What Does Education Do?
Is going to school at the core of a good education? Why do successful people walk tall? It all leads us to explore how we build self-confidence and make success a habit.
Is going to school at the core of a good education? Why do successful people walk tall? It all leads us to explore how we build self-confidence and make success a habit. An excellent institution — whether a family or even a school — should help us walk with pride and build our emotional quotient.
"I believe there's a hero in us all that keeps us honest, gives us strength, makes us noble, and finally allows us to die with pride." — Mike Saquan Wren
To empower us to walk with confidence is what I feel education should do. When we look at schools that work to deliver education, not many will help us achieve the key purpose, as these institutions look at education as a commodity and sell it to us as a package. The main motive of most of these schools is to run a sustainable business; this often will not let them deliver value and meet our purpose of helping us 'walk with confidence'. The school may give us literacy; this is not what education is all about.
"Education has helped to make me who I am. Through education, I learned more about my strengths and weaknesses. It helped me to develop both occupations and vocations. It gave me confidence and helped me to see the world as an approachable place."
Evaluating People vs. Their Education
Does the phrase "well-educated" refer to a quality of the schooling you received, or to something about you? Does it denote what you were taught, or what you learned and remember? If the term applies to what you now know and can do, you could be poorly educated despite having received a top-notch education.
To be considered educated, students should leave school with a deep understanding of themselves and how they fit into the world — and have learned what some call "soft skills": complex problem-solving, creativity, entrepreneurship, the ability to manage themselves, and the ability to be lifelong learners.
As Professor Fernando Reimers of Harvard summarised, there is a disconnect between how education gets delivered in the classroom and the common desire for students to become good, well-rounded people.
Building Self-Confidence Through Learning
How do we empower young people to walk with confidence? This is the dilemma that will never be fully resolved, as we all have our very personal views and beliefs. The culture, the stereotype and the work of generations cloud our minds and make us often feel incomplete and demolish our confidence.
Learning is an integral part of our life and education should not only stimulate us intellectually but build our character, our resilience, and our sense of self. The school that succeeds is the one that sends its students into the world not just with knowledge, but with the confidence to use it.
Sandeep Dutt is a School Improvement Coach with over 40 years of experience transforming schools across India and Singapore. He is the author of My Good School: Where Passion Meets Education and founder of the Good Schools Alliance. He runs the Good Schools Masterclass for school leaders, principals, and educators.