Challenging the Modern Education System

i

have been to nine schools nine

it’s a big number for someone who hasn’t

even finished high school yet

most would assume it was because my

family moved around a lot

but that’s not the case i have lived in

three different states

but other than that i haven’t really

moved anywhere else

until this year when i decided to attend

boarding school

so why did i change so many schools

the short answer is because so many

schools have their ups and downs

and finding the right fit for a kid is

really hard

it is because of this i have gotten to

experience so many different teaching

styles

and find what works best for me

i would like to start by telling a

little story from a school i attended

back in fifth grade when i lived in ohio

i was a shy kid which most people cannot

tell nowadays

because i’m rather outgoing but when i

was younger

i struggled to make friends and

preferred to spend most of my time by

myself

this all changed when i switched to a

school called shilling

it was an unusual school with an even

more unusual method of teaching

they required all students to take an

entrance exam

before attending and had a very

customizable

schedule to optimize learning shilling

offered

no sports no foreign languages or even

art classes for its course schedule

instead you as a student would take math

science

english and history on mondays

wednesdays and fridays

these classes were quite long and would

usually last up to two

hours which yes as a fifth grader was

tough

but most of the classes were hands-on

and rather than being sedentary

on tuesdays and thursdays though every

student got to customize their schedule

with a large variety of shorter classes

if you were someone extremely passionate

about art you could fill your schedule

with different visual arts and pottery

classes

i was interested in sports music and

language

so i took an aikido class which is a

japanese martial art

as well as fencing guitar and two

language classes

the best part was that your classes on

tuesdays and thursdays consisted of

anyone at the school who was interested

in the class

i remember that in guitar specifically i

was the youngest person in the class

and that everyone else was in high

school this kind of learning is highly

unusual

and the only other time i’ve seen a

learning model that allows customized

schedules

and at the same time the intermixing of

grades was at one

school a few years ago when i moved to

new york

i understand the system isn’t for

everyone and we were fortunate as

shilling to be small enough

to be able to implement this alternative

method of teaching

with the amount of confidence and joy i

was able to learn to gain from this

was exponential i had friends as a fifth

grader who were seniors

i was the only girl in my aikido class

which

might be intimidating to some yet to

this day is probably my favorite class

i’ve ever taken

the thrill someone feels of tackling

someone twice your size

is indescribable and can only be

expressed through a giant

grin that was visible on my face every

day after that class

i was never forced to take any classes

outside of my core classes

so if i wasn’t good at art or sports i

never had to take them

this allowed me to figure out what i was

interested in

i never woke up and didn’t want to go to

school because every day was a new

adventure

and i was supported by a community that

not only consisted of my grade

but the grades above and below me flash

forward two years later

when i moved back to the east coast and

began my education

at the school previous to the one i am

at now it was an

all-girls school which i’m not saying is

a bad thing at all

but it was a big change for me as

someone who was so used to being at

co-ed schools

the people at the school were also very

different they were competitive

because the mindset was that you had to

be the best

you had to score number one on the next

exam because if you didn’t

you’d lose your chance for a spot in a

good university

a lot of the schools in the us rely on a

class ranking system

in which universities ask schools for

their top students

and based on that list decide whether

students are welcome at the university

or not it was toxic to say the least and

many friendships seem

forced because you became friends with

the people who were around your rank

and the worst part was that this mindset

began in middle school

this was so different from shilling

where none of this toxic mindset existed

where the mindset was we helped each

other as a group to perform better

because what’s the point of dragging

another student down for the sake of

your own victory

education is not a battlefield it’s a

vital part of

life so why do we fight so hard against

each other just to be

quote unquote better than our peers

there was another big change waiting for

me at this

new east coast school a change to

something that seems very normal for

most schools

it was that the school had a strict

schedule that allowed for no

freedom of choice of classes other than

choosing a foreign language class to

take

which the options consisted of spanish

mandarin and french

we didn’t even get to pick a sport until

7th grade

the one thing we got to choose was being

a part of a school club

that was the one escape i had there i

spent most of my time

building stuff in the engineering lab

whenever i could but

because of the rigid schedule i didn’t

have much free time

at all as i got into the school year at

this new school

i could feel my attitude changing about

the way i viewed education

like the other students i no longer had

a sparkle in my eye

when i went to school many of the other

students seemed as though they woke up

in the morning

went to school did homework and then

went to bed

just to repeat this daily until they

graduated

and i noticed this in middle school

these weren’t college kids who were done

with constantly learning

but kids who had just started their

educational career a few years ago

it was devastating i spent five years

there

and was able to build some of my closest

friendships with some of the girls there

but i can speak for everyone at that

