I believe that higher education plays a vital role in furthering today’s society, and ensuring that humans and the world continue to progress. Paulo Freire believed that schools themselves focused more on their own inner rankings that come around by test scores and empirical score cards, rather than the students actually preparing them for public issues after school. I agree that some schools can get wrapped up in the scorings of testing and grades, however they also focus on furthering their students’ understanding of subjects. Freire highly believed in the idea of critical teaching in order to give students the tools to think critically and to take charge of situations. This can in turn help students learn common sense and analyse the world and people around them in life in order to help promote social change. Critical teaching ensures that students are able to practice and study in an environment that supports their learning in ways to think for themselves, and thus find solutions to harder problems.
Higher education is a tool to help students specialize and further understand a subject of their own choosing, giving the freedom of choice. Students will usually either pick a subject that inspires them to think critically, or a subject that society has deemed to be of importance. One of the downsides of this, is that society has a specific idea of what type of specialized training and jobs students should be aiming for. If asked, most of society will say that students should go towards business, law, medical, or scientific majors and studies. This is because these fields are what make the most money, which is something that society is obsessed with. Students are always going to be conflicted between settling for one of these studies, or something that does not usually get recognized by society, as productive. Going to college though, is a way to increase job earnings, gain a network of classmates and alumni, as well as further understanding in certain subjects of learning. It is a way to ‘get ahead’ of the people looking for jobs with only their GED, due to hiring jobs looking for people with furthered knowledge in their field. While it is not impossible to find a high paying job without higher education, it is difficult to be chosen above someone with a bachelors or masters degree.
While Freire focuses on the importance of critical thinking and higher education, Dr. Johnetta Cole, the former president of Spelman College and Bennett College, states that students come to college in order to better understand the world and how it works. I believe that there is a good mix of both critical thinking and furthering understanding of the world that can be found in higher education. No matter what path a student takes in college, critical thinking is a must in order to better understand the subject being studied. Critical thinking is what has allowed technology and society to progress as much as it has. Higher education is what cements that critical thinking into students’ brains, ensuring that they can carry it on into their future jobs. As for furthering understanding of the world, it is different as per how each person looks at it. Studying math may not seem like it is furthering the understanding of the world, however it can help a person understand programming or physics laws that apply to everyday life. It is different from studying anthropology, where a student literally studies humans and how they interact with the world, however, both in their unique ways, help the learner to further their own understanding of what goes on around them.
I agree with Freire on the fact that students need to learn critical thinking and social change, however I also believe that understanding the world better naturally comes along and develops more with higher education. People who do not go to any sort of college can miss out on little details learned for understanding the world. It does not matter what field of study students major in, because it will all still help in educating them further in order to better society, as well as their own life. So long as students do not fall into the pressure of picking a ‘correct’ field, they will go on to enjoy their study, and use their new knowledge to better the world around them. While they may learn some aspects through society, they will not gain the deeper understanding that people with higher education achieve.
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