The WHY Of Education

Why go to school? Do not facts wear out and skills obsolesce, as new discoveries in science and technology are made and introduction of new socio-political values give us different perspectives on social sciences and humanities previously studied? Indeed, does yesterday teach us anything about today and tomorrow?

The strongest ostensible justification for the Education Establishment in society is to insure future financial independence of citizens, and even to increase money-earning capacities. Presumably, we must have school, lest ours be a nation of street bums, vagrants, criminals and other types of ne'er-do-wells. "Fitting into society" is the goal.

But this pretext raises two more issues: 1)Why is government compulsion required, to assure an educated society? 2)Why must collective society dictate educational priorities to individuals? Does not "no child left behind" also sound like "no child can get ahead"? Under this scheme, we all march lock-step together, because even as some people "get ahead", others, by automatic definition and comparison, "fall behind".

Are we all of equal intellectual endowments and talents to begin with? Of course not!--Nor should we be. As the apostle Paul writes in the Bible, "Can the ear say to the eye, 'I have no need of thee'?, or can the heart say to the brain, 'I have no need of thee'?" Every individual talent has its purpose in a global scheme of things and, for the benefit of society-at-large, none should be supressed, or even temporarily "placed on hold" while other skills and knowledges are involuntarily acquired at state behest. Only when individuals are free, does society progress and benefit the most. In a climate of freedom are individuals most likely to strive with utmost enthusiasm in the realization of their dreams and visions for themselves.

What of the monetary gain aspect of education? Granting that personal financial independence is a valid concern, the Bible tells us man does not live by bread alone. Knowledges and skills put to use outside the context of one's money-earning career can be, and often are, of benefit to society. For example, understanding inter-personal relationships issues--especially those transcending boundaries of racial and national culture--are crucial to survival and success in an increasingly interdependent world. Corporations have learned this lesson by hard experience, in discovery that what sells in America may not always sell with equal success in foreign societal milieus. The reverse is also true. In any case, no amount of money can purchase the blessing of social harmony and concord. In this context, the folly of education exclusively for the sake of monetary gain becomes evident.

How, then, shall the success of education be measured? By the degree of financial prosperity of its graduates? The pornography industry has amply demonstrated ability to make vast monetary treasure by appeal to the lowest bestial side of the human character, rather than to its more noble impulses. Are Larry Flynt, Hugh Hefner, Bob Guccione and Al Goldstein successful? Education clearly must serve more noble purpose than satiation of human material appetite. It must do much more than keep men out of jail, and enable them to say, "I did not have sex with that woman!" All the President's men graduated from the most challenging law schools in America, and still failed to learn that lessons as they went to prison anyway! Education too, thus failed in that instance.

What, then, is the final purpose of education, and how is its success to be measured? The successful teacher is the one who persuades his/her students to continue study in his/her academic discipline, long after they have left his/her classroom. Voluntarism based on enlightened self-interest, in pursuit of relevance to one's own life, is a far more powerful guarantor of academic perpetuity for a given discipline, than is state coercion based on presumptive plausibility not yet confirmed in the life of each individual student.

The why of education, then, is best summed up by demonstration of an appreciative relevance of the individual to the real and total world in which he or she lives.

-Lawrence K. Marsh