Current State of Education: College Pressures Essay

Education as a means of achieving self-determination and professional growth introduces a number of challenging perspectives. On the one hand, education should motivate and encourage students to learn what they are most interested in. On the other hand, the job market faces rigorous competition, which makes future professionals put aside from their personal goals and follow the competition. Within this context, grade system can clearly estimate people’s potential and ability to enter the job competition and achieve professional goals.

However, in the search of professional recognition, people often ignore such important aspects as individuality and aspiration to learn subjects that do not have “practical” value, which is specifically predetermined by economic pressure. Using education as a means for getting a prestigious job can detach students from self-cognition and understanding of their individual aptness for a specific subject, should it be math of art. Following individual goals, but not the ones claimed by education and market, can also provide promising paths to professional promotion.

Zinsser places an emphasis on the idea that students should release their thoughts from ideas about their future perspectives. I agree with the author’s idea that a learning process should not be associated with the necessity to conform to the established grading standards. On the contrary, it should provide students with a possibility to try their skills and abilities and understand what they are capable of. This process of trials and errors is essential and, therefore, students should not be afraid of failing an exam.

Although the education system requires them to correspond to the established standards, it should not serve the bottom line for assessing students’ professional skills and gifts. In this respect, Zinsser writes, “…the road ahead is a long one and that it will have more unexpected turns than they think” (n. p.). Learning should, first of all, imply an experience itself, should it be negative or positive. I believe that the main problem of the educational system lies in lack of possibilities that students can use to cope with the failure during examination. In fact, if students do not pass, it does not mean they lost. The very existence of this possibility poses a pressure on individuals and, therefore many of them start thinking that no more opportunities could be given for ‘recovery’.

Apart from educational pressures, as well as existing learning and teaching standards, there are many other external factors that have a potent impact on students. Indeed, economic and financial constrains pose a great threat to the effectiveness of the educational system. In fact, Zinsser stresses, “Today, looking very good is no longer enough, especially for students who hope to go on to law school or medical school” (n. p.). My personal vision of the education corresponds to Zinsser’s criticism of a learning process as the key to receiving a prestigious job. Students mistakenly believe that ‘excellent’ is the only positive mark that give access to prestigious jobs and positions. Therefore, much concern should be connected with student’s stereotypic thinking, as well as college pressure. Indeed, economic environment and existing norms of assessment prevent talented student to enter a profession.

Students receiving a good mark, therefore, can hardly be considered by admission officers, with no reference to individuality. To highlight the issue, the author notes, “How one appears on paper is more important than how one appears in person” (Zinsser n. p.). Some students are forced to study only for the purpose of getting a prestigious job, which implies that such subjects a philosophy or art do not have good perspectives in terms high salaries and promotion. Therefore, some students ignore humanities, even though they are particularly apt for these disciplines. All these aspects are encompassed in a range of economic pressures imposed on students. Personally, I do my best in receiving high grades to get an access to the commerce school. However, the grades are not that important in case they do not point out your aspiration to enter the profession.

Apart from economic and financial problems, Zinsser focuses on constrains created in a family environment. I agree that parental expectations are also among the obstacles that prevent students from choosing the major they wish. My personal experience proves that high grades do not always point out the way people think or work. They only demonstrate single results received for a specific test, but not the way they conclude or think over specific ideas. Parents who are concerned more with their children’s grades think only over wider opportunities these grades can open for their children in the job market. Such an assumption is logical, but I think that students should also be concerned with the job competition, which pays little attention to students’ interest and preference. Therefore, a balance should be struck between job requirements and personal opportunities. In my opinion, humanities can allow individuals to become more creative in developing ideas both in business and in such fields as law, medicine, and science.

Apart from economic and parental pressure, Zinsser describes the possibilities of personal accomplishment. The point is that students attend libraries day and night with not a minute spent on communicating friends. My personal observations also highlight the professor’s reluctance to understand what approaches they should choose to reveal students’ potential. In this respect, Zinsser criticism of professor’s teaching strategies is justified and professors should more attention to student’s level of comprehension, but not to grades they receive.

To succeed in communicating with students, professors should encourage the possibility of learning such humanitarian disciplines as art, philosophy, and music that can contribute greatly to the development of students’ decision-making and critical thinking skills. Being overwhelmed with administrative work and research studies, they do not actually understand how students should learn the material. In this respect, Zinsser advises, “[students] must be jolted into believing in themselves as unique men and women who have the power to shape their own future” (n. p.). They should depend on a subjective evaluation of one person.

With regard to the above-presented arguments, the article under analysis provides an extensive overview of the problem related to education, as well as to financial, economic, and social pressures imposed on students. In fact, Zinsser manages to render the situation, as well as recommends analyzing the educational system from a learner-centered perspective. In particular, the focus should be made on the assessment of students’ qualities and skills with regard to the learning process itself, but not with regard to the results of performance assessment and grading system. In addition, financial factors should also be reconsidered for students to understand the actual value and purpose of education.

Works Cited

Zinsser, William. College Pressures. The Norton Reader. 1978. Web.