I was just dusting off some memories of middle school and high school days. Middle school was rough for me, but high school was a blast. When I was around 13 years old in 7th and 8th grade, I got picked on a lot, was a misfit, and had terrible grades. I hated going to school. Some days were a bit scary. I couldn’t wait to get home and sink into the world of a video game so my mind could decompress. Usually I preferred the race driving games, or exploring/puzzle/logic type of games. I had no clue these game preferences would match my career path later on in life of truck driving and home inspections.
The school work wasn’t really difficult, I just didn’t care to do good at it. I needed to figure out how to adapt to the social environment before worrying about the curriculum.
By the time I was in high school, I figured out the social environment formula. I was still a misfit, but found my rhythm in sarcasm, humor, and helping out the ones who would still get teased.
I was able to focus more on my future motivations since I wasn’t worried about surviving the social environment.
My grades in high school were still terrible though.
It’s not that the curriculum was hard in high school either, It just seemed so mind-numbingly boring and useless.
In most classes, I would just make a funny comment, or zone out, and I would usually flip through the textbook for that class.
When I got out of school for the day, I would usually get a book from the library, or read something that I got from Elliot Bay Bookstore. Many times I would read books that a friend would give to me to read. Those were the best.
I would goof off after school too, but it seemed like most days I got most of my education outside of school from studying and exploring my interests. I always wonder how much more education I would have gotten then if school wasn’t in the way.
I remember a class in high school called “American History.” It would be more accurate to title it “U.S history,” because it didn’t have anything to do with the parts of America outside the U.S.
There is a difference. As usual, It was so boring, and I read the textbook to pass the time.
“Jeremy, why are you reading chapter 8, we are doing chapter 2 this week. Go back to Chapter 2.”
Sometimes, for fun, I would ask questions that I knew the textbook didn’t have the answer to. Such as, “How did Jim Crow Laws get their name?”
“That won’t be on the test, so it’s not important Jeremy.”
This class was during the Clinton/Bush ‘92 election. We had an assignment to write about who we would want to vote for and why.
My response to the assignment was that I don’t vote for any candidate. The teacher said that’s not an option. I said it is. We don’t have mandatory voting in the U.S.
I told him I could write arguments why someone would be for or against one or the other if you want. He said, that’s not the assignment.
I stood my ground and responded on the assignment with, I choose not to vote.
I failed that assignment. I’m still proud of getting an F on that assignment.
I remember in health class learning absolute garbage nonsense. It’s the type of health misinformation you can still find on the government connected “health” site WebMD.
I wonder how many people believe the stuff they were taught in health class, or currently find on WebMD.
There were a few classes where the teacher hadn’t conformed to the curriculum yet, and we actually learned some things by having freestyle pow wow discussions.
Those classes were the best, but sure enough, just when you’re about to get into the nitty-gritty of something to learn, the bell rings, and you must clear all that from you mind, so you can memorize meaningless material in the next session, until the bell rings again. You become conditioned to not be able to focus on a task for too long. This is a great way to not learn things.
Separating subject matter into isolated slots of time throughout the day, and corralling kids of the same age into a one size fits all curriculum is not how education is obtained.
But the Prussian model of compulsory conformity factories that the government schooling institutions are based on, had and never will have anything to do with education.
The intention has always been to pump out an assembly line of mindless workers who are obedient to anything the government tells them.
Some kids in school get good grades and do their homework, and some go on to university.
Of those, some end up with great paying careers working in a corporate environment or something. Some are content and feel like their career matches their skill and knowledge perfectly, and some are miserable and have no life outside of work.
Many who go on to specific fields of study such as STEM, do very well overall.
One thing that seems to be common among those who put all their effort into getting good grades is, once they receive their final diploma or degree, they choose to stop learning. It’s as if they think the only time to learn something is when being graded in a school environment.
20 years after they got their degree, they haven’t advanced their education in anything.
In contrast, some who seem to hate homework and got lousy grades are very brilliant and curious. Some who did lousy in school are now fantastically wealthy entrepreneurs.
Having the piece of arbitrary paper that says this kid knows stuff is helpful to increase the odds of not being in poverty later on, but this is just one factor among many.
Some more powerful factors that increase the odds of success later on are, negotiation skills, understanding the interests of others you interact and do business with, creativity, going against the status quo, etc.
Negotiation skills in life are far more important than getting good grades. If you can master negotiating in business, relationships, parenting, and general interactions, you will likely be successful in life. Negotiation done right is when all persons involved feel they are better off than before.
I am in my 40’s now, and I am overwhelmingly educated in many subjects, and will continue my education until death comes. A very small percentage of my education came from going to college, and a tiny fraction of my education came from compulsory schooling curriculum.
I got mostly C’s, D’s, and F’s in school, but I’m highly educated.
I have my own home inspection business with pays handsomely for the time invested. I drive a freight truck which I enjoy doing. My wife and I have experienced many different business ventures, and we’re not afraid of failure. I don’t work as many hours compared to the average U.S. citizen. My wife and I are financially comfortable, and the homes we’ve lived in have been just what we wanted them to be. I generally feel successful and content in life (acknowledging there are always many unexpected curve-balls in life).
So do I wish I could go back in time and have done more homework and achieved better grades? Absolutely not.
And I still find value in spending a day getting immersed in the world of a video game.
