The End of Education

I have an unbelievable investment opportunity just for you. I can get you $350 per month for most of your life. All you have to do give me $8000 per year for the next thirteen years. But before you get your payoff, I'll need $15000 per year for four more years. Then you'll be set for most of your life. Probably. This is not your garden variety financial investment either. I will need to meet with you seven hours per day during the entire duration of the investment period. Also, there will be a lot of material for you to study at home. Don't mind that you have to give me a total of $160,000 and wait 17 years for any return on your investment. Trust me, this is the most important investment you can ever make. But there's a possibility that the return won't be as good as I promise. In fact, the investment could fail entirely. If the investment starts to falter, all I will need to fix it is more of your money. I know this pitch sounds to good to be true, but please just mail your cash to my home address. Or just e-mail me your credit card number. That sounds crazy doesn't it? Just as crazy is the repeated mantra of educators, administrators, parents, and especially politicians is that our children are our most important investment. It's not a small investment. In fact, we spend a total of $100,000 per pupil for public K-12 education. During that 13 year indoctrination, the pupil is taught above all that this education is not enough and they must spend $60,000 of someone's money (rarely their own, either borrowed or given) on their real education. After their real education, they can make $350 per month more than high school graduates. What are we really getting for our investment? The way I see it, our education system is out of sync. We are pushing education on a younger and younger crowd. If you want your kid to be a Harvard Law grad, you've got to get him in the right preschool or your kid will never make it. Then, since our high schools are failing, we push advanced concepts on pupils at a younger age. Once the pupil gets out of high school, colleges require them to take two years of curriculum that will review what they should have learned in high school. So we are teaching what used to be high school curriculum to middle schoolers and college students both. For example, when I went to SMSU, I was required to take a Physical Education/Health class. I have the textbook from that class. I also have the textbook from Mrs. Smith's health class in middle school. You know what? I learned more in Mrs. Smith's class than I did in college. I am amazed that every shortcoming of our education system has the same universal solution. Our kids are dumb because we don't spend enough money of education. Test scores down? Give us more funding. Kids unprepared for college? Give us more funding Kids misbehaving? Give us more funding. Teenage pregnancy? Give us more funding. Football team can't win? Give us more funding. Teachers having sex with students? Give us more funding. No wonder our kids are irresponsible with money. In a capitalist economy (which I'm not saying we have), the value of an item is directly proportional to its scarcity. What is the result of decades of pushing education? Not too many years ago, a college diploma was really something rare and important. It was only within the grasp of the rich or the truly talented. Now with grants and loans, any idiot can go to college (and believe me, they do). They wear their robes and get their paper but are really in the same position as high school graduates a generation ago. At this rate, my kids will probably need a bachelor's degree to flip burgers and a doctorate to be a trucker. Now, those who know me are saying, "Of course he would say that. He's a dropout. He's just rationalizing his own failures." Well, yeah. I am. But that's not the point. I'm not opposed to education. In fact, I feel it really is the most important investment you can make. But what are you getting when you fork over your $160,000? An education or a diploma? Did you get more knowledge or a piece of paper for your wall? I really never learned anything from my professors in college. All my learning came from the texts. I gleaned knowledge from the coursework, then a haughty liberal professor would tell me what I should have learned from the texts. Not suprisingly, we wouldn't usually agree. So, if the goal of education is to get diplomas, the status quo is working perfectly. But if the goal is more knowledge, understanding, and enlightenment, don't waste your time and my taxpayer money. You will not be taught how to think, you will be told what to think. You can get your diploma without corrupting your mind, but you will find it a great struggle. That struggle will follow you into your workplace and torment you the rest of your life. Some of you will crack. Your priciples and beliefs will collapse under something I was taught to resist in preschool: peer pressure.