Does One Need School to Be Educated? Essay Example

With the world embarking into ambitious developmental goals and now that as per SDG 4, the world aspires to; Ensure inclusively and Quality Education for all and Promote Lifelong Learning (United Nations n.p), the actual definition of education has drawn interest in the recent past. The interest is what is education? And does one need school in order to be educated?

While unraveling the marvel behind the definition and necessity of school as far as education is concerned, this paper notes that education comes close to being Literate although they are two different things. While education means getting general knowledge and developing the power to reason and draw critical judgments basic for mature life (Education, n.p), the United Nations in its Universal Declaration of Human rights in 1948 categorizes education as a fundamental Human right. In the same, The U.N entails literacy as part of education where learning is described as the possession of knowledge important for the social, political and economic well-being of an individual (United Nations n.p). So these definition contravenes the popular belief that one must have had gone through a formal education system and can read and write. The United Nations considers it that even learning taught through an apprenticeship of basic life and survival skills is education. Therefore, being schooled and educated are two stark things. A person who has been schooled who only possesses theoretical concepts and lacks basic survival skills are not educated by virtue (Lutrell, 34).

To be successful and be educated, therefore, one only needs to be educated from the school of life and not a formal class. There are a number of worlds big profiles who have made it without classroom knowledge and perhaps, anybody can make their life better and the lives of those around them without schooling. The world of Information technology, business, entrepreneurship and innovation, a sector that would not be for any joe doe in the street proves that one does not need school to be educated; Worlds Microsoft founder William Bill gates and Apple Founder, Steve Jobs dropped out of school and they have touched lives and transformed the world without being schooled. Bill gates dropped of Harvard while Jobs dropped out of Reeds College. Facebook Founder Mark Zuckerberg adds to the list of those who made it without school ( Luttrell, 34). No one can deny that these men are educated, In Fact, a novice will think that they are the most educated men and conjecture that they went to the best schools on the planet, yet, they were only schooled at the school of life.

Going further, School brainwashes its leavers with the aspirations of white collar jobs that they will never get. It makes children think that the only thing necessary to succeed in life are good grades, official jobs and urban settling yet, the reality is different. In todays corporate world, employers will not employ top class performers but quality based on performance. It will not demand school that one will be educated to perform excellently in the professional world. It thus will be a waste of time and resources schooling children when school education will not add value to them (Luttrell, 34).

Therefore, to be educated, one only needs to be learned and thus can maintain a high level of personal and societal well-being and awareness in the three domains of life; economically, politically and socially.

Works Cited

"Education." Merriam-Webster.com. Merriam-Webster, n.d. Web. 30 Oct. 2017. N.p.

Luttrell, Wendy. School-smart and mother-wise: Working-class women's identity and schooling. Routledge, (2016): 34.

United Nations, Sustainable Development Goals, Goal 4: Ensure inclusive and quality education for all and promote lifelong learning (2017 n.p). Retrieved from http://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/education/ as at, 30th Oct 0950 hrs. GMT+