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Schools out


Jenna

Jenna is a student at St. Paul's Girls School, London. She's interested in public speaking and debating and is an avid theatregoer, being a member of the National Theatre.

Jenna thinks that education is turning us into robots with endless facts and little to do with making the world a better place.

Education is no longer education! How many of the things that you learn at school will you actually remember later on in life? How much of what you study is useful to what you end up doing? Do you ever feel like you're wasting your time? In all fairness, not everything we learn is totally useless and certainly the social and learning skills that we develop are vital. However, I truly believe that education isn't just about acquiring knowledge, but more importantly of producing good citizens.

The Government controls education with its National Curriculum so teachers are forced to only teach what they have to. Surely teachers must easily lose interest and passion by having to teach the same thing year in, year out? Teachers aren't able to discuss things in great detail as they have to cover a certain amount in a short time and we're taught things so that we can repeat them back parrot fashion. This doesn't mean that the concepts have really sunk deep in, but rather that we have developed the ability to memorise! That's great - but it doesn't seem justifiable spending a whole year working just to learn how to achieve a photographic memory.

With exams we can get away with not doing a great deal of work throughout the year, only to end up cramming at the last minute. How many of you have stayed up the night before an exam gulping down coffee and popping caffeine pills like there's no tomorrow? Unfortunately there is a tomorrow and I believe that way of studying just isn't healthy and doesn't achieve the desired result of preparing students for life.

"How many of you have stayed up the night before an exam gulping down coffee and popping caffeine pills like there's no tomorrow?"

During our education we're taught hundreds of facts and figures, but we're not taught the reasoning behind them and the effects they may have on our lives. This impersonalises education and makes it appear even more irrelevant and useless. If more time was spent discussing things that were directly relevant to us, either at present or in the future, then I think we would take a lot more interest. At the moment the lack of time given to discussing morals can create egotistical people who go out into the world with no concern for others or the world.

School is the best place for teaching people the building blocks of life, for example; compassion, truthfulness, humility and loyalty. If these things aren't developed at school then it's very difficult for them to be learnt later on in life. If people are taught from an early age that everybody should be respected then perhaps there would be more chance of children growing up to respect the world they live in. If we are taught that there are people who are evil, then surely we'll all grow up to hate certain sectors of society? I'm not trying to say that all people leaving any school end up as social delinquents because obviously there are other factors that influence people such as our home life, friends, and the media. But I don't feel that at present school has the positive influence that it could have.

The ridiculous importance that's placed on exams should be examined; the large control that government has on schools needs to be decreased and the lack of moral education must be reconsidered. Obviously there's lots of bureaucracy involved with education, but in principle I believe that the transformation of education is essential for the wellbeing of society. 

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