You would think that the best place to look for the soul of education is in institutes of higher education.
Sadly, discovering that – even there – it’s usually missing should get our alarm bells ringing.
why go to school?
Education is one of the few things everyone agrees is good. Even in the worst of societies, debates were only about who education is good for, but never whether it is Good.
It’s the same today as it has been for generations. But as education in Lombok starts looking more and more alike education in London than ever before in history, you’d think the standardisation would imply we’ve figured out the most important question:
Why do we (and our children) need to be educated?
education, as it is today
Put aside the philsophers for a moment and let’s try to derive an answer from what we actually see in schools and universities.
Education at its core today is to sort humans.
Your qualifications, your majors, your school. Your exam results, your internships. Each of this tells a story but more importantly, a story that can be comprehended by the world, by governments and corporations and society.
Education sorts you, and only then are you seen. Mostly on your LinkedIn.
Consider the university ranking. It’s not enough to go to university and sort yourself as “higher” than those who did not, it’s not enough to be certified as “the best” in your cohort, if the institution name on your certificate doesn’t rank highly. (I know this from personal experience.)
In fact, you and I know that dropping out from a prestigious university sorts you higher than completing a degree from an inferior one.
But what are these global rankings based on? Surely this might hint at what we value education for! Spoiler: it does not.