Valedictorian speaks out against modern schooling

I did a search for this and came up with nothing so feel free to delete if necessary..


(if this link doesn't work I appologize, I've never embedded a vid before )

Transcript of speech

This is the dilemma I've faced within the American education system. We are so focused on a goal, whether it be passing a test, or graduating as first in the class. However, in this way, we do not really learn. We do whatever it takes to achieve our original objective.

Between these cinderblock walls, we are all expected to be the same. We are trained to ace every standardized test, and those who deviate and see light through a different lens are worthless to the scheme of public education, and therefore viewed with contempt

And now here I am in a world guided by fear, a world suppressing the uniqueness that lies inside each of us, a world where we can either acquiesce to the inhuman nonsense of corporatism and materialism or insist on change. We are not enlivened by an educational system that clandestinely sets us up for jobs that could be automated, for work that need not be done, for enslavement without fervency for meaningful achievement. We have no choices in life when money is our motivational force. Our motivational force ought to be passion, but this is lost from the moment we step into a system that trains us, rather than inspires us.

It makes me feel good to know that there are intelligent kids out there willing to speak out like this.
I thought it was a brilliant speech.
Now how do we get the rest of American youth to wake up like this?
What's everyone else's thoughts?

Thank you very much for this.

I think the education system is abhorrent. It is the one thing that gets sacrificed with spending cuts, an IMO is the most I portent thing hands down.

I, too, am happy to see people in the school system standing up and saying this, but honestly, how many kids enjoy school?

We send our children to somewhere that they hate for eight hours a day, ten months out of the year and for 12 or 13 years of their life. All while they are in the most impressionable part of their lives.

Thanks again for this thread and I wish you many flags and stars. Here's one from me.

I hope this thread stays hot and more and more people realize what's going on in our school system.

Pred...

It certainly is great to see people speaking out against the rigid system that is currently in place; a system that inhibits artistic and intellectual creativity and represses individuality. I wonder whether or not changes will occur though. In our increasingly industrial society the need for people with specific expertise is growing. It is possible that the government sees no need to enable the next generation to expand their insights in different ways and reward them for doing so, as all they see a necessity for is a capable, efficient and obedient generation of workers to sustain the system as it stands, and ensure that their power is not threatened by a rising group of enlightened youth.

However, I truly hope that I am wrong, and that new, innovative systems will be integrated into the current system, or that an entirely new system of education will be implemented, so as to empower a new generation to overcome the problems that currently face us, and the one's that will inevitably present themselves in the future.

I find the problem is too, that the teachers themselves have to go through the exact same education system. It's a horrible cycle. How do you start to fix this? You need people like that young woman to become the teachers, to have open minds before the system gets ahold of them.

Originally posted by casijones
I find the problem is too, that the teachers themselves have to go through the exact same education system. It's a horrible cycle. How do you start to fix this? You need people like that young woman to become the teachers, to have open minds before the system gets ahold of them.

I agree buddy.

We need teachers that are there to help children and not just for the paycheck. We need schools that are inviting to children and not ran like prisons.

You have to watch a documentary called the war on kids, it's brilliant. I wrote a thread about it but it died quickly.

Pred...

reply to post by casijones


I wish I could do school all over again.
I would get in more trouble, speak out way more and get straight A's.
Class of '07

Wow, thank you so much for this video.

I'm sharing it to facebook so others will see it, every word she said is true and I might have to look up those authors and read it to my daughter lol.

I just love what she says about critical thinking and creativity.

S&F for you!

Cheers to that girl. I agree with her. Schooling is a mild form of mind control in my opinion. I am coming to learn that the majority of the crap I learned in school was all lies. I wonder if the teachers know this and if so how to they live with them selves while participating in misinforming whole generations.

WOW,

I read the whole transcript, it brought tears to my eyes, my daughter is going
through this right now.

I have known for a long time that our school system is in the stone ages.
I also believe that most of the teachers know this but are powerless against
the system to change it, and the system is "corporate and political america".

I am going to send the transcript and video to as many people as I can.

I have two school teachers in the family, It will be interesting to see what they
think of it.

Thanks for the nice find OP

Peace

I had a friend recently show this video to me because I was going on about getting rid of the public school system. This is evidence that people are waking up to the lies around us. You can tell the teachers start to get uneasy and even the students started paying attention as the speech goes along. Talk about leaving high school with a bang.

