Every forgotten book, unknown quote, and student who refuses to care about their classes is yet another ash of Alexandria. The Library of Alexandria is famous for its tragic burning; however, the much sadder true story is often left untold. The library was mostly salvaged after the burning. The real reason the library went to nothing was because no one cared. The well-known tragedy was the fault of man rather than flames. Many people say if they could go back in time they would prevent the burning, but that would be impossible. Everyone who stops caring is another ash. This begs the question, ”How do we prevent further ashes?” There is only one solution to the ashes. One has to care. The way to Make people care is through reforms in education.
Many people would argue that reforming the school system would do nothing to help anyone. They say reforms are unhelpful and a waste of money. The common argument against reform is that the kids are too young to understand why school is important. Children tend to have lower attention spans and wouldn’t be able to understand more complex material or changes in their education. Their lack of understanding would come from the fact that they simply aren’t fully developed. They would have trouble understanding the importance of literature and mathematics because they barely understand the importance of food at their age. How is one supposed to believe the curtains are more than blue when they recently developed object permanence? The entire idea that children don’t understand anything, however, is because of thinking similar to what was aforementioned.
Children are in their developmental period. They are growing and learning the things they will continue to believe for a large portion of their lives. A child who does not attend a school that makes them care will continue to have an apathetic attitude about school. The developmental period is a vulnerable time in which many young people experience changes. This vulnerable time needs to be spent nurturing a child’s interest in important things. A child should be learning the values of education while they are in school. Learning the importance of education at a young age will instill a sense of deep care for learning and academics as a whole. A world in which no one cares about growth is one that will collapse. The biggest reform schools need to make is teaching kids to love education.
Because kids have low attention spans, as mentioned previously, Classrooms need to be more engaging for the students. Children are eager to learn when they are given the right resources. It isn’t hard to keep a child engaged as long as one can make the content interesting. The reading program Epic does an amazing job of keeping children engaged. Teachers have even commented on how their students want to take the material home. The engagement of students is a quick way to keep them excited about reading. It is a quick way to get them excited about growth. The excitement of learning is important because a student will not want to do something they are not interested in. A shift to more interesting curriculums would help cultivate young minds.
Many people claim that education reforms simply don’t work. They say reforms have done more harm than good and are to be resisted. Many schools have done reforms over the years. Many reforms were not successful. In Scotland, a reform severely damaged a school. The curriculum change ruined the school’s academic standing. Changes can easily ruin a school. An unwelcome change will always cause problems. The changes many schools have been facing have simply been a waste of time and money. These changes, however, aren’t the big problem.
Any change that isn’t structured around the well-being and interest of students will benefit no one. A change structured for students, however, is incredibly beneficial. The problem with the previously mentioned changes is the lack of specifics. People have mentioned that their largest problem in school is the amount of earning they do about things not directly related to school. When nonspecific changes are made, they will always be the wrong choice. Schools need to make specific changes to make classrooms center around a student’s willingness to learn. Specific changes with students in mind will work significantly better than broad changes that don’t help with school in any way.
With younger students falling behind, it’s important to change the curriculum to focus on what they are struggling with. Finding a focus for the school changes will boost students tremendously. Public school enrollment has been on the decline since COVID. The younger students are the ones who aren’t enrolling as much. Parents have lost faith in the system and seen declines in their children’s proficiency. Their proficiency has been greatly affected by students having an apathetic and combative attitude after COVID. Students aren’t wanting to learn the way they did before, making jobs for teachers difficult. Putting a focus on where the students are falling behind as well as engagement and the importance of education would have an astounding effect on their results. Students would become proficient in what they were previously lacking and become less combative as a result.
The school system needs extreme changes and there is no better time to start. Schools will continue to struggle as long as students don’t care. Everyone has heard the phrases “The curtains are just blue” and “It isn’t that deep.” It’s time to consider that it is, in fact, that deep. It is time to look into why the curtains might be blue. It is time to think about what we want our future to look like. No one wants to become yet another ash of Alexandria.
