The prospect of conventional education has loomed in the distance for...well, basically ever since I left school at 15. A lot of people told me, not necessarily because they thought I was dumb (or at least, I hope not), but because they figured my lack of traditional education would be an impediment. I don't know about that.
A couple of months back, around summer's end, I started thinking about things I would like to do with my life. On top of writing. I would love to move more towards psychology as it has always been (and probably always will be) a huge interest and a big help in my own life. It's by far one of my favorite subjects and one of the few things I would consider proper schooling in. And while nothing has been decided yet, I did decide to (finally) take some kind of end-of-school exam. Just to have it there, in case I decide to enroll somewhere sometime in the future.
I quickly settled on the SAT as accessible, international, and frankly, way easier from a bureaucratic standpoint, to actually take, than the BAC (Romania's equivalent). Well. I just took it this morning. And while I won't get the results for some weeks yet, I wanted to get down a few thoughts while the experience is still fresh in my mind.
Had to borrow @graveyardpat's laptop since the program requires Windows. Fucked if I know what the guy behind me must've thought about this screensaver.:))
First off, what a humbling fucking experience.
By nature, I'm someone who moves very fast. In all senses of that. I demand (perhaps too) much of myself, and tend to get shit done faster than most people. I blaze through the day, doing as much as I possibly can, which isn't necessarily good. I get dizzy. Confuse myself sometimes. Exhaustion and burnout, almost always. Working on it, yes, but it is nevertheless how I am.
Enter mathematics. I never liked math. I had bad teachers, sure, but also, I don't understand its purpose (except very limited). I don't believe I will ever need to know the value of x squared. So I figure fuck this. I have very little patience for things I consider impractical to my experience, and while I'm sure many of the more mathematically minded here will argue otherwise, math has very rarely crossed paths with my world.
I'm (probably) not stupid. I simply don't care. I have exactly zero mathematical thinking. Which meant it took me a while to get through the work. Pissed me off something awful. I am not accustomed to going slow. I'm a fast writer. I'm a fast student. The Reading & Writing section of the SAT, both in practice/studying, and in the actual exam, I blazed through.
With math, though, I couldn't. I had to take it slow. To work my way gradually through the problems. I had to explain many of the questions to myself as though I were five. I needed to put everything on paper, to give me some chance of visualizing it.
I think I did well enough on the actual test. But man, what a humbling fucking experience that was. A kick in the shins, coming to terms with the idea that
You need to slow down, and take time to properly understand. This is hard for you. And it doesn't mean you're dumb. It just means you don't get to move through it at breakneck speed, the way you do most things.
A hard one to swallow, that.
Fun and all, but still, what's the point?
While it was an interesting enough experience, it was still a pretty laid-back two months of my life. I kept thinking last night of the kids who go through 12 years of working up to this, and for whom this constitutes one of the most important examinations in their lives. For me, it's an option among many. It's neither win, nor lose. But for many many kids who took the SAT today,it seems like a deciding moment.
It's probably not.
After all, the world as we know it is very likely to disappear in the next decade (if not way sooner). The jobs these kids will be training for will effectively cease to exist. Doesn't it sound like a wasted twelve years, then? Yes and no. Some of the things you learn in school will stay with you forever. Many of them, you'll forget. The kids who are naturally gifted, inventive, open, smart, will very probably find their place even in the next alignment.
The rest? The ones who are indoctrinated to believe that knowing where to stick a comma genuinely makes you smart? Seems a bit unfair to me to keep with a system that we, as parents and educators (and society, in general) have literally no guarantee will still be relevant in ten years.
Did I learn anything from the SAT? No? Is it because I'm old?
The security guard at the school this morning stopped me and went "and you, Madam?". "I'm here for the exam too," I grinned. She gave me an awkward look. All the more when I said I should know better at my age, but what can you do.
I don't think I learned anything of use in these two months. I learned the rules of some of the mathematicy shit they ask, sure. But I'll probably forget it in a week or two. After all, I've gotten this far without it suddenly becoming relevant, why should it now?
Inevitably, this came to my mind often during the past month:
Does knowing what the sine of X make me any smarter than if I didn't?
And most importantly, if not that, then what does constitute an intelligent person?
math is weird. to some point it is useful to everyone and after that it is useful to maybe 5% of specific people with specific jobs. my problem with it was that it was logical to that point so i never really had to work on it and after that point nothing made sense. so in college i ignored everything that was needed beyond 6 (passing grade).
but language is even weirder. @godfish could maybe confirm (Czechs probably complicated it even more), i and y sounds and reads exactly the same but you need to know when you write y instead of i, because that makes you smart.
True, don’t do math, do meth instead!
Also,,what’s that weird symbol you used? The %? Isn’t it mathy? We can still burn you for using math against us!
well if you want to use meth maybe take chemistry more serious than math :D
Right?! I've got no problem learning the bit that's useful to everyone. I try to do as much of my own calculations as I can, but a lot of the stuff they teach is entirely superfluous to someone like me.
I think we had similar experience with math. I never minded the easier stuff, then suddenly, it was a foreign language.
Too true! Currently trying to learn Czech myself, and come up on this problem all the time. Does it really even matter? And should it matter more than what's said?
i think Czech complicated it even more. why use Cz when you can just use Č :)
did you learn the difference between ch and h in pronunciation? :)
Oh my god, I hadn't even thought of that :))))why is this language so complicated?!
And no, Duolingo hasn't seen fit to teach it to me yet.
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The bit with the guard calling you “madam”… that’s just charming. And the screensaver on the borrowed laptop… sublime. Your brother’s won the lottery again here, haha…
I’ve had the same thoughts as you—maths, what for? I mean, I won’t deny that multiplying, adding and subtracting are necessary and useful, because if you ever lose your calculator, you’ll be in serious trouble. But the rest—what’s the point? Such nonsense, especially since I forgot it all anyway. Will I need to take an astral journey to recall those complex formulas? 😂
Intelligence… mmmm… I believe we’re all part of a vast intelligence, and each of us is a component, a drop of water in the ocean, so to speak. This intelligence reveals itself in many ways, one of which might be being open to new ways of understanding the world.
A person who practises mindfulness and realises that, in the end, their thoughts do not truly belong to them is an intelligent being.
Being a good person is also a form of intelligence… I don’t know, you ask a lot of questions. You’re very intelligent.
I mean, I try to not rely too heavily on my phone for every little sum or such, but do I really need to know the slope of a graph? What for? Doesn't seem to have much application in my life as a writer or as a yoga person. So that's that.
What a beautiful way to sum it up! I've never understood why so much of school tries to define intelligence in very rigid terms when there is so much fluidity and brilliance out there. There's people who can do things that I never could do, the way you do with pictures for instance. So much skill and talent and beauty, seems really sill to boil it down to a couple of formulas.
Back at you, lovely. :)
Well I believe you'll ace it...you just strike me like someone that gets results, so congratulations in advance.
I've always hated Math too BTW...
Thank you! And I'm glad to find fellow math skeptics ;)
I see you even got a laptops for dum-dums, with the PIN clearly marked on it :))
Also, as someone who moves very fast, you'll kinda enjoy next Saturday afternoon. I guess :)
Commas, commas ... I just wrote an article about Cosmas. What is your opinion on studying history?
I love history. I see the point of studying history way more than the more complicated math parts for sure :)