about this: the fact that I’m 21 years old in college and wasting my time getting lectured about where to put commas, or the fact that the teacher felt the need to lecture us after reading out work. It struck me then that I didn’t even remember the specific grammar rules about commas. And then I wondered, how much of the information taught at school will ever be remembered, never mind useful. Is it really worth spending years of people’s lives to make all sorts of information sound familiar when they hear it years later? I don’t know.
Anyway, I am a film major. My major involves creating, producing, directing, and analyzing movies. Perhaps this sets my perspective apart from the average college student. Essentially though, I don’t feel like I’ve learned a whole lot in my in my time here. Or I have, but most or all of that learning took place outside of the classroom. So for me, college was just a blanket excuse to have time to practice my craft without the pressures of a full time job. Is that really worth the thousands of dollars per year?
Consider college in America. The entire first year or more is spent on general education courses. These classes have nothing to do with your focus and essentially, they are the same as what you learned in high school. So why take them? Or even better, why have high school? Why not go straight from elementary school to college?
Inevitably, I could sum up everything that made any impact on me during college in two words: study abroad. For one year, I studied abroad in Norway and it was really (cliches aside) a life-changing experience. It was amazing to see that a country with a culture so similar to what I am used to could be so different underneath the surface.
One thing that struck me about Norway was how the school system was run. If you wanted a trade career like being a carpenter or a plumber or whatnot, you could specialize in high school and when you’re done you can get a job. If you want to go to college, it is only 3 years for a bachelors and all the classes are specific to your major. No gen-eds. What’s more, if you go to a public college, it’s basically free. That’s awesome. Except for the time put into it. Either way, it’s nice to know that our way of doing things in the US isn’t the only way of doing things. Sometimes we forget that here.
So to conclude, I can come up with 5 reasons to go to college:
1. You don’t know what to do with your life and you actually WANT more school and the “college experience.”
2. You know exactly what you want and it’s something that’s complicated enough to require college degree (engineering is the first thing that pops into mind).
3. You really want to study abroad in a school setting rather than just taking a trip somewhere.
4. You have a full (or nearly) scholarship and have some desire to go to college.
5. You want to get a job that requires a degree.
That’s my five cents. Maybe one day we can return to a society that no longer needs schools, but I don’t think we’re there yet.
These two blog posts talk about that world and were some of my inspiration for thinking about this topic.
Far Beyond The Stars
Mnmlist