The conversation my friend and I had afterwards went along the lines that we think college is infact a waste of time. We concurred that indviduals limit themselves and never find their true potential, either because they are lazy or because of some type of fear. In other words, we both agreed that we are better off teaching ourselves than relying on someone else to "teach" us.

The old saying goes: Everything I need to know I learned in Kindergarten. Think about that one for a second. You learn to read and write and count and draw, the basics of communication. The rest of school is a bunch of manufactured crap to get you into the work force and make a slave out of you like everyone else. The speech was brilliant. School should be redone in such a way that inspires children to learn in their own ways and be what they want to become while giving them the tools necessary to follow those dreams.

Having gone through Primary and Secondary Public School and several years in College, I myself have always been critical of the Education system in the United States. Recent changes due to "No Child Left Behind" have only acerbated the problem.

I earnestly believe that the most major problem with education in the United States, even before the dumbing down of Education to the lowest common denominator and "one-size fits all" Education, is the fact that our Education system relies upon teaching the What instead of the How (or what to think instead of why to think).

Instead of empowering our students how to educate themselves we promote a mentality of "cram and purge" of seemingly irrelevant facts. Rather than give our students the tools of reading, research, reason, rhetoric, and logic we instead spoon-feed them excerpts from a book, denying them the ability to discover self-evident truths for themselves.

For example, most children in our Educational system can point to geographic North on a map. However, how many of those children know how to actually use a map? Do any of them know how to determine true North without the aid of a map or compass? If you teach a child how to observe true North using but two stones and the stars, that basic knowledge will lay the foundation for everything else, allowing them to fill in through logic and extrapolation for themselves the things that a teacher fails to instruct them.

Likewise, when you empower a child to love to read, give them proper research methods and the ability of use reason to determine the difference between fact and pseudo-fact, then there is nothing that child can't learn on their own. A teacher at that point serves no other purpose than to encourage, to guide, to be a resource, and act as peer-review, rather than the dictator of what the child is to think.

In all my years of education in the United States there was nothing, outside of penmanship, that I learned from a single one of my teachers other than the fact that they were far less learned than myself and as fallible as the next person. The greatest of my teachers that I came to respect were the ones humble enough to acknowledge this and acted more as a mentor than an instructor.

I see the same thing happening to my own daughter as she goes through the same Educational system today. She has difficulty grasping the abstract recitation and memorization of seemingly irrelevant dates, names, places, equations and notations, and relies on me to make up for where her teachers have failed her to provide the "Why" and "How" so that she can explore the world and educate herself.

The worst part is that we are creating a self-perpetuating crisis as those who are lacking the essential understanding of these subjects become teachers, being no better qualified to instruct in any other way than by rote, just as their teachers did for them.

I weep for the Educational system in the United States. It is a farce, even (or rather especially) at the university level.

If we don't revolutionize our Educational system in the United States soon, going from 18th in the world back to the Top 10, we are going to see the United States continue to become increasingly more irrelevant upon the World Stage.

I have recently graduated High school as well. I wish I was as eloquently as spoken as her, but I feel the same way on many aspects of public education in the U.S. today.

I have always thought the fastest way to combat ignorance would be to drastically alter the public education system. We can't take on the fool directly, we have to educate them when their minds are still vulnerable.
Parents must be held accountable as well. Unfortunately we are already stuck in this cycle of stupidity. The nuclear family has been deteriorating rapidly in this country since the 50s. Unfortunately, many parents today could be considered negligent.

At any rate, the first step is to reform public education. I am not sure how to reinforce good parenting skills. The negligent parents were just kids who have been exposed to our extremely backwards society(This statement really needs a more in depth definition).

My mother used to be a CPR worker, I have heard many stories of parents who have claimed they had a right to abuse their children. Where did that sentiment come from? More than likely our extremely #ed up ideals on freedom that exist in this country. We have all gotten to comfortable with American Exeptionalism, unfortunately that reality died in the 1970s. If we do not do something now, every generation will descend deeper into what could be considered ignorance, negligence, and irresponsibility.

Starting a dialog is the first step, but if we do not act on our sentiment we are no better.

