More Research and More Thinking [HW #42: Part B- Significance]

Focus: For the school unit I was, still am interested in schooling alternatives. Based on my interviews, it seems like a huge majority of the people has accepted the education system, as it is. We all follow this straight, two-dimensional path. This path has become our way of life, and our approach towards, as well as our definition of "success." Schools are, of course just an organization interpreted by man. It is only the method that our ancestors chose, and we follow. So what if that choice was never made, or if we made another choice- to discontinue and change courses? What are our options? What have people living on the sidelines of the mainstream road been doing?

Being a student for 13 years, awaiting an additional 4+ years, I feel like school, as it is, is extremely dreadful. Between the lag of the curriculum, and inability to change the things we're doing on a daily basis, there's not much to look forward to in school. However, I thought that it really didn't help to mourn and whine about this again and again (but that didn't stop me from doing it). So I decided to look up alternatives to our orthodox education system. Although, it is a bit too late for me to apply any of these alternatives to my life, being that I'm already in too deep, it is still important to know what are the options given to us... Well not "given to us," but are there and neglected.

In terms of how this topic matter functionally, I think just the fact that there are all these alternatives, and we're only aware of maybe four of them shows a lot about the situation we are put in. And by that I mean: we are trapped in a room, with the door open. It's almost like our society is structured so that we are guided- maybe even pushed to go in one direction. However, there are these options that we have, but are unaware of, to escape that path; but rarely does anyone embrace those options. Most of us move along with the push, and. It is much easier to go with the current, than to go against.

Similar to myself, many others constantly whine about school, and constantly return to school. For the most part, none of us particularly enjoy school or look forward to school, and yet we go to it 5 days a week, for 6+ hours. As of right now, with the people in my life, school seems to just be an obligation to all of us. We're here to fulfill those obligations, and play the role we are given. With that, none of us have tried to break out of those obligations or those roles. All of us have remained stationary, just living the life that was given. And until, last week I didn't even know about majority of the other paths that are there for us. Even so, I only discovered them due to another obligation, that was a part of school. It's not only that this topic- alternative paths show insight about what else we can do to feed our minds, but it also shows us how we are as a society. It's just the fact that we're not embracing this chance to escape that we dread, that shows us how trapped we truly are.