Modern Education

Let me take this moment to just say that our modern education system is messed up.  Seriously!  I saw a video on Facebook of this girl crying because of school and saying she just wanted to give up and be a stripper.  I don't know, maybe she made that video for laughs, but there are other students who feel the exact same way she at least pretended to feel.
I don't like school.  That may be a shock to some people, but it's true.  I don't like school.  I like learning.  I hate when people think that learning and school are the same thing.  They so aren't.  I love learning, actually.  I tolerate school, because right now, that's the best place for me to go to learn things.
But so much weighs upon a person, especially a high school student, while they're at school.  Students are pressured to make good grades, so they can go to a good college, so they can get a good degree and get a good job.  College is pushed so hard that it could turn someone off to the idea of college.
But then you also have students who work.  There's a student at my school, who lives alone and supports himself.  While also being the right hand man of the FBLA (Future Business Leaders of America) sponsor.  He's tired a lot.  Why?  Because he's feeding himself, clothing himself, keeping his apartment paid for and still working to get good grades so he can go to college and go into a career with Google someday, by working his way up.  After Google, he plans to go into politics.
There are students that are involved in sports and music and plays half of the clubs at the school, because those are the things they enjoy, but they also have to keep up with their grades.
And school itself isn't a bad thing, but what is is all the classes that students are required to take.  A student only gets to choose three electives.  Three.  That's three things that they personally want to learn about and that they personally can choose to learn about.
Is an advanced Algebra class, for someone who barely understands Algebra1, who wants to be an English teacher really needed for them and their career?  Stop telling students, "Oh, you'll need it later in life, no matter your career", without telling them why or in what situation.  We're big kids.  Give us the real reasons.
Is an English class really necessary for a student who plans to go into a computer engineer career?  If so, tell them why, don't just say "because you need it", "because you'll use it in life", "because you need to be well rounded".  Give them a real reason, please!
And the worst part for me is seeing all of the posters up for the state testing.  Posters saying things about unlocking your potential, and doing great...what about the kid that bombs it?  Has that student not reached their true potential, just because they bombed that test?  Has that student...failed?  Failed at life, failed at school, just flat out failed?
No!  Because those tests prove nothing.  They prove how book smart a person is.  They prove how well a person is at tests.  They prove how fast someone can read.  They don't prove that this kid is good at singing, or that even though this kid reads slow, they remember and understand everything they read.  It doesn't say anything about how this kid treats others.  It doesn't tell anyone that this student is really good at computer programing.
Those tests only state...how well you did on that test.
Why not let students learn about things they want to learn about?  Maybe a student does want to take all of those classes.  Maybe a student actually likes working with imaginary numbers.  Maybe there's a student who actually kind of likes picking apart sentences and sentence structure.
Why not give classes on book publishing, video game making, hey, maybe even intro classes for teaching!  I get that it could get kind of expensive.  But at least get the kids where they love to learn.  Because then they can go out with their own initiative and find the things they want to learn about on the internet, with the teacher's guidance if they get stuck or need help.  That's kind of what PBL (Project Based Learning) is.  That's why I like PBL.
I honestly don't think that there are any students who would go ahead and have school, even if school was cancelled.  I read a book once, when I was younger, called The Secret School, by AVI.  It was about this one room school house school that got cancelled because the teacher either died, or got sick or had a death in the family, I don't remember which, and a fourteen year old girl, one of the smartest in the school, took the role as teacher, to ensure that people were still learning.  Because they liked to learn.
I guess...school isn't really the problem, it's just that students don't like learning anymore.  And probably because it's been shoved down their throats that they have to learn and they have to learn this and they have to learn it this way and that if they don't do well with their learning, they're not smart and have failed.
And this has gotten really really long, so I'll just end it now.
~Katie