I remember when I was young how totally excited I was to start another year of school! The smell of new paper, pens, pencils and the constant questions to answer!

There is no more of that. Education is in the DARK! No more pondering or questions. You now are only allowed to regurgitate. Sit there and repeat back what someone told you was fact. Then you are patted on your head and told you’re a good person. Repeat back facts the very facts that in 20 years won’t be facts. Repeat them on tests, in writing assignments and say them again… and again… and drone on and on at accepting someone else’s thoughts. NOT yours… you are not to have thoughts.

I picked up a grammar school science book from back in my day. The first few pages I scanned, again filled me with excitement. Not because it taught me anything, but because it asked me questions? It gave me something to do. “Go lie on your stomach in your yard and list all the things you SEE, HEAR, SMELL, TOUCH, and possibly see something you could taste or lick, like water off the grass.” That is exciting! Mostly because no one can tell me that I didn’t see, hear, smell, or touch those things. They were mine to own. My own observations. My own thoughts. I am valuable because I can perceive and share with others what I have experienced.

Now the drones are not allowed to have experiences. Only those we have labeled Great are allowed to state facts. They will never know what I saw while on my belly in my yard… why am I not valuable for MY observations, just as well as they are with theirs? That seems to be education’s purpose now, to remove individual validity.

Proof of validity is only accepted as numbers! Numbers? Really? Numbers are a human language created by humans to try to convince others of the observations they experienced. “I counted 24 sulfate on the slide.” that is a fact. Oh, Wait… maybe that is a separate drop, maybe it is 25? Or those clustered together might just be one droplet? So maybe it is 19?

Aww but we finally make a decision that the count on the slide is 22. Ta Da! Now THAT is a FACT! However, experiential observation and a human’s interpretation were just as much involved as “The sun was shining most of the day.”

A single person’s rendition of an experience, no matter how well articulated is not a fact. It is just anecdotal and dismissed. “You didn’t see that!”, There is no book or PhD that will collaborate your observations, hence you are constantly told of your invalidity.

Now THAT is Education? If you buy that…. 

You are of value. Your observations are valid. Now putting those observations in an unbiased story that you recognize as YOUR story is the purpose of life. Understanding what you have observed and experienced in multiple contexts, that is education.

Enjoy the journey.

Hugs, Pam

(The Roadside Philosopher)