School: "an institution where instruction is given, especially to persons under college age."
Let's review the hierarchical structure of a typical, IB Diploma Highschool:
The Board of Directors
School Principal
High School Principal
Head of Departments
Teachers
School is where people like me go to receive education and to prepare for life. We pay money; we invest in the school for it to, in return, provide us with the best quality of education and the best environment possible under the circumstances. Almost 200 people, from the cleaning staff to the head of the math department to the "board", work so that we, the students, can get the best education possible. At least that's what it's supposed to be like in a world where IB diplomas grow on trees and you can understand HL Math.
On average, I spend approximately 8 hours sleeping and 1 hour on the road everyday. The amount of time for which I am fully awake and functioning is about 15 hours. And I spend more than half of this time in school. So it is only natural for my school to have become like a home to me, especially because I've been going to the same school since kindergarten with friends with whom I learned to write with. I expect my school to support me and each and every student, because the reason there is a huge stone building on top of a hill 15 km outside of town with hundreds of people inside it spending their time is to educate us. We, and by "we" I mean the students, should be the priority in any decision the "school", people listed above, make. The primary and most important goal of a school being to provide the students with the best conditions and education seems like a given, but believe me, it is overlooked most of the time.
This week (so far), I've had 3 quizzes and an oral commentary, one math test, and 5 lab reports and one essay due. I also go to Dersane, private teaching institutions preparing students for the final 2 exams which will get them enrolled into university, and its only Tuesday. Last night, I came home at 8 pm, after a 2 hr 40 min long exam at Dersane, and started writing these lab reports then. You must have understood that I don't get enough sleep. Or rest. Or relaxing time. Or freedom. None of us, seniors, get enough of these. So much is expected from us that we're trying very hard not to crumble under this stress. We burst out laughing when we hear the words "mock exams" and "IB" and "getting a 7 from HL Math", we slack off sometimes, uncomfortably watch an episode of How I Met Your Mother instead of doing the math homework, and then stay up until 2 in the morning to finish that same math homework.
You would expect that people around us seniors would try everything to make our lives easier.
They don't.
Instead, for the first time in my 14 years in school, I've been feeling that the school is doing everything in its power to make our lives harder. I wouldn't have thought things could get any harder, but, hey, I was mistaken.
Maybe the first time it wasn't intentional; the people on top of the educational food chain thought they were actually helping us. We went and spoke to these people, and they listened.
The second time is also somewhat understandable though not excusable. We went and spoke to other people, and they did not listen at first. Apparently, a board "commitment" was more important than people's parents attending their child's high school graduation. Only after we bantered them with our requests and got our parents involved did they decide to do something.
But when this happens for the third time, when the people who are supposed to be helping us try to tackle us for their own personal benefits, for what they have understood of the current national education system and their (rightful) hate towards it, and perhaps, just to show their stance and "prove", rather despairingly, to the rest of the schools in Ankara that they are different, I personally don't want to go and talk to them. I now know, unfortunately, that we don't matter. Their decisions do.
With every regime, there arises a problem called the "principal-agent" problem (funny how the wording fits the exact situation at hand). This is when the people elected to represent the people (agents) do not serve in the best interest of the people (the principals). It is somewhat inevitable, because human beings are selfish and crude- and I'm sorry Mr. Freud, but the super-ego does not always kick in. Sometimes though, there is one person high up in the chain who you can rely on; who you know you can trust. Unfortunately, that person, being a "predator", is also the "prey" for some people.
Who suffers from this problem is the principals. The people. The students. The agents get what they wanted all along. It is true that the people have great power; they can go against the system and the agents, and with enough will they, too, can get what they want. But when the "principals" are broken, when they have no hope that the agents can be changed, when all they really want to do is to get these horrible few months over with and never look back again, when the place they called "home" turns against them, well, then, there is nothing anyone can do. The agents may proceed with their merry lives. The seniors (oops, I meant "principals" (!)) can suffer on for the next months and wait for the principal-principal problem to claim its next victim.
Showing posts with label School. Show all posts
Showing posts with label School. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 4, 2014
Saturday, April 6, 2013
Opportunity Cost
One of the most basics concepts in economics is the concept of "opportunity cost". An opportunity cost is a cost you pay when you do something instead of another, and this "cost" is not always, actually most of the time is not, a monetary value. For example, they're selling my favorite cereal in the grocery store near my house, store A, at a higher price than the grocery store on the other side of town, store B, let's say two dollars more. The opportunity cost of not going to store B is two dollars, but the amount of time and gasoline I would waste if I had gone there, which are the opportunity costs of going to store B, are greater costs than two dollars. So, instead, I prefer buying the cereal and give two dollars more than usual.
