The Purpose of Education

If you ask a student what is the purpose of education you will get a variety of answers. Some will say to get into a good college so they can get a good job. Others will say to learn. A few will even say to torture them. This makes some people wonder, is there a true purpose to education? The purpose of education is to open our minds to new concepts and ideas as well as to examine and reevaluate social norms; yet, because thinking can lead to changes in society, upholders of custom view thinking as a threat.

The purpose of education is mainly to open our minds to the new concepts and ideas that are affecting our world. “Educate a child and he will be able to adjust to the turbulence of the market place; train a child for a job and he will be dependent upon government to retrain him when buggy whips are no longer in style,” (D’Aloia 1). Without education, the mind is closed to the changing of times. When education plays a role in someone’s life, they can be the person to change the times. “The purpose of education is the preservation and enhancement of knowledge and the development of character within our given form of society which will best prepare the individual for the conditions of extreme novelty the near future is bringing,” (Jones 1). An uneducated person would not be very accepting towards the innovations yet to come. An educated person would adapt to the advancements and know how to work them into daily life. The purpose of education is to help student become critical thinkers, (Purpose of Public Education 1). Critical thinking helps people to understand the concepts of the changing world and why it is changing. In this way, the mind becomes more open to the changes through understanding. “That is why it is very important to find out while you are young what it is you really love to do; and this is the only way to create a new society,” (Krishnamurti 1). When a person is educated in the thing they love to do, they try to make improvements to that subject. These improvement involve reevaluating the subject. Once the subject is reevaluated, it can lead to changes in both that subject and society.

Education is also meant to examine and reevaluate the social norms of a society, so that we may adapt and change. “Representatives themselves require this most generalized knowledge during periods of rapid, indeed, revolutionary changes of unknown scope and duration,” (Jones 1). Education is meant to help people adapt to the changes of the world by immersing them in knowledge. It is this same education that leads people to make revolutionary changes. A well trained, not well educated, work force performs well in a technical work climate and is not a citizen who can think, question, and understand what makes society function and why he has the freedom he has, (D’Aloia 1). An educated person will think, question, and understand what makes society function and why he has the freedom he has. This occasionally leads to hidden fragment of truth hidden from the uneducated mind. These truths can lead to the reevaluation of society. “When you begin to see that which is false, then there is the beginning of awareness and intelligence,” (Krishnamurti 1). The awareness and intelligence that is gained through seeing the falsehoods of society can be used toward setting those fabrications correct. However, many traditionalists do not find change appealing. Therefore, they view thinking as to their way of life.

Upholders of custom view thinking as a threat because when people think they find problems in certain traditions. These problems often lead to revolutionary changes of customs, that do not appeal to traditionalists. “But when they talk about you as a new generation, they really do not mean it because they make sure that you conform to the older pattern of society,” (Krishnamurti 1). Upholders of tradition find new thinking to be a threat to their customary pattern. New thinking instills fear in them that their beloved traditions will go through unwanted changes. “Such a mind cannot think straight, cannot reason logically, sanely, or healthily, because it is rooted in fear,” (Krishnamurti 1). These traditionalists are so afraid of change that they cannot see the good it could do. They only view changes to tradition as radical and wrong. “Universal education is the most corroding and disintegrating poison that liberalism has ever invented for its own destruction,” (Adolph Hitler1). People fear that by educating people they will think that certain traditions must be destroyed. They fear that all they know as universal truths will turn out to be a dream. However, without education and without radical thought, the world would still be a primitive place.

“The whole purpose of education is to turn mirrors into windows,” (Sydney J. Harris). Education is meant to open our minds to be accepting toward new ideas. It is meant to make people examine and reevaluate the world’s universal truths. Yet, this way of thinking toward the new and the unknown frightens people into thinking their ideas will be unraveled. All in all, education is meant to open our minds to the world around us.

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1 This quote was found on one of the pages of The New York Public Library Student Planner 2005-2006.