mtoto wa jirani

I’m finally done with school…for real. I have absolutely no plans of pursuing any academic achievement beyond my pending Bachelors Degree. And while its very easy to write me off and stop reading this post at this point, I beg your indulgence as to the reason why I’ve made this decision.

Two words: Academic Inflation.

Citing Wikipedia:

Academic inflation is the process of inflation of the minimum job requirement, resulting in an excess of college-educated individuals with lower degrees (associate and bachelor’s degrees) competing for too few jobs that require these degrees and even higher, preferred qualifications (master’s or doctorate degrees). This condition causes an intensified race for higher qualification and education in a society where a bachelor’s degree today is no longer sufficient to gain employment in the same jobs that may have only required a two- or four-year degree in former years. Inflation has occurred in the minimum degree requirements for jobs, to the level of master’s degrees, Ph.D.’s, and post-doctoral, even where advanced degree knowledge is not absolutely necessary to perform the required job.

…and that’s just half the story.

Last night I was driving home with my mum and we chatted about my finishing school and future plans. As you probably expect we argued about my decision not to pursue a masters. While academic inflation was my primary reason, I also argued from the point that I’m not the kind of person who would go about looking for a job. I’ve always cherished the ideas and skill sets I have and always determined to make something out of them (and I might add at this point that a job doesn’t qualify).

Academia is honestly in my opinion biased towards getting people prepared to work in the “real world”. Its aims are to equip students with knowledge and skills that will enable them to tackle the challenges they will come across outside academic circles. To paraphrase it, it makes a lot more sense to have real world success as opposed to handing in homework!

I’ve got a problem with this.

Who says that academia is not a part of the “real world”? Are we fencing off students from the challenges they should ideally be tackling? My answer? YES!

We spend almost 20 years putting kinds in boarding schools and universities teaching them about ideals of the world and setting these ideals as the default standard when in reality, the “real world” is a complete opposite. Proof of this is the fact that most organizations have to train new recruits for almost a year before they can actually begin working tangibly.

Academia’s biggest problem is the fact that it doesn’t exist together with the real world!

I will go ahead and propose a solution: self-directed learning!

I recently cam across Uncollege.org which advocates self-directed learning based on three things; introspection, passionate action and self-motivation (words I rarely hear in academic circles). I believe this is true and I strongly advocate for this. We should focus our learning efforts in the real world rather than hiding behind “academic walled gardens”. This way our learning is practical and realistic with a direct impact on our world.