A 'C' for Education

And the debate on education never ends. You can travel anywhere in the world, but you’ll never escape the sense of discontent that the education system has been breathing on for years now. Pink Floyd screamed it in ’79, authors and artists have been calling attention to its iron fist since education became synonymous with institution and most recently, parents can barely understand what they’re feeding their hard earned money to.

For 20 years, I studied in India. I went through high school excelling at English, Foreign Languages and the Arts, all the while flunking in Math and barely making it through the Sciences. But what I did well went pretty unnoticed because what I did well couldn’t earn me the big, fat paycheck that nobody ever makes today. My favorite part of the whole education system was never being allowed to ask a question or put forward an original idea. No, none of that indiscipline. We took what our teachers told us, swallowed it blind and regurgitated every false fact and untrue notion when the time came. How do you give someone a poem to critique and give them the critique before you give them the poem? No wonder I spent most of my time standing outside the classroom.

It wasn’t just high school. I did my first master’s in India too. Fortunately, I have an ambitious attitude and am pretty good at teaching myself what should be taught in class. I ranked sixth in the university in my program thanks to the effort of none but me. I didn’t bother receiving my award. Why? To tell me I did a job well done? I can do that myself.

Destination next, the United States of America. Home to the Ivy Leagues, I laughed my rear end off when I realized the state of affairs of the American public school system. I had it good because I came here for a graduate education, but at the rate the public education system is failing its American little leaguers, Harvard and Stanford are going to have to outsource its students very soon. What’s the point of the U.S., the world’s most powerful nation, if it can’t give its citizens one of the most basic rights it preaches about all over the world? The argument is, of course, a lot deeper than what should and shouldn’t be. As an international though, it’s difficult to understand how something so important in a country so seemingly powerful can even be up for debate.

I love the United States. When I look at the art it produces and the opportunities it presents, it makes me wish I had come here sooner, younger. In retrospect however, I wonder if my memory would have been as strong as it is had I not studied in India? Would I know as much as I do about American literature and Renaissance Art and Shakespeare had I studied elsewhere? Would I think and rethink things the way I do now if back then the rebel inside wasn’t nurtured and fed?

What I do know is that no matter where you go the education system is always lacking. And that may just be because we’ve lost sight of the idea of education to begin with. If we hadn’t, we, the people, the government, in the States and in every country abroad, may still be fighting for it instead of against it.