Education

A certain Mr.Roger Scruton has made very perceptive observations in an essay titled Know your place. It is a must-read. Scruton argues that the present dumbed-down education system across the world is largely a result of a culture that values self-esteem more than real achievement; and that real achievement is gained through hard work and thought.

Despite the plethora of As and Bs gained through dumbed-down examinations in dumbed-down subjects, young people tend to enter university without the skills required for real study. The likelihood that an incoming undergraduate can read a book or write an essay diminishes from year to year, and only the entrenched sentimentality of the educational establishment prevents it from acknowledging that the cause of this lies in the culture of self-esteem.  The ruling principle of our educational system seems to be that children should be made to feel good about themselves.  … examinations should make no judgment of their linguistic or literary skills. Education involves transmitting knowledge and skills, not illusions, and a practice devoted to persuading children that they are fine just as they are does not deserve the name of education. [...]

…the curriculum has been vandalised (and also compelled) and the subjects which contain worthwhile knowledge — maths, the hard sciences, Latin, Greek and ancient history — have been driven to the margins of the system. And having destroyed the schools the state would now like to destroy the universities, by forcing them to take the dumbed-down products of its vandalism.

It isn’t uncommon to find students (in school and/or college) hating the very mention of the word “essay” in the same breath as the mention of the word “maths.” On the other hand, do I see the manifestation of a widespread dichotomy that sees a ”clear separation” of “science” versus “the arts,” or “tech subjects” versus “humanities?”

It was very common just in the early 20th century to find people who were well-versed in both these (not that there aren’t any now: that creed of people is rapidly declining). This compartmentalization has caused a lot of damage: for example, most engineers I’ve worked with can’t write a single sentence that is grammatically correct, while these are the ones who term poetry/writing/literature (in fact, the habit of reading anything other than technical books) as “boring” or “useless.” These are the same ones who cannot express a single thought clearly: they substitute jargon for speech, their words jar the ear; and it is no coincidence that their speech resembles random bits of sentences that you get to read in an engineering/technical text book.

This is the outcome of a pervasive attitude that abhors literature–or at least the learning of the basics of language. Words are our tools to express thoughts. However, the science that teaches them this is shunned. The results are obvious.

As I stated earlier, most kids are averse to maths because it is an unforgiving science: there are no two answers to a mathematical problem. And the route to that answer isn’t easy. But then it is a beautiful science, one that can be learnt and mastered as an end in itself, for the sake of pure enjoyment if not for finding something new. Here is something Emerson said about “hard” sciences, which is true to me as it is for everybody else:

What leads him to science? Why does he track in the midnight heaven a pure spark, a luminous patch wandering from age to age, but because he acquires thereby a majestic sense of power; learning that in his own constitution he can set the shining maze in order, and finding and carrying their law in his mind, can, as it were, see his simple idea realized up yonder in giddy distances and frightful periods of duration.

Also, here’s another extract from Emerson who lamented about the state of education during his time.

We teach boys to be such men as we are. We do not teach them to aspire to be all they can..

And so we want our kids to be super achievers whereas we don’t define achievement clearly.  

Egalitarianism and Hierarchy

Scruton also examines the necessity of having an unequal, and hierarchical society. He says it is far preferable to have an unequal society with several layers of the High and the Low instead of an equal society where everybody is dumb. Read this:

In a society of equals there is neither failure nor success, and despair is conquered by the loss of hope.

A wise author once said that Hope is one of the driving forces of mankind. The loss of this anticipation that somewhere on the invisible line of time, “my time shall come,” is perhaps the greatest loss. It is to fulfill this Hope–a conviction that it shall be realized–that gave birth to hundreds of movements, revolutions, and inventions.  

… egalitarian dogma does nothing to abolish social hierarchy: it simply ensures that children at the bottom are given no chance to rise to the top.

The advocates of self-esteem are so exercised by this fact that they try to invert the social spectrum, to represent the bottom as the top and the top as the bottom. Slovenly speech is praised as socially authentic, and ignorance as ‘difference’

… a society can be hierarchically ordered without being oppressive.

Yeah, and don’t examples of slovenly speech abound in the world today? Arundhati Roy, Resident Idiot… They Who Speak for the Oppressed. Their world is one where they see oppression in every corner of the earth, and contend that being rich and prosperous is a sin. Never mind their own personal record of double standards. These advocates of an equal, just, and ordered society need to get the following words into their brains:

The culture of self-esteem wants everybody to feel OK about themselves, regardless of merit. True self-esteem, however, comes through the sense of being right with others and deserving their esteem, which in turn depends upon fulfilling the duties of your station. The office cleaner who conscientiously does her job is rewarded with the friendship of the workers whom she benefits. It does not matter that her social position is a humble one; for by occupying it rightly she earns a place in society as honourable as any other. [..]

For every station has its duties, the performance of which is both an end in itself and a passport to social affection. And through education, ambition and hard work you can change your station, to arrive at the place that matches your achievements and which, through performing its duties, you possess as your own.

Oh! but do read the essay.