Today, educational institutions seem like a relic of the past – thanks to search engines, you can google and get an answer to your question at any time. It is so natural for us that it seems as if we have found this knowledge not online but in our heads. And really: why do we need to learn if all the knowledge is just a click away?
This is the illusion of “knowledge” that makes us think that education is a paid service to find information. Of course, it isn’t. In this article, we’ll talk about the real value of education.
Why is higher education devaluing
One of the key problems with education is that schools and universities don’t know what kind of future to prepare young people for. And they, in turn, are most afraid of not having enough time to do something with their lives. Time spent studying seems to be wasted, because youth is a very limited resource.
This fear is also fed by public opinion as to if everyone has to go through college, and a student must always be an excellent student, otherwise, society will condemn him. These thoughts are so strongly entrenched that they have become part of our worldview and we don’t even try to doubt them. But is it so?
Don’t Pursue Good Grades
Grades are just a game that essentially means nothing. It’s an indicator of how fast you’re learning the material. Five grades – good for you, move on. Two – stop and figure out what the problem is, use essay helper and make more effort.
If you make the effort to learn new material, you end up being good at it. Of course, integrals and valences will probably not be useful to you in life, but the soft skills acquired during the process of learning create a solid foundation for your personality.
To become in-demand, interesting, sensible, independent, persuasive, necessary, and useful, you have to learn it somewhere. That’s what people invented educational institutions for, and that’s why you should go to college.
What does college give you and why do you need to study?
Many people go to college for one of two reasons:
- They want to get a deferment from the army and go through the military department;
- They don’t want to upset their parents and be worse than their mother’s friend’s son.
If you have these motives, it’s strange to expect anything more than a job in fast food afterward.
College is your big chance to get new experiences, make useful acquaintances, become part of a community, get involved in a community of interest. It’s an environment of influential people with connections. And it doesn’t matter what your specialty is. What matters is the kind of people you can connect with.
Those five or six years you spend in the company of intelligent people and a hundred exams will make you better and more confident. By developing your flexible skills, you will learn to find common ground with professionals from different fields more easily, and in the eyes of future employers, you will look for more reliable and in-demand employees.
So, it’s worth it to go to college. But another question remains…
How do you choose a major
The stupidest thing you can ask a child and teenager is, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” At 17 or 18, we just don’t know that – we can only choose from what exists these days. Probably no one can say which profession will be in demand in five years, and in general, which professions may appear and which will disappear forever.
The best solution is to choose the most interesting direction for yourself and try to accept the fact that you will not miss anything important and valuable. Just because you got into a certain major doesn’t mean you have to devote your whole life to it. You could have gone into another major, and you could have lost interest in it just as easily or become unclaimed. Remember that it’s not the mistakes themselves that hurt us the most, but our reaction to them.
Concentrate on the training itself, on the useful knowledge you can get. In any university, you are only guided, and the choice of future profession you have to make yourself. All that you will be shown in high school – just an example of what you can do in life. Demo. Studying is not a goal; it is only a choice of directions for moving forward.
Studying does not end with school or university. No matter how pathetic it may sound, all life is one big learning. The more skills and connections to the right people you have, the more successful and happier your life will be.
Even if you don’t have the opportunity to attend a prestigious university right now, try to enroll anyway. If you give it a shot, you have two choices: either you can succeed, or you can’t. And if you don’t try, there’s only one.
