Len's News, Notes, and Stuff

How you did in school is not a measure of intelligence

According to our education system, I’m smarter than a lot of other people.  I know it isn’t true, but I’m not going to turn down awards, scholarships, and ego boosts by giving an acceptance speech by saying it’s all bunk.  But it is.

Our education system, as it is currently constructed, is a game.  If you know how to play the game, you get better marks, which gives you rewards.  The assumption is that if you have better marks, you are:

• more intelligent
• more capable
• more worthy

It’s not true at all.  Marks are but one possible measure of what a person knows and what they can do.  My brain works the way that seems to match what the school system – from primary school through to university – is looking for.  But I will admit to you that there are a lot of areas where I’m dumb as a pile of rocks.  And I know there are people who are smart and excel in the very areas where I’m useless.

Intelligence is not about how well you can do mathematics, analyze scientific problems, and compose elegant papers.  Yes, those skills are important if you are going into finance, medicine, academics, engineering, or scientific research.  But is that all the world is about?  Is that all that is worthwhile?

I don’t believe it is.  There is a lot more to the world than science, medicine, academics, and finance.

But aren’t these the only ways a person can make a ton of money and be considered “successful” by society’s most prevalent standard?  Not necessarily.

I’ll have more to say on this topic in the future, but let me share with you an interesting, entertaining, and thought-provoking speech:

I’m a smart person.  But so are many of the folks who didn’t excel in school.  It’s a shame that our education system and our society would ever let kids and people who didn’t excel in school think otherwise.