This problem of opportunity costs comes from the very problem of economics and the reason why a science called economics exists: scarcity. When there are limited resources, and unlimited wants.
Opportunity costs are everywhere in life, and we face them every, single, day.
To park the car in a very, very, small gap in front of the house and spend 15 minutes trying to do it, or to park it 4 meters up the street easily, and walk the way?
The most typical example in economics; to produce 20 tons of butter and 10 million guns, or to produce 5 tons of butter and 40 million guns?(here, the opportunity cost of producing 1 ton of butter is half a million guns).
The reason I have not been writing blog posts for the past six days, I have not been able to play the piano or the guitar, I have not been able to watch the new episode of Supernatural, is, simply, that the opportunity cost of doing these is very, very, big.
Economics tells us and teaches us how the real world works and functions. Not just markets and GDP's and how to lower unemployment rates, but what to do, how to do it, and to do it at what cost. Basically, we answer two of the three basic questions of economics, what to produce and how to produce, in our everyday lives, trying to allocate our own resources as efficiently as we can. Maybe I am not a factory and land owner, and I don't decide, to increase production, let's say, whether to buy 50 million dollars worth more capital and reduce my labor force, or to keep my capital the same and purchase more labor. But what I do, and what everyone does every day is the exact same thing. My "limited resource" is my time, from when I get home from school until I go to bed, my "unlimited wants" are to play the piano, to write blog posts, to watch TV, but also to do my homework and study for the physics test, and the way I allocate may resources is through being organized and trying, although most of the time not succeeding in, time management.
Just to get the concept of opportunity cost clear, here is a thing which happened to me four days ago: It was a Tuesday night, and I had a physics test the next day, but I could also play the guitar and sing at the Art Show hosted at our school, for an hour that night. The opportunity cost of playing the guitar was perhaps and hour of studying physics or an hour of rest, but the satisfaction and the utility I would get from playing the guitar and singing in the Art Show with my friends, would be much, much more valuable than an hour of studying physics. So, I decided to go to the Art Show and study physics when I come back, and thinking back to that Tuesday night, and the test I faced on Wednesday now, I know for certain that I made the right decision, no matter what grade I may get from the test.
This problem of opportunity costs comes from the very problem of economics and the reason why a science called economics exists: scarcity. When there are limited resources, and unlimited wants.
Opportunity costs are everywhere in life, and we face them every, single, day.
To park the car in a very, very, small gap in front of the house and spend 15 minutes trying to do it, or to park it 4 meters up the street easily, and walk the way?
The most typical example in economics; to produce 20 tons of butter and 10 million guns, or to produce 5 tons of butter and 40 million guns?(here, the opportunity cost of producing 1 ton of butter is half a million guns).
The reason I have not been writing blog posts for the past six days, I have not been able to play the piano or the guitar, I have not been able to watch the new episode of Supernatural, is, simply, that the opportunity cost of doing these is very, very, big.
Economics tells us and teaches us how the real world works and functions. Not just markets and GDP's and how to lower unemployment rates, but what to do, how to do it, and to do it at what cost. Basically, we answer two of the three basic questions of economics, what to produce and how to produce, in our everyday lives, trying to allocate our own resources as efficiently as we can. Maybe I am not a factory and land owner, and I don't decide, to increase production, let's say, whether to buy 50 million dollars worth more capital and reduce my labor force, or to keep my capital the same and purchase more labor. But what I do, and what everyone does every day is the exact same thing. My "limited resource" is my time, from when I get home from school until I go to bed, my "unlimited wants" are to play the piano, to write blog posts, to watch TV, but also to do my homework and study for the physics test, and the way I allocate may resources is through being organized and trying, although most of the time not succeeding in, time management.
Just to get the concept of opportunity cost clear, here is a thing which happened to me four days ago: It was a Tuesday night, and I had a physics test the next day, but I could also play the guitar and sing at the Art Show hosted at our school, for an hour that night. The opportunity cost of playing the guitar was perhaps and hour of studying physics or an hour of rest, but the satisfaction and the utility I would get from playing the guitar and singing in the Art Show with my friends, would be much, much more valuable than an hour of studying physics. So, I decided to go to the Art Show and study physics when I come back, and thinking back to that Tuesday night, and the test I faced on Wednesday now, I know for certain that I made the right decision, no matter what grade I may get from the test.
