Help with discussing a statement for my education?

Today, schools have become the most dominant and pervasive institutional format for learning. Throughout the world, schools have come to form part of our common sense, the normal way of “growing up modern" and learning."

So my question now is: Do you agree with the statement that it's common sense that attending school is the way we grow up and learn (in all the learning sense that you can think of)?

Okay, I'm about to say something really controversial.... especially because I do plan on finishing my testing and workshops to work as a sub and a licensed teacher down the line (hopefully). I agree with the first part of the statement that schools are the most dominant and pervasive institutional format for learning. Everything works under a schooling format. Now this is where I am going to disagree. I don't think the second part of the statement.

Schooling is not common sense to parents. Parents will and can keep their kids out for days and very little explanation to it. If it was common sense, then kids would always be in attendance unless there was a death in the family or they were ill ( or the weather was bad enough that they should have closed schools but didn't. The reverse is also true for some states).

It also isn't the only way we can learn. I learned and relearned more about writing and history and honestly just historical figures through the internet. School does provide the tools we need to grow up and learn how to complete these tasks, however, it is not the only way to learn in our day and age. Kids now have more access to media and different learning formats. Kids can learn things off of YouTube videos. Parents are learning from their kids who figure these things out.

That being said, should it actually be part of our common sense for growing up modern and learning? Yes. Is it the only way we can learn? No.

Also, yes, I agree with all the other statements so far.
 
"Today, schools have become the most dominant and pervasive institutional format for learning. Throughout the world, schools have come to form part of our common sense, the normal way of “growing up modern" and learning."

This is difficult for me to take one side or the other. In general, I don't believe that schools have become the most dominant and pervasive formats for learning. Online courses have taught a lot more (from my experience) by way of forming our common sense than schools ever have. People are finding ease being able to learn online and home school as well, instead of the traditional way.

On the other hand, I believe that society (I'm in the United States) has perceived us going to school and getting a degree to get a job has been considered the "normal" way of growing up modern and learning. Jobs still ask for degrees in business, information technology, etc.

The thing is, from my experience, it seems that a lot of people these days are more drawn towards certificates and courses online than spending thousands of dollars on education for a degree that may or may not be generally considered "useless", with the exception of degrees for the "big" jobs like doctors, lawyers, and nurses. Real life experience and online courses is where I've seen people go, what I've heard people like.

It's a complex dichotomy and I can see both sides of the story, hence why it feels difficult for me to take one side.
 
Simple answer is yes. School is the most obvious way for learning. With that it also becomes part of the common sense, because it is the first option that comes in thought when someone decides they want to learn something new, but also often the path you’re forced down into by the market.

However, just because it is the most obvious doesn’t make it the only option, or THE common sense, because what is common sense really other than that it is apparently what the majority will answer, or the safer option. There are a lot of other factors that play into growing up and learning new things. Facets that educational institutions often don’t touch, or fail to provide (now), or that need to be taught outside of the environment of the school benches.

That being said, I see a lot going in on the traditional school, and a few mentions of online classes and homeschooling. I think that with the way we are developing now as a digital consumers market that the definition of ‘school’ is changing from an actual building, to the sense of passing down knowledge and encouraging research within a discipline. In that sense I believe that ‘school’ will actually refer to the discipline itself rather than creating the image of a building or institution and thus become more fluid in definition. Of course we will still need central locations where the facilities needed for research is provided, but I definitely believe that the definition of ‘school’ is changing and reforming itself to adapt to our current and future advances and adjust to our demands and needs.

With that I also believe that ‘school’ will stay around as the most obvious option to learn and grow up, as well as that it will stay part of ‘common sense’ in the future. However it will most likely have changed again in its format or styling like it has always been changing and shifting itself throughout the years and generations, however gradual said changes may be.
 
"Today, schools have become the most dominant and pervasive institutional format for learning. Throughout the world, schools have come to form part of our common sense, the normal way of “growing up modern" and learning."

So my question now is: Do you agree with the statement that it's common sense that attending school is the way we grow up and learn (in all the learning sense that you can think of)?

In our modern society, yes, absolutely. O: It used to be that people got their education directly from parents because of doing family jobs or apprenticeships, where you learn all the practical skills you'll be using for the rest of your life. Cause if your parents were farmers, you were pretty likely to also be a farmer. Now there are so many different types of jobs and you're not trapped in whatever the family career is. So you absolutely need school to learn all the necessary skills for future jobs and social skills that'll help navigate social situations.
 
Hello all.

Thank you so much for participating. I'm sorry for my absence, an exam paper came up and then got sick. But I'm here now.

I am glad to see you taking your time to put thoughts into your explanations. My idea with this was, that I wanted to see whether or not that statement as actually true. In my line of work, we would not agree with this. I work as a pedagog (European/danish education), where we do not see the school system as being the common way of growing up modern and learning. While it is of course an important institution for our children, it is nonetheless not the institution where all learning takes place. We learn through our continuity of interactions other individuals. We learn morals, behaviour and emotions, all of which is important to function as a human being. These things also takes place during the school years and in the school setting as well of course, but it also takes place outside of the school.

Being educated, is therefore, in my head, not only associated with school, but again, with interaction with other individuals, as well as watching movies, documentaries, listening to music, watching comedy, experiencing coaching, fencing, basketball, skydiving and what else you can think of. I believe we have gotten a broader idea of what learning contains and how it is achieved, than what we had before, in the traditional sense, of the school taking care of it all.

I'm not saying I'm right of course, as this is an abstract term, and it very much depends on how you want to read into this (which is the whole challenge with studying anthropology, so much abstraction it explodes my mind sometimes), but it is nonetheless interesting to discuss our understanding of the school system and education, and whether or not those are still our most important setting for learning, to which I would say I'm not quite sure of anymore.

So thank you again all of you, and please, do let the debate continue if you want, or let me hear your thoughts on what I've said, if you are interested, I know I am. :)

@Diana @Astaroth @Aero Blue @Moon Rocks @fatalrendezvous @PoetLore @LuckycoolHawk9 @Nemopedia @Kat @Applo
 
I didn’t look at this, write up half an answer and then get distracted by life and forget about it, not at all. Sorry. For what it is worth here are my thoughts.

The first sentence is easy enough to agree with. For clarity I would say that I read schools to mean an educational establishment for children between the ages of 5-16/18 years old that provides primary or secondary education. Personally I’d prefer to see some sort of source after such a statement, but, from my own lived experience and knowledge I can agree with it.

As for sentence two, my interpretation of what the author is trying to say is; going to school has come to be seen as part of the standard path that a child will take through life and where they will receive the bulk of their formal education. Again that is something I would on the whole agree with.

The main thing that has been going through my mind as I’ve looked and thought about this statement is how did it get published/who published it and was the editor napping. It is at best sloppily worded. As you touched on and as we see in this thread, this statement is really very open to interpretation and hence what the author is actually trying to say isn’t obvious.

I am willing to concede that as an isolated statement it suffers from a lack of context that may well make it quite clear what the author means. Even then though, I have to question the use of phrases like common sense.

I know this makes me sound a little high on my own supply about my writing ability when Iwaku provides plenty of evidence that there's nothing to write home about in that regards; it is just this is the kind of language that I would put large amounts of red biro around back when I marked undergrad essays and encourage the student not to do it again.