# Highschool: Is it more important to pursue success or knowledge?



## Juggernaut (Jul 9, 2012)

"What college are you going to?"
A common question among teachers.

But at this young age, should occupation really be prioritized when the young adult is still discovering who he is? Do you believe schools should be developing children's skills and interests more or should stay future and success-oriented?

In my opinion, I believe in order for a student to become successful in the future, he needs to develop his skills and talents, and become aware of himself. But I think schools aren't correctly nurturing each student in the way that they need. They are telling them "Here, you have four years to study a vast array of professions. Pick whatever you like the most, no more than two in a year, and then by the time high school's over you better have a college acceptance letter."

Me, (being the INTP that I am) I had to explore *every* possibility and *all* my talents. Four years wasn't enough. I needed help figuring out what I had a knack for and what profession related to my sets of skills. Mainly: I needed _direction._ How is a child supposed to pick and nurture a career when he can't even figure out who he is yet? Input?


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## Kormoran (Mar 15, 2012)

I think knowledge is more important. I hardly ever did my homework in high school, but I learnt so much more outside of the classroom. I speak several languages fluently, and have a working knowledge of several others. I got top marks in history and english because I was a voracious reader. My grades were unimpressive, but not bad.

A former classmate is studying medicine in Poland. About a year ago, I had to tell her the difference between diameter, radius and circumference. She was accepted to medical school, so her grades were probably very good. This particular anecdote, however, shows that she lacked basic mathematical knowledge, which is fairly disconcerting considering she's going to operate on people in future.

I'm with Dawkins on this; school, as we know it, is detrimental to young minds. It kills their sense and interest for exploration, for the arts, for knowledge. It fosters only a groupthink-mentality, a tradition of hazing and pecking order, and veiled stupidity and ignorance. People always seem to give Montessori shit for being "radical", but I think she was visionary.


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## Swordsman of Mana (Jan 7, 2011)

Juggernaut said:


> "What college are you going to?"
> A common question among teachers.
> 
> But at this young age, should occupation really be prioritized when the young adult is still discovering who he is? Do you believe schools should be developing children's skills and interests more or should stay future and success-oriented?
> ...


short term: success
long term: knowledge

thus, while both important, I would say that success is the more urgent priority until you have your life in order


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## cue5c (Oct 12, 2011)

It's a little more complicated than that as every child is different. I'm not saying the system we have is efficient, it's not, but to be successful we'd have to cater to everybody in a unique and individual way and that's not likely to happen. What would be good is if along with school, parents had to go through their family history with the child. For some unknown reason we tend to follow in the steps of our family before us and try to complete things that never quite panned out. Learning about our place in history is something that I think everyone could learn from, but I'm just being idealistic here.


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## bellisaurius (Jan 18, 2012)

People need prodding sometimes. Curious people need to be made to try one thing to develop depth of knowledge, as they'll gather breadth on their own, outside of school.


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## Juggernaut (Jul 9, 2012)

Hmm I see I see... I'm taking this in but trying to figure out how to respond... I agree with you for the most part Cue5c, but going through my family history would get me no where. My parents see education as a waste of time, they're a lot more material. So they really had no interest in what they wanted to be when they grew up. (The again, back in my parents day, if you weren't as mentally competent like the rest of the kids, they would literally set you aside and tell you to drop out.) Although ideal, again each child needs to be catered differently, sometimes it's best if kids don't follow in their footsteps... Like in my case, and I am sure with a lot of other children's cases.

Now addressing Swordsman of Mana, how can a kid be successful? Successful would be a long time goal. Success needs motivation. Personally, I don't like to do things if I see no practical application, as do a lot of kids do. Not all kids are just going to do their work because someone tells them it'll be good for the future. When a kid doesn't know what do when he grows up, he's not going to want to waste his time doing homework when he could be out nurturing his interests. Be honest, you'd had to of at one point laid homework to the side for some social time, video games or some other amazing procrastination aid. Wouldn't it seem like schools would get much higher reports of success if their interests were catered to in school? They'd *want* to apply themselves, they'd be enthusiastic about knowledge instead of see it as a waste of time.

Knowledge is a gift in itself, children should be inquisitive, they should want to understand things. Forcing a child to learn math, English, history only pushes them away. Now I am not saying these core classes are a waste, what I am saying is they need to experience these classes on their own terms, with desire. The harder you try to push something, the more likely they are to head in the opposite direction.


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## Antipode (Jul 8, 2012)

Juggernaut said:


> But at this young age, should occupation really be prioritized when the young adult is still discovering who he is?


Cliff (Bill Cosby): Where you going to school?
Boyfriend: I'm not. I want to spend time finding myself.
Cliff: -leaves room and goes into kitchen-
Cliff's daughter (girlfriend): So, do you like him?
Cliff: I don't know if that's him or not, he hasn't found himself yet.

xDDD love that line.