Monday, March 25, 2013
PROCRASTINATION
It is the thing that all students do, no matter how smart they may be, how logical a mind they might have...
Almost every month, once, we get instructed on time management and "how to use our time efficiently". They hand out nice little sheets of paper with neat tables printed on them. They ask us to "plan our week". We do. And then we throw those sheets of paper away in the first recycle bin that comes in our way. We sometimes even delay throwing the paper away.
To be honest, the time management things and the schedules saying :
17:30 - 17:45: Snack
17:45-19:00: Study math
19:00-20:00: Dinner
20:00-20.30: Practice the piano, memorize 3 of the scales.
20:30-21:30: Do econ homework
21:45-22:00: Break
22:00-23:00: Solve tests
23:00-23:15: Get ready for bed
23:15-23:45: Read two chapters of your bedside book,
NEVER WORK.
Instead, it metamorphoses into this:
17:30-17:45: Snack
17:45-18:00: Study some math and get bored
18:00-until your mother calls you to dinner: Break Time! Let's see what's going on in the social media...
After Dinner: I'll just play these pieces on the piano one time through...
A little while later, starting to get sleepy: I better start the econ homework and those tests...What's that? A new episode of Grey's Anatomy?
45 minutes later, feeling guilty about the episode you just watched, clock closing around on 23:00: Gee, it's almost bed time-cram in the math, hurry through the econ homework, get to the Turkish project assigned two weeks ago, decide to take the tests with you to school next day to solve them during your "free time".
Sometime later that night, or maybe even the next day: I better go to bed, but I should read a few chapt--zzzz.
This is why those schedules never work.
The student lives on procrastination, it is in its blood.
I even procrastinated on writing this blog post about procrastination, as I've had the idea for a couple of months now.
I am procrastinating doing the hard part of my math project even further (since it was assigned a week ago and I only got to it now) by writing this blog post.
What can I say? Just like you cannot take out religion completely, just like you cannot achieve world piece, you cannot possibly take out procrastination from a student's life. You just cannot.
Almost every month, once, we get instructed on time management and "how to use our time efficiently". They hand out nice little sheets of paper with neat tables printed on them. They ask us to "plan our week". We do. And then we throw those sheets of paper away in the first recycle bin that comes in our way. We sometimes even delay throwing the paper away.
To be honest, the time management things and the schedules saying :
17:30 - 17:45: Snack
17:45-19:00: Study math
19:00-20:00: Dinner
20:00-20.30: Practice the piano, memorize 3 of the scales.
20:30-21:30: Do econ homework
21:45-22:00: Break
22:00-23:00: Solve tests
23:00-23:15: Get ready for bed
23:15-23:45: Read two chapters of your bedside book,
NEVER WORK.
Instead, it metamorphoses into this:
17:30-17:45: Snack
17:45-18:00: Study some math and get bored
18:00-until your mother calls you to dinner: Break Time! Let's see what's going on in the social media...
After Dinner: I'll just play these pieces on the piano one time through...
A little while later, starting to get sleepy: I better start the econ homework and those tests...What's that? A new episode of Grey's Anatomy?
45 minutes later, feeling guilty about the episode you just watched, clock closing around on 23:00: Gee, it's almost bed time-cram in the math, hurry through the econ homework, get to the Turkish project assigned two weeks ago, decide to take the tests with you to school next day to solve them during your "free time".
Sometime later that night, or maybe even the next day: I better go to bed, but I should read a few chapt--zzzz.
This is why those schedules never work.
The student lives on procrastination, it is in its blood.
I even procrastinated on writing this blog post about procrastination, as I've had the idea for a couple of months now.
I am procrastinating doing the hard part of my math project even further (since it was assigned a week ago and I only got to it now) by writing this blog post.
What can I say? Just like you cannot take out religion completely, just like you cannot achieve world piece, you cannot possibly take out procrastination from a student's life. You just cannot.
Friday, March 22, 2013
Life is Not Fair
In one of my favorite cartoon series, in the face of doing chores and having to go to school, Calvin always says to his father "This isn't fair," and his father always replies "Life isn't fair." Recently, I've seen this more than once, in my own experience and around me, and, yes, Calvin, life really isn't fair.
