(un)schooling

09/23/2019

i am very unaccustomed to deciding what i want to do everyday, and i think it is partially because i've spent the last 15 years in school with people telling me what achievement looks like. i've recently been excitedly googling master's programs and i need to accept that a big part of that excitement is that someone will once again be giving me a framework where i can measure my success.

i came to leh for a conference on the 'economics of happiness'. it was refreshing to be surrounded by people from so many different disciplines, a stark contrast to the last conference i was at which was attended almost exclusively by biologists who studied chimps. i went to talks on localization, radical ecological democracy, ecotourism. a big focus of the weekend was reimagining education to make it more practical and place-based. the conference took place in Ladakh, nestled in the Himalayas, home to many yaks and apricot trees and traditional agricultural villages. so there was talk about how children here should learn local agriculture at school so that they can go back and work in their villages. on a village visit the other day, a group of women told us that school is stealing their children away and directly contributing to the destruction of their village and way of life. education is so widely touted as important and necessary and something that everyone deserves. i was raised by two scientists to believe the same. but what is education for? who does it serve? what does it foster?

i talked to one of the speakers about the (entirely hypothetical) prospect of not sending my kids to school. "i worry they would resent me," i told him. "they'll resent you for letting them decide what they want to do every day?"

it's a valid point. he and his wife have raised their kid in an intergenerational community of artisans and professionals and have let her explore her interests as she sees fit. he told me his daughter has worked in cafes, volunteered in animal shelters, spent time with doctors, loves baking, is in a band. she's also working on starting a business. he said this method of education is easier in India, where no one is worried that you'll sue them if your kid cuts her finger. and if she wants to go into mainstream education, it's just a matter of taking some open tests.

i've always treated school as more of a game than a place of learning. it was a fun game because i excel at it. but it was distinctly not fun for my siblings and many of my peers. i know many people who've come away from school feeling inadequate, stupid, or entirely mismatched with the system. college in particular can really psychologically and physically fuck you up, from anxiety disorders to all-nighters. and although i'm addicted to good grades, i too have definitely felt disillusioned by school. i remember waking up one day in grade 4 full of existential dread about the fact that i had to go to school despite having no good reason to. in my last year of high school, i started skipping frequently because i knew my grades wouldn't be affected, and i thought that hiding from my parents in my basement would be more fun than going. 

i know that i am underestimating and undermining my conventional education. i get that. i learned to write, i learned critical thinking, i learned math, i learned french, i learned some basic principles of ecology, i learned to conduct scientific experiments, i learned to forge my own communities, and i'm sure i learned a million things at school that i'm not cognizant i didn't know before school. and, yeah, kids often hate school, but kids also often hate broccoli and that's good for them! but i wonder who i would be if i hadn't been made to sit at a desk for 40 hours a week for 11 years. maybe i could have learned to build my own house and grow my own food. maybe i would've written a book. maybe i would have a better idea of what i want. or maybe i would be utterly miserable and unstimulated. i'll never really know. 

of course, the grass is always greener. i'm not oblivious to the trend of romanticizing traditional lifestyles or the university-education-sized throne of privilege i'm sitting on while writing this. but i'm also not oblivious to the destructive effects of globalization, the climate crisis, and the grip that the white and wealthy have over the proceedings of our society. i've certainly gained skills from my schooling, but they are skills to succeed in a system i'm not sure i want to be in. and localization, and by extension radicalized education, presents an alternative. one of my favourite quotes from the conference: "if you're resisting a system that you feel disempowers you, don't worry if someone calls you an extremist." so here i am, trying out extremism. and it feels kinda nice.

Ilana Nyveen
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