Anyway, in all seriousness, our education system is no where near perfect, but our current system (which you can either accept or reject it, facing what happens) runs like this:

Knowledge = success = paying job = American Dream

Or as the transitive property would say: Knowledge = American Dream

Now obviously there are problems with that--and, a good amount of people have found their way around such a system, but that is current day's system. The beauty about America (unless you aren't in it) is that you have the choice to do as you please.


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## Mutatio NOmenis (Jun 22, 2009)

I've been to HS and graduated. What you need to do is focus on getting those good grades and job skills. If you go on to secondary education, then you can focus on the knowledge there. There's also education for adults who are not in college. Highschool is by no means the end of the process. Don't get a job until you know that you can handle university life. And do't worry too much about saving up your early wages or putting them to good use; everybody spends them on toys anyway. Just focus on your grades and on your higher education preparation. Oh, and don't drink, get high, or get involved in crime.


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## Raain (Jan 3, 2012)

The system should be devoted entirely to equipping a person with skills and knowledge needed to succeed in life, not focusing on equipping them with a lot of useless knowledge in order to earn the best grades as possible.

It's too focused on earning high grades and talking people into college/university than it is on helping the person to actually develop as a person by discovering what there interests are, building there confidence and gaining the skills and knowledge needed to go were ever they want to.

That said though most schools usually have a lot of extra-curricular activities they encourage people to get involved in, so wouldn't that help with the gaining skills, confidence, knowledge and interests, whilst the lessons focus on earning the grades needed to get into the university/college you want to go to.


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## Persephone (Nov 14, 2009)

High school is meant to _educate_. According to William Deresiewicz, teachers transmit _culture_ to their students, and that's what I think every teacher should do. Culture, as we know, is not merely knowledge. Education, as we know, is not merely intellectual exploration. In David Foster Wallace's words, education is, in its essence, _awareness_ of our place in the order of things, and to be equipped to choose how to think and as a corollary, what to do. As such, I do not see how in pursuing true education, you can't have both knowledge and success. I like how my liberal arts college does it. We can't declare a major until the end of our sophomore year. I like how St. John's College (the great books program) does it- you don't specialize, period. Most jobs don't need specialization anyway. When was the last time most former English majors cracked open a good book and had to perform literary criticism? That's what I thought.


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## Trapking (Sep 22, 2012)

I believe knowledge is better than success. While school is meant to give us knowledge to have us achieve success in the future of the career we choose, I do not like that way of thinking because success is probably determined how much money one makes anyway. I do not like people who would only work because the pay was good. To me it seems like they no longer have a happy life and just tell themselves they did the smart thing.


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## AnonymousJuggalo (Jan 1, 2013)

the economy might get bad and can get you laid off then you lose your house and money ,but the one thing no one can ever take from you is your education/knowledge


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## Elvira (Dec 1, 2011)

It's really hard to respond to this thread because I can see the many facets of this topic.

I feel like high school is flawed, but I think that providing a basic education for society is crucial. For example, we need good English skills to write resumes and company reports, etc. However, I do feel like there is a lack of options out there for people to explore their careers. We had a partnership with a career center and also a vocational school. These options are sometimes stigmatized, but I knew several people who got their associates degrees while in high school through the program. That was one way of exploring. What are osme others? Job shadowing can be great, as well as volunteering. 

What do you think of tracking? They tried to implement it at my high school (ex: a science academy, a teaching academy, technology and arts academy) and while it was a good idea, it ultimately pigeon-holed people. 

It seems like good grades are a bridge to success, because good grades allow you to go to college, get into graduate school, etc. Even though a college education isnt needed to be successful, I think it's a lot easier for a college graduate to succeed than a high school graduate. My advice to you would to job shadow and volunteer to explore  Its important to explore but by all means try to do it for free. College is expensive. 

But i oftentimes question the validity of college. I have a 4.0 in a pretty easy major (education), and my first semester I was so excited to learn about teaching. However, I didn't really learn much. My college waits until your senior year to actually have you start doing student teaching. A lot of my psychology classes and education classes were helpful - i thought,because I got good grades! - but then I asked myself, "what did I learn from that?" And honestly, what I learned about teaching, I probably could have taught myself independently. I feel so stuck in theory land. I feel like I still haven't been taught to teach. 

But one of the classes required for my major (linguistics) led me to the decision to go into speech therapy.  
sometimes classes or presentations will spark your interest in a completely new topic.


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## AnonymousJuggalo (Jan 1, 2013)

Elvira said:


> It's really hard to respond to this thread because I can see the many facets of this topic.
> 
> I feel like high school is flawed, but I think that providing a basic education for society is crucial. For example, we need good English skills to write resumes and company reports, etc. However, I do feel like there is a lack of options out there for people to explore their careers. We had a partnership with a career center and also a vocational school. These options are sometimes stigmatized, but I knew several people who got their associates degrees while in high school through the program. That was one way of exploring. What are osme others? Job shadowing can be great, as well as volunteering.
> 
> ...


you should check out Why I hate school,but love education video by sulibreezy on youtube


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