5 ms·

I find it amazing that many of these people complain about the school system leaving them behind, behind in the sense that it didn't fulfill all of their curios

by brentr 18y ago

I find it amazing that many of these people complain about the school system leaving them behind, behind in the sense that it didn't fulfill all of their curiosities. I felt the same way, but I didn't complain; I went to the library.

LogicHoleFlaw 18y ago
The system doesn't leave you behind. It locks you into your seat with your eyelids taped open with turgid pap being projected onto a screen in front of you. Any creativity or individual initiative which resists the system is swiftly punished.
- deleted 18y ago
  [deleted]
- brentr 18y ago
  I read books while many of my teachers lectured. They knew there was only so much they could do for me without seeming to neglect the rest of the class. I was left alone to read or do what I wanted as long as I did the work that was assigned.
  - unalone 18y ago
    I was put in detention for reading in class, I had books taken from me and thrown away, I had long lectures from teachers in front of classes to humiliate me. I was sent down to several offices and lectured by several administrators who told me something like, "We understand you can do this, but it's disrespectful to your teachers and the school operates in loco parentis while you're here." And I thought the school system was a very good one overall. If you can get away with that stuff, it's great. But more often than not you don't have a choice.
    - kaens 18y ago
      More or less the same experience here, except that I don't think the school I went to was very good at all. I tried really hard to get my school to let me test out of classes and be in classes where I would actually be learning something, they refused. I spent the entire time there pissed off and frustrated at having to sit through a whole lot of boring, and in many cases inaccurate shit when there was so much out there to actually learn about. An example: I got suspended for correcting a teacher that told the class that Germany was a communist country during WWII.
      - brentr 18y ago
        In that case I would take all the detention they would give me. The truth is the truth.
        unalone 18y ago
        Yeah, but "the truth" only goes so far before some level of anger, if not cynicism, begins seeping in. Once you get used to this idea that you'll be punished for doing the right thing, either you start deciding that the right thing isn't really right (which I find despicable, but which happens pretty often), or you decide that the system itself is flawed in some way, which is what happened to me. It's tough to keep yourself an idealist when your parents tell you it's not worth it to get in trouble for things - I suppose they might have had a point, especially since if they did I'd still be too stubborn to cave in to somebody that was wrong - and when you get scolded across the board for what you do. I spent 3 years mainly under the radar at the school, then in my senior year was threatened with suspension three times: once for making a rude gesture at a teacher who over-the-top ranted at me for not standing during the pledge of allegiance, once for telling the teacher in charge of the literary magazine that I was the editor of that the magazine was bad and that he was refusing to fix things, and the last time for posting on Facebook about my dislike of the yearbook magazine (on a private note, of course). I left still trying to do the right thing, but the result is a profound dislike for that school, despite the excellent handful of teachers that actually shaped me as a person. That's really sad, when you think about it. Anyway, the point is that unlike most systems - unlike, say, the world of entrepreneurdom, where all that matters is idea and execution and getting ahead - some systems are designed intentionally to cripple the people within it. The school system is the worst, because a, focusing on the best students would hurt most other students and that would be unfair in a manner of speaking, and b, it's much easier for the teachers when they can create a bland routine, force everybody into it, and have everybody come out unharmed if not much wiser. The teachers who didn't do that at my school were incredible, but there were always unspoken hints at how difficult the administration was making things. I entered school wanting to be a teacher. I left it realizing that it simply wasn't worth the sheer cost fighting the system would be worth.

by brentr 18y ago

LogicHoleFlaw 18y ago

The system doesn't leave you behind. It locks you into your seat with your eyelids taped open with turgid pap being projected onto a screen in front of you. Any creativity or individual initiative which resists the system is swiftly punished.

deleted 18y ago
[deleted]
brentr 18y ago
I read books while many of my teachers lectured. They knew there was only so much they could do for me without seeming to neglect the rest of the class. I was left alone to read or do what I wanted as long as I did the work that was assigned.
- unalone 18y ago
  I was put in detention for reading in class, I had books taken from me and thrown away, I had long lectures from teachers in front of classes to humiliate me. I was sent down to several offices and lectured by several administrators who told me something like, "We understand you can do this, but it's disrespectful to your teachers and the school operates in loco parentis while you're here." And I thought the school system was a very good one overall. If you can get away with that stuff, it's great. But more often than not you don't have a choice.
  - kaens 18y ago
    More or less the same experience here, except that I don't think the school I went to was very good at all. I tried really hard to get my school to let me test out of classes and be in classes where I would actually be learning something, they refused. I spent the entire time there pissed off and frustrated at having to sit through a whole lot of boring, and in many cases inaccurate shit when there was so much out there to actually learn about. An example: I got suspended for correcting a teacher that told the class that Germany was a communist country during WWII.
    - brentr 18y ago
      In that case I would take all the detention they would give me. The truth is the truth.
      - unalone 18y ago
        Yeah, but "the truth" only goes so far before some level of anger, if not cynicism, begins seeping in. Once you get used to this idea that you'll be punished for doing the right thing, either you start deciding that the right thing isn't really right (which I find despicable, but which happens pretty often), or you decide that the system itself is flawed in some way, which is what happened to me. It's tough to keep yourself an idealist when your parents tell you it's not worth it to get in trouble for things - I suppose they might have had a point, especially since if they did I'd still be too stubborn to cave in to somebody that was wrong - and when you get scolded across the board for what you do. I spent 3 years mainly under the radar at the school, then in my senior year was threatened with suspension three times: once for making a rude gesture at a teacher who over-the-top ranted at me for not standing during the pledge of allegiance, once for telling the teacher in charge of the literary magazine that I was the editor of that the magazine was bad and that he was refusing to fix things, and the last time for posting on Facebook about my dislike of the yearbook magazine (on a private note, of course). I left still trying to do the right thing, but the result is a profound dislike for that school, despite the excellent handful of teachers that actually shaped me as a person. That's really sad, when you think about it. Anyway, the point is that unlike most systems - unlike, say, the world of entrepreneurdom, where all that matters is idea and execution and getting ahead - some systems are designed intentionally to cripple the people within it. The school system is the worst, because a, focusing on the best students would hurt most other students and that would be unfair in a manner of speaking, and b, it's much easier for the teachers when they can create a bland routine, force everybody into it, and have everybody come out unharmed if not much wiser. The teachers who didn't do that at my school were incredible, but there were always unspoken hints at how difficult the administration was making things. I entered school wanting to be a teacher. I left it realizing that it simply wasn't worth the sheer cost fighting the system would be worth.