Lets be honest, no formal school will ever give a public shout-out or the proper credit deserved by Khan Academy.
If you wish to educate yourself further, then Sal Khan designed a number encyclopedia that can easily fit into the palm of your hand.
Do yourself a favor and research into this platform if you haven't heard about it.
It is designed to teach the world- children, women, men and everything about the beauty that modern education has without the need for 6 - 8 hour daily commitments.
In countries like the US students who participate in at least 1 high school extracurricular make up 75% of the population. The top 25% in extracurricular activities also thrive in high school.
It's funny to me that in Australia, high schools very heavily lack opportunities. This issue did not come into my mind until this year on a trip overseas where a discussion with a cousin led to this conclusion.
In Sri Lanka, high school students are encouraged to band together in healthy ways to form clubs that offer valuable experience that students can list on resumes. Richmond College in Sri Lanka is a school with 50+ supported clubs solely supported by student systems, being backed by an impressive powerhouse of 4500 students.
Despite many clubs having mostly male members- Richmond College is known for it's unique student atmosphere.
This is where private schools in Australia charge more and too much exploiting students and their parents for what should be a basic right established in public schools.
In Australia, teachers openly discourage this healthy form of banding together, citing issues such as:
- "Inclusivity" or lack off- this is hypocritical
- Lack of teacher supervision
- Lack of financial incentives for the school
- Safety issues
"Inclusivity" is hypocritical because it doesn't account for the fact that students who want to participate in an activity may not be able to safely without causing harm to other club members because of a mental or physical deficiency. Inclusivity fails on 3 further points:
- A biased teacher may use inclusivity as a reason to disband a club they dislike personally though doesn't violate laws or school rules
- In the situation where a club doesn't have enough attention or desire to participate, it may get disbanded unfairly because of a "gender split"
- Inclusivity doesn't have a standard definition or defined ruleset. If a club needs to be inclusive, does a person in a wheelchair have to play with 6"+ players- or does the original club get disbanded?
Teachers in Australia often talk about their schools and to their students like it is a "fine establishment" but when it matters, the students think that the teachers are behaving like children.
I would attribute a lack of mental self development (not in an insulting manner) and helpful information to this.
Something Western high schools do well is helping students pay attention to their mental health- albeit in very irrelevant ways.
Instead off:
- "Students mental health is suffering, here are multiple ways to alleviate this..."
- "Schools and lawmakers across Australia are taking action on this issue to guarantee the safety of our students."
They say:
- "We will need another 2 hour course in the middle of assignment time for our students on mental health and what they can do while we sit back and avoid responsibility in lawmaking where it really matters."
- "We can ban phones and even social media at home but we cannot help students with what is making them tick."
- "We'll direct the next generation of learners and workers towards social media potentially filled with pedophil*s and sex*al exploiters while brainwashing them not letting them form their own opinions"- bluesky, 1, 2
- "The social media laws we implemented definitely won't let children slip through the cracks because we handed the trust over completely to the companies in power without setting up a correct system"
- "Students and children obviously have space to form their own opinions and thoughts free from the laws of parliament."
Bluesky- a platform that a lot of news platforms are saying is facing a mass influx CSAM material
This is the platform that Australian politicians want children to use.
The issue here being that students who are meant to be critical thinkers are not given space to think by schools and figure out what is happening in the world around them:
- "Don't buy a petrol car because JSO said so and Iran is fighting the world and you will sponsor their nukes!"
- "Don't buy an electric car because of that rich billionaire!"
- "Look at this war- I'll have forgotten about it soon but because of my short attention span you should care too instead of taking action in what you believe in!"
- "It is the patriarchy!"
- "Do as your told! It doesn't matter if you waste 2 years of the most important time of your life!"
- "She/he is a victim and it's always your fault!"
The ROI of going wasting the last 2 years of high school in Australia is disastrous because you don't get work experience or a pathway to uni. If you have those 2 years of experience, you have a massive advantage over all of your peers because a job does not ask you for ATAR.
If you hate school, here is my suggestion:
- Quit in year 10.
- Work for 2 years with Khan Academy and other platforms on the side to keep your mind fresh.
- Pass STAT with a +90 for $240 AUD when you become 18 (which is nothing for 2 years of work).
- Get a degree or certificate 4 to heavily boost your opportunities.
Quick side note: 2 years of work experience will open up all sorts of apprenticeship opportunities because now workplaces think you can manage yourself.
This is why Khan Academy is so useful. It can be used to heavily game the education system because it doesn't require a useless 6 hour daily commitment.
Students should rebel against this school system that isn't giving them the necessary space to grow.
Thank you for reading, if you took something useful away from this post, leave a comment!