Schooling Quotes
48 quotes
"Study without desire spoils the memory, and it retains nothing that it takes in."
"The principle goal of education in the schools should be creating men and women who are capable of doing new things, not simply repeating what other generations have done; men and women who are creative, inventive and discoverers, who can be critical and verify, and not accept, everything they are offered."
"I imagine that one of the biggest troubles with colleges is there are too many distractions, too much panty-raiding, fraternities, and boola-boola and all of that."
"Considering he was neither priest nor scholar, the young man gave sensible, thoughtful replies -- the more so, perhaps, for being untrained, for he had not learned what he should believe or should not believe. Present a statement to him in flagrant contradiction to all Christian doctrine and he could be persuaded to agree on its good sense, unless he remembered it was the sort of thing of which pyres are made for the incautious."
"...some nights I'd sneak out and listen to the radio in my Dad's old Chevy - children need solitude - they don't teach that in school..."
"We, Equality 7-2521, were not happy in those year in the Home of the Students. It was not that the learning was too hard for us. It was that the learning was too easy. This is a great sin, to be born with a head which is too quick. It is not good to be different from our brothers, but it is evil to be superior to them. The Teachers told us so, and they frowned when they looked at us."
"In my school, no consideration is given to anything unreasonable; the heart of the matter is to use the power of the knowledge of martial arts to gain victory any way you can."
"Do not give them a candle to light the way, teach them how to make fire instead. That is the meaning of enlightenment."
"It is usually unbearably painful to read a book by an author who knows way less than you do, unless the book is a novel."
"You are more likely to find three TVs inside a randomly selected house than you are to find a single book that is or was not read to pass an exam, to please God, or to be a better cook."
"Any child who can spend an hour or two a day, or more if he wants, with adults that he likes, who are interested in the world and like to talk about it, will on most days learn far more from their talk than he would learn in a week of school."
"Mr. Polly went into the National School at six and he left the private school at fourteen, and by that time his mind was in much the same state that you would be in, dear reader, if you were operated upon for appendicitis by a well-meaning, boldly enterprising, but rather over-worked and under-paid butcher boy, who was superseded towards the climax of the operation by a left-handed clerk of high principles but intemperate habits,—that is to say, it was in a thorough mess."
"Education is a system designed to make you feel inferior, yet they encourage you to accept it in order to be superior"
"Education is a natural community function and occurs inevitably, since the young grow up on the old, towards their activities, and into (or against) their institutions; and the old foster, teach, train, exploit and abuse the young. Even neglect of the young, except physical neglect, has an educational effect -- not the worst possible."
Paul Goodman, Compulsory Mis-education/The Community of Scholars
"Education aims at solving problems, but some educators are problems to be solved"
"When spontaneity and individuality and really good original stuff occurred in a classroom it was in spite of the instruction, not because of it. This seemed to make sense. He was ready to resign. Teaching dull conformity to hateful students wasn’t what he wanted to do."
Robert M. Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values
"As long as high schools strive to list the number of Ivy League schools their graduates attend and teachers pile on work without being trained to identify stress-related symptoms, I fear for our children’s health. I am not mollified by the alums of my daughter’s school who return to tell everyone that the rigor of high school prepared them for college, making their first year easier than they’d anticipated.If they make it that far."
"I feel ashamed that so many of us cannot imagine a better way to do things than locking children up all day in cells instead of letting them grow up knowing their families, mingling with the world, assuming real obligations, striving to be independent and self-reliant and free."
"It isn't a coincidence that governments everywhere want to educate children. Government education, in turn, is supposed to be evidence of the state's goodness and its concern for our well-being. The real explanation is less flattering. If the government's propaganda can take root as children grow up, those kids will be no threat to the state apparatus. They'll fasten the chains to their own ankles."
"A relationship is a process. If you have nothing to learn - you have a slave to teach. 's why schools are effective."
"It was a time when a degree was expected but not much respected."
"Literature cannot be imposed it must be discovered."
"The first bombardment showed us our mistake, and under it the world as they had taught it to us broke in pieces."
"History has been stolen from us and replaced with guilt inducing lies."
"There is no smarter professor than life, and no wiser sage than experience."
"My schooling not only failed to teach me what it professed to be teaching, but prevented me from being educated to an extent which infuriates me when I think of all I might have learned at home by myself."
"Education is for freedom - freedom from mental slavery."
"Paying the high cost of education is better than paying the high price of ignorance."
"The task for parents and teachers is not to teach, it is how to inspire the people of youth to find their desire to learn."
"To stimulate life, leaving it free, however, to unfold itself--that is the first duty of the educator."
"No teacher has the right to cure a child of making noises on a drum. The only curing that should be practiced is the curing of unhappiness."
"School is about learning to wait your turn, however long it takes to come, if ever. And how to submit with a show of enthusiasm to the judgment of strangers, even if they are wrong, even if your enthusiasm is phony."
"If we spark a student's passion, we unleash a powerful force upon the world."
"What I learned on my own I still remember"
Nassim Nicholas Taleb, The Bed of Procrustes: Philosophical and Practical Aphorisms
"Everything is like a wall. Said a scholar to the troll. Bang your head to go on through. Then you'll see, there is no queue."
"Schools themselves aren't creating the opportunity gap: the gap is already large by the time children enter kindergarten and does not grow as children progress through school. The gaps in cognitive achievement by level of maternal education that we observe at age 18-powerful predictors of who goes to college and who does not - are mostly present at age 6when children enter school. Schooling plays only a minor role in alleviating or creating test score gaps."
"A person who says “every person has a right to a decent education” may not actually mean “people should be robbed to support bad schools” or “all children should be forced into a prison-like building for 12 years."
"Schooling is a manufacturing process whereby the raw material called curious boys is turned into products called obedient men."
"If you feed a child, you strengthen him for a day; if you educate him, you strengthen him for a lifetime."
"There is no such source and cause of strife, quarrel, fights, malignant opposition, persecution, and war, and all evil in the state, as religion. Let it once enter into our civil affairs, our government soon would be destroyed. Let it once enter our common schools, they would be destroyed. Those who made our Constitution saw this, and used the most apt and comprehensive language in it to prevent such a catast"
"One problem with the way the educational system is set up is that it only recognizes a certain type of intelligence, and it’s incredibly restrictive - very, very restrictive. There’s so many types of intelligence, and people who would be at their best outside of that structure get lost."
"The trouble with school is they give you the answer, then they give you the exam. That's not life...."
"Yet that is considered an excellent school, and I dare say it would be if the benighted lady did not think it necessary to cram her pupils like Thanksgiving turkeys, instead of feeding them in a natural and wholesome way. It is the fault with most American schools, and the poor little heads will go on aching till we learn better."
"Half of teachers leave the profession within their first four years, and kids with behaviour challenges and their parents are cited as one of the major reasons."
"Schooling gives you knowledge, but education makes you wise."
"In sum, one of the primary things I learned was how to kill time. I learned also to wish away my life. I learned to give myself away."
Derrick Jensen, Walking on Water: Reading, Writing, and Revolution
"In the race of life I would rather to be around the best and sink than to be around mediocrity and swim."
"Well, Jack, we have taken the Macedonian, and your share of the prize, if we get her in safely, may be two hundred dollars; what will you do with it?” Stephen Decatur, commanding the frigate United States, North Atlantic, near the Azores Islands, 1812.“One hundred will go to my mother, sir, and the other I shall spend on schooling.” Jack Creamer, aged ten."