Don’t Let School Get in The Way of Your Education

Mark Twain once said: “Don't let your boy's schooling interfere with his education.”

Today I was debating one of my readers regarding the word education.

The reader seems to feel that schools are not as liberal as some sources might contend.

He also commented that most “educated” people lean left. Sort of a left-handed insult if your ideology conflicts with his.

But his comments did get me thinking.

What Is an Educated Person?

Is educated the right word we’re looking for? There are plenty of smart people in this world living and dead.

But the real meaning of education is hard to pin down.

Was Abraham Lincoln educated or smart? He’s the only president with a patent.

He taught himself trigonometry. But he sure failed a lot in his life before becoming president.

Was Thomas Edison educated? Never graduated high school or grade school.

He was homeschooled by his mother and gained most of his knowledge by reading on his own.

Fired from his first two jobs for non-production.

The few teachers he did have said he was "too stupid to learn anything."

Yet somehow, he changed the world. Smart or educated?

Bill Gates college dropout, Mark Zuckerberg college dropout, smart or educated?

Former President Barack Obama invited heads of universities and heads of corporations to the White House for a formal dinner and remarked, “This is the most intelligence assembled in one room in the White House since Thomas Jefferson dined alone.”

Educated or smart?

How About IQ?

Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking reportedly had an IQ of 160. An IQ above 135 would put you in the rarified air of less than 1 percent of the world population.

But an eight-year-old girl, Adhara Perez, diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome lives in the slums of Tlahuac, Mexico and has an IQ of 162.

Most of us have no clue where we rate on the IQ scale and maybe that’s a good thing. The actual score might be deflating.

Book Smart or Street Smart?

We’ve all heard this before. Two more hazy definitions.

Can you have one without the other? I guess you could say some teachers, not all, but some teach the same book over and over year after year.

When students leave that class are they educated, indoctrinated or do they just know when the War of 1812 occurred after nine months of study?

It’s hard to pin down a definition of “street smart.” I suppose that mean you know a lot of “Stuff.”

Would you say Edison was book smart or street smart? Hard to pin down, isn’t it?

I’m not really convinced it’s possible to accurately define “educated.” There are just too many variables in knowledge.

Stupid or Ignorant?

I have no idea how to put a rocket on the surface of the moon. Does that make me stupid or ignorant of how to put a rocket on the moon?

I’m not even sure there’s an accurate definition of “stupid.”

Einstein is quoted as saying, “The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.”

We know from personal experience that he’s right on stupidity but it sure seems like there are more geniuses than there used to be.

Some Final Thoughts

I doubt I’ve enlightened anyone with this article. But maybe I’ve given you something to ponder.

The next time you ascertain the intelligence of someone this article might pop back into your mind.

Are you really using education as a benchmark to define someone? That might be really stupid.

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