The Value of Education

“No one can take away your education.”

I have lost count of how many times I heard that growing up. Parents, teachers, elders. Everyone said it. Everyone you turned someone reminded you of that. From a young age, I acquired this impression that education was important, better yet, vital to success. If I earned a good enough education, I could successful like my father. In hindsight, this goal is ironic because my father became successful without a formal education. But my parents, more or less, pushed me to not think like that. No, they wanted me to be successful in school. They wanted me to take it seriously. And I listened. I listened because I was impressionable and obedient.

Truth be told, I credit a lot of personality and opinions to my parents. I took whatever they said as the highest word that any one could provide. Their opinions, at least in my more formative years, were fact. Whatever Mommy and Daddy said was “the end, be all.” Everyone else was wrong. Except maybe for the teachers, and that was only because my parents pushed me to take school seriously. School is where I was going to become intelligent, successful and a “grown up.” I always treated the teachers with respect, did my homework and pushed myself. Without school, I wasn’t going to get anywhere. Sure, perhaps I viewed all of this out of necessity, but an education was going to provide me with opportunities I wasn’t going to have otherwise. I needed school.

Whether I realized or not, this crafted a very high opinion education for me that I carry to this day. It is likely the reason I chose to pursue my Master’s Degree right out of college. It is probably the reason I want to be teacher. Education has become the vehicle of social mobility in the United States, and teachers are the engineers of this vehicle. Education, consequently, is something of a very high value to me and something I firmly believe that people should have access to, commit his or herself to and become successful through. Through education, people acquire the knowledge and skills that open a number of opportunities for them. This is a given, naturally, but education yields more money and a more productive society. Around the world, education is readily available and subsequently leads to lower crime rates and lower Gini Index, which means wealth inequality will decrease due to better job opportunities.

But this is all a given. We know education offers these things. We know education provides these opportunities, and is a reason why many of us value it. It’s what I used to value it. But then I realized something that gives me such a high opinion on schools and teachers. It is the reason why I wish our education system could improve. It is the reason I will try my best to improve education in my career as an educator. Education makes better people. A good school with great teachers provides an excellent education makes better people. We become smarter, wiser and more cultured. We acquire knowledge and skills that can develop new ones. Interests are stimulated that have the potential to be pursued. The world becomes less of a mystery. Ignorance is subsided. Minds are opened and ideally a motivation to become a better person is instilled in the student. Education was one seen as a means to create citizens than exist and succeed in a democracy, and vote and rule themselves responsibly through the means of an election. This much is still true, but now it has become so much more. Education is now the means in which can succeed in a society. We need great schools to do this. We need great teachers to make it happen.