The Purpose of Education | TED Talk - Prof. Dr. Ying Zhang - Amsterdam

2017. Nov. 17th | Amsterdam, the Netherlands

https://youtu.be/3K1xTYpdE9E

Summary from Prof. Ying ZHANG's TED Talk

This summer, I had an opportunity, to discuss the topic of happiness and education, with a group of school principals from China. The idea was to identify from different groups in different countries, what matters in life, what matters in education, and the relationship between these two. I still remember one school principal told me something I will never forget ~~. “We have to find ways to help improve our students’ academic performance, even though we know, that such tough academic training system in China, will bring hardship and tremendous stress, to our students, parents, teachers, and schools. but we have no choice, because academic output, so far, seems to be one of the only objective measures to evaluate and promote our students.

This might sound extreme, to my educational fellows from this part of the world. But studies have already shown, that education in high-income countries has not sufficiently improved students’ basic academic skills, even though we have more resources available. In addition, as the quantity and quality of parenting decreases, the quality of education at home and at schools also decreases.

From the primary education to the higher education, across the world, there are different challenges: in the low-income countries, it is challenged by school enrollment, middle income countries are challenged by equal access to education, in high-income countries it is more for to equal access to qualified education. Back in the day, education was meant to bring knowledge and skills. Today, it has become a symbol of social-economic status, and is now one of the most important entry tickets to the job market. The Reality-is: there are too many people educated in the same way; but there are not enough jobs, especially not enough highly-paid-jobs for highly educated kids. As a consequence, you see more and more people becoming impatient, unhappy, and aggressive; which creates more economic, social, and environmental strains.

What are the sources of these problems? One argument we often heard was inequality. Usually, we view inequality or equality from economics perspective. Over centuries, we humans have developed a fantastic economic-framework to create wealth and capitalism. We tend to value those things measured by economic returns but not-able to value those things beyond economics. For example: We have been talking about gender-equality for a long time, and claim that women should have equal access to job market and equal pay to men. But we lack the capability to measure the value of those "jobs" that only women can do, for example giving-birth, breastfeeding babies, and most of time the housework. If we calculate the economic return for such work by considering the fact that women have been taking care of for the next generation, women should be objectively paid much higher than those men who work as bankers, lawyers, and doctors.

We were educated in our childhood to love, to trust, and to share. But throughout education, we learned to compete, to fight, and to care about ourselves first. We have been changing our environment from an eco-system to an ego-system. We spent years of education to learn about the outer world via physics, biology, geography, economics, and so on. We developed institutions to replace peer-to-peer trust. We develop management skills to rule over resources and others. All we learned looks objective, but all point at others, rather than at one self. In the end, we know so much about others’ problems (including other countries), but find it difficult to look at ourselves and deal with our own problems.

What’s wrong with this picture? and how to resolve it? My argument is the problem comes from education, and the solution can only come from education.

To figure out how early our kids have developed an idea about the purpose of education, I conducted a series of interviews with kids from 6yrs old who just entered into elementary school to 11 years old who were in the transition to the secondary school. It is very interesting to see, that the mindset-switches around 11 years old. By that time, they have developed a clear and direct link, from their current education to their future education, to the degree/diploma, and to jobs-and- money. That is consistent with what we see from the university students across different levels. There is one 11-year-old boy from an international school, in a high-income country, telling me this, in a very serious way, that if you don't have a university diploma, you will have a big problem, bc you will not have a job, meaning that you might become homeless.

WOW! Seriously?!!!! Where does this idea come from? If we think about it harder, we can see that it-is actually from us. We have discriminations for different professionals, implicitly or explicitly. We have different rankings for universities, locally and globally. We have clear cut-lines between elite schools and non-elite schools. Here are what kids told me how-it-is: better ranked means better quality, better quality means better degree, and better degree means better jobs, and better jobs means more money. Money will bring more happiness bc with money people can buy houses, cars, iphones, and other things…..

WOW! Sounds like they really have figured it out… I continued to ask: suppose you will have all the money in the world to spend, and you don't need to find a job for money, what do you do then? “I will study at home with my parents, I will start projects with my friends, I will create jobs rather than find a job. OK!~~~ So what would you do to make yourself happy when you grow up? “I will find a partner I love and who loves me. I will call my friends to meet frequently to discuss ideas; I will give something back to my parents. Okay!~~~ why? I asked. “bc I am with people I love. Because I am giving back to people I love. Because I can do something I like and I don’t have pressure to make money”~~~~ You see? the logic of kids ? They have two tracks of reasoning in their head: one track is counting economic values, as taught by us, to be competitive, ego-individualism, that nurtures inequality. The other track is their own heart–based logic: counting social values, collaborative, and eco-oriented, that nurtures equality.

In the transition from inequality to equality, education plays the most important role. Education not only means formal school education, but also a larger context of the education from family and the society. To offer equal comprehensive education that includes knowledge and wisdom for the outer and the inner worlds, we need to be self-conscious that education is meant to bring knowledge and wisdom to people’s mind and heart, and help people to identify and develop their uniqueness by respecting diversification and inclusiveness. That is the core of equality. Knowledge and skills towards the outer world are important; however, the inner world is what counts for the quality of our life, our happiness, and the purpose of our education.