Poll: 80% of what you learn in school is useless?

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Everything you learn in school is useful. It just depends on how you use it.

 

[Ruffythepirate]

Unless you want to choose your profession when you begin school around the age of 6 it has to be that way.

 

[teqrevisited]

True a lot of subjects are just ways to waste your time but if you did decide to carry on to college / university then the things you learn in secondary education provide a foundation that covers a wide range of choices.

If you're sure of what you want to do later on then you can probably ignore a reasonable amount of the rest as long as you will end up with enough relevant qualifications to be accepted into whatever it is you want to do.

 

[Unesh52]

I don't think any of it's useless. I mean yeah, people aren't going to come up to you on the street asking about how you find the integral of a trigonometric function (maybe, if you're at a college or something), but you can still apply your knowledge to the real world. Actually, finding layman applications for higher calculus probably would more effort than it's worth, but especially history, english, science, as well as foreign languages, philosophy, and obviously all those "practical" classes like computer apps can help you in life if you just look around for a minute. For e.g....

If you're watching the news and some bearded geezer on CNN is talking about the economy, wouldn't it be nice to have sufficient economic and mathematical knowledge to tell if what he's talking about is even plausible? Or when they start talking about social reforms, wouldn't it be nice to understand the history behind the society you're reforming, so that you know who has what stake in everything. Wouldn't it be nice to understand foreign culture and politics (not to mention the domestic side) instead of having to "go with your gut?" And when they bring on some "analyst" to talk about the latest theory, wouldn't it be nice to actually know the difference between a "theory" in science and a "theory" in common vernacular? Or what the proper scientific method is?

School isn't about giving you practical knowledge you will need on a daily basis, it's here so you can understand the world around you; so you can be a good citizen. It's on you to apply the knowledge though, and it won't always be like it was in the controlled classroom. Keep your head up and pay the fuck attention!

 

[Snor]

well.... no?

depending what you want to do in life? maths for me is completely useless but I am still glad that I had it for the rare occasions that I need it.

 

[shadyh8er]

Everything that I really needed to know, I learned in Kindergarten. (Sorry, couldn't resist!)

OT: No class is useless. It's always good to have a vast understanding of different topics.

 

[brunothepig]

No. For some, school isn't as helpful as for others. I'd hear people whinging about learning some of the maths in my class (when they chose the advanced class anyway) about how they'd never use it. Well, there was people in that class who wanted to be engineers and stuff like that. Suddenly, it becomes very important.
To say it's "useless" is just a stupid generalisation.

 

[Wicky_42]

What I learning in ELEMENTARY/MIDDLE school was useful.

What I learned in High School...useless.

Basically the content of what you learn is damn near useless, but the logic patterns and thinking methods taught are what become relevant in later life.

Yeah, pretty much the combo of these. Learning how to think is probably the most useful outcome of education - facts come and go, but education shapes your brain ^_^

 

[sb666]

i say 60%

 

[lomylithruldor]

A lot of it, yeah. Especially science, every step in education you find out that pretty much everything you learnt before was wrong, or at least massively over-simplified. I always found that the best teachers would tell you that, and either point out where to go for the more indepth stuff, or even teach a bit of it themselves.

So, you think that trying to teach what a potential well is to someone who doesn't even know what an atom, an electron, a proton and a neutron is a good idea? Don't you think that following the tread of the evolution of atomic theory is a better way of explaining it to a 15 years old? If you want the student to learn, he has to follow how the train of thought, not just the end result because he won't understand it, even if he knows it.

 

[craddoke]

It completely depends on what you consider useful.

I believe the purpose of life is to learn (after all, the only thing you ever really possess/own is the knowledge in your head; everything else is just on loan). Therefore, all education is useful by definition according to my world-view.

 

[Bocaj2000]

Why do people insist that the public school system is broken? I see no problem with it.

 

[ZelosRaine]

I would say no, but it depends on how you learn it.

Of course most people will never need to exactly know Shakespeare's plays later in their lives. But on the one hand, it serves to give you part of the cultural shared heritage of the western hemisphere, on the other hand, it's a handy tool to learn reading comprehension and text analysis, and those are skills everyone, I repeat, everyone, needs.

Yes, unless someone asks you that in a quiz, you don't need to know from when to when Hitler was in power. But just look how the second world war still influences world politics indirectly, and how big a thing it still is in the public conciousness over here in Europe. Every time a politician here in Switzerland mentions the army, someone else will use WWII as an argument. It gives you an understanding of the world today.

The same goes for pretty much every other subject. You don't need the specific knowledge, you need the general skills.

Edit: also what Odin above me said.

This is one of the best responses because it starts to look at school as more than just "job prep." School, in a word, is a socializing institution that manufactures "citizens." This is a pessimistic outlook. On the positive side, we, as students, can undermine the institution by questioning what we have learned. While not all teachers actually want their students to USE what they learn (as in how they live there lives), many do. So, when your teacher asks you to analyze a text, a math problem, a chem. equation, remember that the right answer is only half of it. It's the process that is really important.

 

[Bocaj2000]

Well the concepts taught in English are still valid but I doubt I'll ever get into another conversation about Of Mice and Men, Maths beyond basic arithmetic seems to be unneeded until I move up the job ladder, Biology and Chemistry never made it outside the Scientific/Medical fields, Physics is similar but swap Medical for Engineering, etc etc.

Basically the content of what you learn is damn near useless, but the logic patterns and thinking methods taught are what become relevant in later life.

It's not useless. English teaches creativity; math teaches logic; science teaches how the world works; history teaches where you've been and where you're going.

Even if you have a "bad" teacher, these will be accomplished.

 

[EatPieYes]

It's up to each and everyone to decide what's necessary for themselves. For me, and what I aspire to be, it's almost completely worthless to me. Atleast at this point in my life.

But if you want to be 'just another sucker on the vine' (get the reference?), then go ahead learn everything you're told in school and don't, for one second, think for yourself what you really want, or need, to know. Just do as you're told. "The powers that be" are gonna love ya.

 

[Dastardly]

Accurate: You don't make use of a great many pieces of the information you learned in school.

Inaccuracies with the OP's claim:

1) "Information" doesn't account for 80% of what you learn in school. Skills, problem-solving strategies, study techniques, work ethic... these things are far from useful. And you probably learned a few of them in your math class, even if you're not using advanced math at your current job.

2) Just because you're not directly using it doesn't mean it is useless. A seatbelt is "useless" until you get into a crash, at which point it becomes incredibly useful. But also, some of the thought processes and logic you're using at your current job may have been developed during a class with unrelated subject matter.

3) People have a tendency to overemphasize the perceived "failings" of public schools, while underemphasizing the overall impact those schools had on them. Basically, it's the classic "self-serving bias"--take credit for all of the good things as though you just always had those skills, while blasting the school system for all the things you feel were mistakes.

Well, what is your opinion on this claim? Please motivate and tell how we can change if you think it is!

 

[Amethyst Wind]

Well the concepts taught in English are still valid but I doubt I'll ever get into another conversation about Of Mice and Men, Maths beyond basic arithmetic seems to be unneeded until I move up the job ladder, Biology and Chemistry never made it outside the Scientific/Medical fields, Physics is similar but swap Medical for Engineering, etc etc.

Basically the content of what you learn is damn near useless, but the logic patterns and thinking methods taught are what become relevant in later life.

It's not useless. English teaches creativity; math teaches logic; science teaches how the world works; history teaches where you've been and where you're going.

Even if you have a "bad" teacher, these will be accomplished.

You know that's what I said right? The content (the individual facts) doesn't need to be remembered, the conceptual side of it is what is important.