''You can't be neutral on a moving train'' - Howard Zinn

Edit: Fixing sentence structure and other errors

I work for a private pre-K and also have a 17 year old and a 10 year old in public school. Some of the stuff my kids bring home for homework amazes me. Everything is set up to enhance the scores on the standardized tests. There is little or no extra learning involved. The text books are so politically correct, it's sickening. Even in Math, the story problems have to reflect every race, religion, and creed. My daughter tells me the high school has a banned book list, which I totally disagree with. There is so much B.S. it's no wonder kids aren't really learning anything.

reply to post by Corruption Exposed


I do not think every teacher is like that. I can say for sure that many teachers in my high school were irresponsible and deserved to be fired on the spot. Unfortunately, the Teachers Union in Washington State is very powerful.

However. Although this is a rare event. If a teacher could be considered 'good' and you have a positive relationship with them, then I think it can be one of the most valuable learning experiences.

But in the end, Books can tell you more than school ever will.

reply to post by predator0187


By now I have realized politicians can not be trusted.

But how can some politicians on the federal level suggest cutting anything that is not involved with our military spending. When you break down our budget it is god dang sickening. We arm countries like Saudi Arabia, or Israel, or India that will lead to the deaths of innocent humans. While we cut our education or medical spending.

academic.evergreen.edu...

This # needs to stop now, and we need to starting helping humans.

(Also that list does not include sales of weapons that would lead to that countries victory in their military endeavor.)

reply to post by Marulo


I agree about the teachers. They are for the most part stuck teaching what they are told to teach. In a nearby school to ours, a teacher was severely repremanded for basically doing her job. She was teaching a writing class that included persuasive writing. She chose several subjects for the students to write about, from an education website no less. A parent complained about the subject matter and the school board punished her for "inappropriate subject matter". I know her personally and she would never choose something risque or anything. She is quite religious and genuinely cares about her students. None of the subjects were religious in nature. She told me the kids were excited about the writing projects and many quality class discussions centered around their opinions on the subjects. Such a shame, a teacher gets punished for "shudder" making children think freely and voice opinions. No, in this country, they would rather have robots that do only as told and think only as told to think.
My kids have been taught by me to think for themselves and not go with the flow. My daughter, especially, voices her opinion and argues her point. She's the kid some teachers love and other teachers hate. The one who can get a rousing debate going or make a person feel totally ignorant. Got to love her, she wants to study law so she can prosecute the bad guys. Sometimes, I wonder by the time she graduates law school just who the bad guys will be.

I myself only have a GED. I didn't graduate high school for personal reasons, not because I wasn't smart enough.
Nowadays though, I find it amazing that I have more common sense than some college graduates... kinda makes me feel ok about not having attended college yet.
I went to a fairly decent school in a small town. Looking back now, it's no wonder I had a rough time. The only classes I remember getting A's in were German and art. Our German teacher was a wonderful little man from Poland. He was astonished at some of the things they didn't teach us here. My art teacher was gay, and he allowed full freedom of expression. Nothing was off limits in his class, because hey, it's art!
I wish I could speak as highly of my other teachers. Most of them had either been there so long they didn't really care anymore, or they were fresh out of college and had no clue yet.
Copying down notes for 84 mins off of a projector with the lights out at 8:30 am, I remember wanting to sleep more than learning anything.
Kids need to be stimulated. They need to have teacher that are going to make them think outside the box. They need to not feel like they're competing with the kid sitting next to them, or not feeling stupid because they don't understand something when everyone else does.
I think it needs to be a group effort. It's not one person's fault.
You need the students, teachers, and parents all working together toward the common goal.

Thats why the teachers need to stop the teacher union it's killing the system. They work, KNOW FOR SURE they will get a paycheck no matter how much they suck at teaching then after a few years want tenure... An increase in pay every year guranteed No one else is guranteed a raise. I think it's the unions standing in the way of teachers who care and teachers who just want to get the day over with like the kids they teach... Teachers need to be held accountable and not simply given a raise on a silver platter if they are not doing a good job... It is a fact you got teachers that really care, and teachers that are just gaining the system. Thats why if all teachers were in unions it will be even more destructive to the youth..

Originally posted by Corruption Exposed
Cheers to that girl. I agree with her. Schooling is a mild form of mind control in my opinion. I am coming to learn that the majority of the crap I learned in school was all lies. I wonder if the teachers know this and if so how to they live with them selves while participating in misinforming whole generations.

I agree, even in canada there is no difference.


i am glad she spoke out against the current so called modern schooling at her speech i don't think the teachers in there liked it very much

Good thread op