Current problems with the school system

School

School is a place to learn and be educated about the world around us and dictates our very lives since kindergarten, but as good as it may be, many studies and from experience prove that school may just do the opposite, it may make you less intelligent. School may educate our children about science, math, and English, but the subjects and the way they’re presented make children unintelligent and unsuccessful. The purpose of school actually gives the opposite effect than what it is intended to do. Some problems with the school system are Industrial Age values, lack of freedom, no room for passion, obedience over intelligence, and inauthentic learning.

Industrial Age Values

The school system was created over 100 years ago making it outdated and very different from our modern world. Today the modern world values creativity, ingenuity, and of course, intelligence. However, 100’s of years ago, the world valued the ability to work and listen, not intelligence, in fact some of the most successful people dropped out of high school because it was outdated and they didn’t really learn anything, such as Albert Einstein, Steve Jobs, and even Bill Gates. The Industrial Age was a long time ago and thus, the school system should be updated to fit today’s values. A start would be to teach in different methods and allow creative ideas and to not spoon feed. A primary way to help children in the modern age, is to allow them to figure things out and develop ideas with others through more projects that require a creative mind, challenges that require ingenuity, and questions that require knowledge, these 3 should be the 3 core values in any school.

The Lack Of Freedom And Passions

In school, students are required to listen and work on problems and worksheets almost always without talking or communication. This creates a sort of “ prison” for the student as they are forced to stay here and do pointless work without even having the ability to communicate with others. It greatly limits their freedom and makes many students hate school and not want to come to school. The student should feel eager and come to school to learn and feel free, not to despise it yet be forced to come, stripping them of free will. The student should have the freedom to choose the topics they learn without being required to take classes that are in many cases not beneficial to their future and aren’t enjoyable. An example is someone wanting to become an artist, they should not be forced to take subjects like science or math unless it benefits them, such as geometry, animation, graphic design, architecture, painting, and other classes that are chosen by and focused on the student. The student should be the one who controls their life, not the school district, they should be able to choose the classes they want because it is their future.

Obedience Over Intelligence

Students are taught in schools to always listen to teachers and are in some ways brainwashed without ever realizing it. Every day the same useless chore occurs of sitting down, listening, copying down, not talking, then doing a worksheet, then leaving. The student is always expected to follow the teacher blindly because the teacher dictates they’re life while in school, just like before, there is little freedom and makes students hate school. Those who listen to the teacher blindly are becoming more obedient, not intelligent. Intelligence isn’t just memorization for a test, it includes independence and the ability to think, if the student is taught only to listen and take notes and do tests, then they will commonly expect the same in the real world, because the way a human acts is almost entirely based off of how they are raised. If they are taught these things at an early age, they will continue their whole lives. Those who rebel are punished with suspension, RPCs and other punishments, without ever the teacher realizing what is actually happening. Almost always, a student just becomes more likely to rebel the more punishments they endure. By giving these punishments at an early age, they just become more likely to not listen. The correct way to handle the situation would be to help the student or send them to a counselor to help them. Instead of punishment, it should be revision, when a student does something bad, they should be guided away. However the problem still remains for those who follow the teacher. To solve this, students should be taught independence and should be given, as I mentioned earlier, more projects, experiments, and learning experiences that isn’t spoon fed by the teacher and taught in a way that suites the student.

Inauthentic Learning

To a student, the grade is the only thing that matters. This creates an environment in which the student only remembers what is going to be on the test or what counts as a grade. Once the semester or the year is over, almost all students forget the information, because it doesn’t matter anymore. Inauthentic learning is created. Students that cannot keep up are left behind which makes learning for them almost impossible if they don’t know the material required to know the next, which makes them even more behind creating a snowball effect that only gets worse. Subjects should not be left alone after being learnt, some teachers do reviews, but most of the time it doesn’t help since it is so little. This could be easily solved by having a review every week on everything that was touched on and all work and projects should contain aspects based off of previous work. All work and projects should also be able to be remembered with ease by making said work or project fun or applying to the student. Just like before, the work should be what the student prefers and needs for their profession, making it more unforgettable.