Downside to Education

The Downside to Education

A particular concept of education is that it is the idea of attaining valuable knowledge and then being able to use that knowledge to one day get ourselves a nice job. Most people think this because it is what our culture has brought upon us. People have been indoctrinated with the idea of education being one of the ways in landing a career. Most people growing up were taught if they study hard and get good grades, then they will become successful. People are intrigued by this idea because of the American Dream. The American Dream is notorious for letting people think that working hard will bring success. Although this is true, to some extent, the effort put into schoolwork and the work place has become a problem because our society has become a consumerist culture where we feel entitled to getting what we want and to the point where most things are already done for us that we no longer have to put effort into our work. Students fall prey to consumerism because they have been indoctrinated with the idea that education will lead to success, leaving them blind-sided to the dangers it causes.

Although our culture puts emphasis on education as a means to making a good living, Thomas Jefferson would have to disagree. Jefferson was an advocate for education reform. He believed that education should further develop people’s critical thinking skills. He thought that people would be better off being well educated in a society that gives the people the right to choose and make decisions. If we had implemented Jefferson’s education system, the world just might be a more sophisticated place in that people would be more considerate of others, utilize more common sense, and be more self-reliant. In “What is Education?” Petra Pepellashi addresses points out that “Jefferson included self-examination and sincere consideration for all as crucial aspects of critical thinking” (143). Unfortunately, we did not take these aspects into consideration and went with the Prussian model. Pepellashi states that “[t]he Prussians initially instituted their schools in order to indoctrinate the Prussian world view and elevate skills for improved soldiers and workers” (144). It was the time when the Industrial Revolution was booming and we needed more skilled workers. Thus, we adopted the Prussian system and now people view education as a way to succeed as a worker.

  Our education has always been a top priority for most. From the early years of childhood, we went to school, did homework, and took tests to check for understanding. As we have aged students have become victims of consumerism where they can get away with doing minimal effort such as not doing all the reading for a class and just wait for the teacher to explain the readings or only having to memorize certain information for multiple choice tests which requires little thought. Because of this, student work habits have started to decline and they feel they can get away with hardly doing any work. In “Have It Your Way: Consumerism Invades Education,” Simon Benlow illustrates how “[w]e are prompted in a variety of ways not to be agents of our own making. Our needs and desires are met by the work of others” (140). We expect the work to already be done for us and to lay back and have others tell us what to do or what not to do. Benlow goes on to say that “[s]tudents who come to college with a consumerist attitude are lost” (141). Students are lost when they enter college because they got away with poor study habits and were victims of grade inflation in high school. In “Entitlement Education,” Daniel Bruno mentions “how consumerism has invaded education, leading some students to expect good grades for little effort” (266). Grade inflation is what makes students feel entitled to better grades we do not deserve because as a consumer we are supposed to get what we want and in this case, we want good grades. College is supposed to help a person grow and further one’s intelligence, but if a student is not taking his or her education seriously, then that person’s future could be at risk.

Students take the easy way out by taking simpler classes, doing less work, and not being more proactive. As a consumer, we have this mentality that “the customer is always right,” when we are not. When we think this way, we are cheated out of the quality of our life. A way to not get cheated out of life is by intelligence and that involves being able to use knowledge. Bruno mentions how “education shifts focus from mere accumulation of information (knowledge) to application of information (intelligence)” (266). As a child goes from the lower levels of education to the higher levels of education, his or her intelligence is supposed to increase. With the little effort we put into our work, our intelligence is not improving, but instead declining. This is why students enter college unprepared because while they may have attained information, they have not learned how to apply it. Students are therefore unequipped to enter the labor force because the skills they need for the job cannot be demonstrated properly. A person’s quality of life gets diminished when he or she does not take his or her education seriously.