Education as Hope

             Education is defined as the process of imparting or acquiring general knowledge in order to prepare oneself for mature life however to so many the process of become educated is more a chore than a passion to make something of their life. Where children should leave high school with a desire to go farther, and a basis to make an educated decisions when choosing the path they wish to follow, there are too many who see continuing there development as a chore expected by society with little ambition to learn the material, it is all to often that students learn with the premise that they will just have to ingest and regurgitate the information for the next test before letting the knowledge slip away. It is this misconception that calls for an increased demand in educators relying on application of knowledge.
The ability to build and reinforce critical thinking skills within the developing child is on the rise as the standards are changed and programs become more competitive asking for a new quality of students as employers demand a new quality of employee. The truly sad part about this is in many institutions they wait until the child is older before they start to instill these tactics when it should be one of the first things a child learns. A mass of knowledge means nothing if the child has no way to apply the knowledge and simply allowing them to flit through early years learning through trial and error is not good enough. It is during a young age that a child needs to be instilled with the desire to learn and to understand that it is their responsibility to take control of their own education.
It is this lack of understanding that causes epidemics such as the ADHD effect. An entire generation of children being raised with the idea that they can not learn because they have a disease. They are being taught that this is not their fault and they hold no responsibility in the matter and if they do not learn it is excusable because they have an alternative choice that society chooses to blame. It is children like these that are in greatest need but are given the least amount of attention because they require more theoretical work to instill knowledge within them and while in some cases, class size may prevent, in many, it is disregard for an unruly child that leads to something that can only be called neglect.
When I was still in high school I had an acquaintance that was due to graduate the same year as I and I asked her what she planned to do in college and she told me. She said that she didn’t know what to do, she had been diagnosed as having ADHD in early middle school and they let her into the learning disability program because of it. They had always given her the answers and she never had to actually learn the material for the tests because she knew the right way to ask a question during a test so they just told her. The worst part of it being, she was ok with this. The fact she could barely read at a 6th grade level and basic algebra was incomprehensible didn’t matter at all to the young woman because she thought it would work the same way in the real world. As a result she is now in remedial classes and will be for the next year or so before she ever comes close to taking her first class at the college level, all because no one had the desire to instill her with the want to learn, to take responsibility.
That is a core of education, to prepare children for the real world, and sometimes that means letting them find out at certain ages that things will not always work out for them. The world will not just fall into their lap but the message doesn’t need to be dire. All children should grow up with the desire to grow and learn. To bring good into the world and do no intentional harm and while it is an unrealistic goal, to get even one child to want for the greater good, to desire knowledge is a success. Letting a child know that no matter what background they come from, there are options can mean the world to someone. A girl I met recently, was ecstatic when I was speaking with her and she told me she was getting her GED but didn’t know how and I told her that the college offered a program that would help her if she needed it. She had come from poverty and had no idea it was ever an option she could get financial aid. I was appaled when I heard that not one of her teachers over the years had never informed her she had options for that was why she dropped out in the first place. She had a 3.5average and left because she knew she would never be able to afford college.
Events like this is what fuel me to become an educator. One should never walk away from a future and a career because they feel they are trapped, like there is no one there who can show them a better way. Instructors should always strive to show their students that there are other ways. The world is not black and white, there are always options and to live in ignorance is not bliss for ignorance breeds into disdain and into distrust of the unknown. While so many children will disobey and flaunt the rules, it is your patience, understanding, and guidance that you hope they will remember. The one who always took the time to listen, inspired some glimpse of hope, or gave them the benefit of the doubt, these are the instructors that people should strive to be.


Hope. It's contagious. Pass it on
Corset signing off.