In a perfect world, the terms “failure” and “success” would not exist or, if they did, rather than antonyms, or exact opposites, they would be regarded as having a cause-and-effect relationship. Perhaps in our perfect world these two words would be regarded as steps in the same process; each coinciding within the other, a necessary process that without one, the other is not achieved. Success is not achieved without failure.
Do not view this as progressive propaganda, or a radical bias, for the idea is not equipped with any variety of bias. It is a simple boundless truth. The idea conveyed is not that neither should exist, but that the terms applied and the connotation implied should not. Rather than seeing the two as forks in the road, or two opposites, imagine that instead that failure is a basin, and success, the water. Creating a stream that carries what, when, and where it will. They are one within the other.
The marks received in one's educational career attempt to quickly summarize their ability in the classroom in one letter. An “F” is a failure. An “A”, a success, Far from the reality of what intelligence or aptitude actually is. If they cannot efficiently judge ones academic intelligence accurately, then we must reevaluate the system used to judge. Success is broader than a pie chart of 50% success and 50% failure. This process alone used by schools does not achieve nor dictate the actuality and intelligence of which our students actually have. It branches like a tree with many roots, a trunk, and branches which grow leaves. I will not say that lower scores are an accomplishment, but if you want to see how intelligent a student truly is, you must look deeper than their represented letter. You must dig to the roots.
Teachers are deviating from grading upon academic content, and understanding and more based upon regurgitation and memorization, to which is by no means learning.
There’s a reason kids can’t remember anything they learn a week after its “taught”, let alone years down the road. Learning should last a lifetime. Students are being taught to cram for tests and set aside the actual learning and critical thinking necessary for a life and future. Kids now believe that actually learning critical thinking and useful skills, will lead to failure, because it is shunned in schools. You can’t strive for critically thinking. You cannot question, because it’s not the teachers jobs to be questioned. Therefore you must give up your thought and inner thinker for memorization and preparation for a test that means nothing except makes you a statistic in a failing system. It has nothing to offer but failure. The education system has lost sight of where success lies. Creativity and the ability to critical think are discouraged. Teachers should open doors, not close them. They are no longer a success but a failure. But instead they leave their students feeling like a failure; to their college of choice, to their peers, their parents, and to themselves. When they are not the ones failing, the system is failing them.
And what are we if not diverse? We as humans must be. If a teacher is to give a lecture on world history, their students will be graded on such. The teacher should teach, the children should learn. If you wish to teach a course on how to organize your thoughts, memorize, or regurgitate, you may. But do not be surprised when you are greeted with an empty classroom (or minds). Mental diversity in education should be encouraged not repressed.
A perfect world can never be achieved, that is a work of fiction. But we can strive for it, at times. Perfection can be as simple as understanding that what is called, imperfection, and finding the beautiful in the things a system call ugly.
