Once in a while, stumbling onto a piece of history bring back a flood of memories. While I was going through those boxes in storage labeled “university” last week trying to find my degree for the insurance company, I started reading through some of the notes that I took during those four unbelievable years.
Education is Not Just for Academics
I hear countless times that education is useless. That those classes we all took was on subjects that had no real world value. Some even called it a waste of time but for me, it was priceless.
School is not just a place for learning, but also a launching pad for real life. It provides a stage to:
- Allow You to Experiment – How many times have you changed your mind on what you wanted to do while you were in school but felt like you couldn’t anymore after you are in the workforce? If you were just thrown into the first career path that you ever wanted, would you really be happy? Staying in school gives you time to gain life experience and decide.
- Learn the Social Skills – Many people believe that friendship is purest at the high school and University level because the relationship doesn’t carry additional agenda. The school years was also a time when you can really meet a ton of people that share the same values and interests.
- Gain Experience – There is obviously a limit to how far this goes, but many people had experiences that would be much harder to gain once they are in the work force. Some might call it reckless or some other names, but these experiences will be cherished by those that were bold enough.
Why Skipping School May Not Make Sense
I remembered in high school when I had to convince the school counselor that I was mentally ready to take classes that were a higher grade than my age suggested. My reasoning was that age shouldn’t matter as much as maturity, and that I was much more mature than some of my classmates.
In the end, I took a bunch of classes with people who were older than me. It felt good at the time just to know that I could do it, but I’m not so sure it was right for me. While academics was never a problem and my grades turned out okay, I missed the chance to socialize with people that was in the same age group. Most of my classmates saw me as a kid (even though they were only a year older) and the way they interacted with me was different. In an obscure way, I felt like I was cheated somewhat of the whole experience.
Why My Education was Great
I am the first to admit that knowing first principles in Calculus didn’t help me one bit in my real life, but that wasn’t the point of school.
I would go to school because:
- I learned about the real world while still insulated from it
- I made a ton of friends
- It allowed me not to rush into everything because there is no hurry to find the results
- Some of the experiences I had will be cherished for the rest of my life
Even those English lessons turned out useful. Who would’ve thought that an computer geek like me would turn into a writer?
Stay in school. You just never know.
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{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
Education is like exercise for your brain. Yeah, that calculus may never come up again but it works your mind in such a way that builds “muscle” for later on. It will help you to critically think in other situations. And that goes for other classes as well.
Your points for education are good.
It’s never to late to start or return to college and get a degree. Sometimes people aren’t ready and/or don’t appreciate college right out of high school. Many students I work with have returned to college after working many years. They know what their goal is and tend to get a lot out of college. I can relate to them, because that’s what I did.
Side note: Isn’t it awesome that we can find the areas of odd shaped things by using Calculus? Or is it just me?
I agree to most of you viewpoints.
It’s really ture that school is also a place where students learn how to communicate,cooperate and deal with others.
Education teaches you to be flexible, learn to adapt to new situations and seek constant self- improvement. You learn to work in a team and finish projects on tme.
Last but not least you get to network with a lot of people, which is awesome.
Nice post…thanks for sharing your thoughts!