school that is nearly impossible to love

school and learning at that institution

after that constant miserable experience

i am fortunate though to have extremely

supportive parents

that have allowed me to follow my

passions and make a lot of my own

decisions and they have also taught me

to be independent

so when i decided i could no longer

handle the stresses of my school

because of the amount of mental health

issues it was causing me

they allowed me to apply to solemn and

have since then encouraged me to perform

to the best of my abilities

as much as i would love to praise my

current school as the perfect place that

helped me escape

the stresses of my past school that

would be a lie

i’ve experienced the good and bad sides

of education

but education is subjective finding the

right school is different for every

student

we all learn differently but most major

systems don’t realize or take this into

account

the education system around the world

that governs our lives as people

are not exactly suited to foster

creativity and learning

a small but dramatic example of the

backwards nature of learning nowadays

is as simple as sitting in rows henry

ford

one of the principal architects of the

assembly line process of

mass production proposed to have

children sit in rows in order to prepare

them for factory work

yet to this day where we as humanity

boasts that the industrial revolution is

over in most countries

we still impose this rigid seating

arrangement that limits the interactions

of children

and defeats the purpose of learning

erasing any chance for open discussion

just because of the strict nature of the

seating arrangement

some schools have started to break from

this tradition

offering round tables now to create a

more open environment

meant to offer group rather than just

individual learning

back during the time of the philosophers

in ancient greece

education was all about group learning

and was done

in a public open environment simply

because the idea was

two minds are better than one yet we

have revoked

this way of learning and succumbed to

the robotic classroom nature that leads

to boredom

and lack of interest education for the

most part has become a business

profiting on the success of children if

you think about it

the reason everyone here pays so much

money to go to the school

is just to simply go and study at

another school

creating a long and tiring cycle of more

than

16 years in some cases of sitting in a

classroom for

hours listening to teachers who aren’t

always concerned about the kids they’re

in charge of teaching

this mentality of forced systematic

learning has been causing the decline in

mental health

around student among students around the

world

we as a society are forcing children

most under the age of 18

to supposedly determine their future

through grades

and the expectations of them getting

into a good university

there’s no longer this idea of learning

for the sake of interest

and fun but now it’s all for the sake of

a good mark

on your next exam an interesting

anecdote is that in tok the other day

mr parker my teacher asked us to

individually take a short quiz about

happiness

it was scored 1 to 6 with a 4 foreign up

being considered that

you as a person were happy most would

like to assume that a majority of the

students in the class scored at least a

four

but the reality was that most got a two

to a three

the sad reality of this experiment is

that many of my peers including myself

don’t feel as though every day is filled

with sunshine and rainbows

when monday hits we are forced to wake

up at 7 00 am

for the next six days and trudge along

to classes

some of which we don’t like trying to

grasp the complex information

all for the sake of some exam we take in

a year that determines

what colleges we can go to the

assumption

is that success in life comes from a

good education

in which someone is assumed to have

completed 12 years of primary and

secondary school

but also have attended university and

graduated with at least

a bachelor’s degree i can vouch for many

of the students here

when i say that the stress of university

is astronomical

when that threonine exam comes back for

some it feels like the end

of the world getting into a prestigious

university

for many isn’t a want but rather

something pushed on them that’s a stigma

from the students around

or from their parents it is assumed that

you will go to a socially

good declared university such as

america’s ivy leagues

oxbridge in the uk or even eth in

switzerland

which boast a certain prestige in class

which many aspire to attain

in order to get a good job i have

experienced this mindset

over and over again throughout my

academic journey

the fact that i can only confidently say

that one

school out of nine truly fostered my

interest

in learning is extremely disappointing

and more than a little concerning

we as a society need to understand that

everyone

learns differently so by imposing very

rigid forms of teaching

we are only catering our education

towards a certain group of people

there are schools like shilling around

the world that allow for alternative way

of teaching

but they are rare and often not

considered as good as the

standard school we as a community need

to offer

more options for students especially

those who don’t necessarily learn best

in a classroom setting

because education is so vital and

everyone should have the opportunity to

learn to the best of their abilities

we also need to be more supportive so

that students who are struggling have

opportunities to recuperate and regroup

every day shouldn’t feel like a cycle

every day should be

filled with an interest in love for

learning but we don’t offer that to

students

and overall give very little support

school is stressful and i don’t think

anyone will argue with that

so when a school offers a counselor or a

mental health bit to

help students deal with the stresses we

have to face either because of workload

or socially

it allows students to somewhat balance

the struggles they face

because of the rigid education system

they are thrown into

at a very young age already thank you