DIDASKALEINOPHOBIA (The Fear Of Going To School)

What exactly is school?

For long I have wondered why I have to sit behind a desk for 4 years, preparing myself so I could be qualified to sit behind another desk for the most part of my life. I have to say this as much stubborn and irresponsible as it may sound cos after all that’s what we are called when we revolt against our tutor’s static and aged techniques of teaching.

I wonder why my department still has on her payroll, a teacher who was a student in the 20th century; someone who has never been to any other institution of learning both formal or informal in the 21st century. So what do they expect him to teach me? Ideologies and techniques as old as antiques. Black and white television has migrated to coloured TVs, it’s no longer Nitel lines but smartphones, no longer VCR but micro-chips. A lot but tutors who have stuck to their adamic teaching ways have changed.

You get to class everyday to meet the same boring face with a long history of techniques that has no business with the now. A class where notes are dictated in practical courses as graphics and computer science; where they only paint a mental picture of a studio and not take you to the studio itself, but expect you to make a good TV presenter. A class where your tutor on Journalism and new media has no social media account, even when he has he doesn’t accept friend requests from students. An engineering class where your practical is to see how welding is done and your project is to build a ship or bilge pump.

In this 21st century where you’re asked to define communication, and when you define the term in the best way you understand it, you earn a ‘D’ because you didn’t define it according to Saldman et al. A definition that was made when Nigeria still had 12states, now there are 36 and lecturers still want to take students through that retrogressive path.

School is great, but ‘our system’ of education especially in Nigeria is one that should be debunked, hence the possible reason many hate school and wish to stop – although not necessarily out of the availability of a better option. But common how dare you stop school when you’ve got a parent that had a first class yet works for minimum wage and now expects the same first class grade from a son who no longer attends class, but has chosen to improve his talent and/or gifting. But wait a minute, I thought having a first class increases your chances at getting a job? Yeah, but that’s pretty much about it. It only increases your chances, it never really gets you any job.

Certificate without ability in this day and time is like a complimentary card for a man who has no company. The card can say you are a CEO but in reality you are still a job seeker. What’s the use?

Our lecturers suddenly become analyst, headlining their cynical speeches with words like ” IN OUR DAYS” or “WHEN I WAS IN…” because they see students with smart phones instead of big heavy K.A Stroud textbooks that were bought only out of necessity and most likely would never be read. They call you lazy and irresponsible, but forget Linda Ikeji who’s creative laziness and irresponsibility got her a mansion in Banana island. Oh I forgot, please remind me again how many professors have flats on that island? Creative Laziness pays these days. Or William Gates who failed his courses in school and his friend passed all. Now he’s friend works in Microsoft while he owns Microsoft. Sometimes I just wonder; if you did something in your days and now expect the same thing to hold water in mine, what do I tell those after me, maybe “in the days of the days that my lecturer told me in his days”, right?

They tell you that if you don’t make up to 70% of class attendance you wouldn’t write exams, because they feel you know nothing unless they taught you. Well, because their classes are boring most times you already know what they are teaching, though not because you’re smart but because like the songs in your playlist, they keep repeating same lessons. They unnecessarily stress themselves to make the course look difficult by telling you it is hard to pass when you already know how to pass – R.M.W i.e Read, Memorize and Write. I wonder why they still encourage self development anyways. What happened to my studying on my own? You see that’s why exams are very defective and as such should not be a yardstick for the measure of intellectual prowess. You read and comfortably had a ‘C’, while I cheated and graciously had an ‘A’ and celebrated victory over a battle I never fought.

Our schools would have made more sense if they taught us how to make cars, and not the names of those that made cars. How to build banks and not just how to work in them. Gave us a stage to speak and not just how to do public speaking etc we spend more time in teaching history of an art or act than we spend teaching the art or act itself. So the average Masscom student knows how to report a news, but lacks interpersonal relationship skills. So much for communication.

Don’t blame students for not liking our system of schooling, rather blame the government and tutors for making school impossible for them to like. In the words Suli Breaks, “school cannot and would never define us”, yes we may be tired of it, but we choose to complete it. Having in mind that what keeps us outstanding are not the things we learnt in class, but things we learnt through self development.

Take advantage of every opportunity… Cos the eyes with sight are many but the eyes with vision truly are few.

Tired Of School