Discussion Group Participants– Mackenzie Neiderer, Isabella Bedore, Adam Griffin, Jenna Schreiber, Josh Rogers, Luke Jarvis, Emily Foley
In our group discussion, we focused on how educators do not care about a student’s understanding of the course content but rather, a student’s capabilities to memorize material. We came to the conclusion that education is a less intense version of the hunger games; it’s all about survival of the fittest, who can memorize the most. Our generation is told how lazy we are and how we have no work ethic. In reality, we don’t know what real work is because all we’ve been programmed to do is take test, to make our teachers look better and get our schools money. We have been turned into robots that regurgitate information with no concept of its real world application. Memorization has dehumanized us. I can’t hold a basic conversation with another human being. However, I can recite the quadratic formula by heart. We have not been taught how to succeed in the real world and many of us are going to turn into the failure that we are told we are. Schools need to refocus their priorities, and money, on providing students with resources to help them figure out their futures. Students need to start taking their lives into their own hands and turn their education around. The scary reality is that we are the future of this country and the world. If our generation doesn’t try to learn from the roadblocks laid out for us, we will fail. And in turn, so will everything else.