I had to write a lab report the night I got back from Honor Choir, and I was terribly sick. Anyway, I wrote it one way, or another, and sent it to my teacher on its due date. Next week, because of the complaints of my classmates, our teacher did not assign a lab report because some of my classmates had a similar excuse to mine.
This is just one example of the unfairness I've faced only the past week. Everyday, in my class, in my school, in Ankara, all around the world, people face unfairness, and the worst thing is that, most of the time, there is nothing they/we can do about it.
My small little lab report is very, very insignificant in the face of what unfair circumstances people face every second. Bill Gates is one of the world's richest people. Why? Yes, one of the reasons why is that he figured out a code which when entered, would allow him to use the computers in his university's lab without time limitations and so got hours and hours of practice, but one must ask, how did he go to that university? His parents were wealthy people, so he got raised in great circumstances, got a high school diploma, got to go to university. Maybe, some child of the less fortunate families in the world, could have been richer and more successful than Bill Gates. Only, he died of heart failure at age 4, because he had a damaged valve at birth and it was not discovered, let alone be treated, because of the circumstances he was born in to.
What happened to the child is simply, discernibly, unfair. Unfortunately, in our little, corrupt, capitalist world, not everyone is "born equal". As Gavroche in Les Misérables said, here's the thing about equality: everyone's equal when they're dead.
Nothing is fair. Sometimes, you just have to accept the fact that just because they're better friends with the people who choose the team, some people who otherwise probably couldn't have landed that position take part in this prestigious team. Sometimes, you just have to admit to yourself that whatever you do or say, won't make a difference. But sometimes, you have to see the sunlight piercing through the clouds and be stronger, be better, in spite of all the brooding and gloomy clouds of injustice and unfairness.
I had to write a lab report the night I got back from Honor Choir, and I was terribly sick. Anyway, I wrote it one way, or another, and sent it to my teacher on its due date. Next week, because of the complaints of my classmates, our teacher did not assign a lab report because some of my classmates had a similar excuse to mine.
This is just one example of the unfairness I've faced only the past week. Everyday, in my class, in my school, in Ankara, all around the world, people face unfairness, and the worst thing is that, most of the time, there is nothing they/we can do about it.
My small little lab report is very, very insignificant in the face of what unfair circumstances people face every second. Bill Gates is one of the world's richest people. Why? Yes, one of the reasons why is that he figured out a code which when entered, would allow him to use the computers in his university's lab without time limitations and so got hours and hours of practice, but one must ask, how did he go to that university? His parents were wealthy people, so he got raised in great circumstances, got a high school diploma, got to go to university. Maybe, some child of the less fortunate families in the world, could have been richer and more successful than Bill Gates. Only, he died of heart failure at age 4, because he had a damaged valve at birth and it was not discovered, let alone be treated, because of the circumstances he was born in to.
What happened to the child is simply, discernibly, unfair. Unfortunately, in our little, corrupt, capitalist world, not everyone is "born equal". As Gavroche in Les Misérables said, here's the thing about equality: everyone's equal when they're dead.
Nothing is fair. Sometimes, you just have to accept the fact that just because they're better friends with the people who choose the team, some people who otherwise probably couldn't have landed that position take part in this prestigious team. Sometimes, you just have to admit to yourself that whatever you do or say, won't make a difference. But sometimes, you have to see the sunlight piercing through the clouds and be stronger, be better, in spite of all the brooding and gloomy clouds of injustice and unfairness.
Thursday, February 28, 2013
My First TEDx Event
...I walked up on the stage, the spot lights glaring at me, my friends, family, anxiously waiting for me to begin, people experts in their fields looking at me as if they were saying "What journey could an 11th grade student possibly have to tell?"...
The microphone, check. Hair, check. Piano at the right place, check. Sheet music, check. Confidence, check.
I will never forget last night, the night of February 27th, 2013. It was my first TEDx conference, and even my first experience at public speaking. Until last night, the biggest assembly I've ever talked to was my 40-people committee in MUN conferences. Last night, I talked to 150 people and soon, the whole world will be able to watch my talk named Life in A Major.
The theme of our TEDx event was A Journey to Tell. I talked about my journey through music, how I started playing the piano, my wonderful teachers, how I played and what I played on the piano, and I ended my talk with a full performance of Alla Turca Jazz by Fazıl Say. Now, I said full performance because my whole talk contained bits and pieces of piano, me re-enacting my first concert, playing pieces from different genres, showing how you can experience and live the music on a Chopin piece...
I wasn't worried about playing the piano in front of a crowd, in the end, I do that all the time. What worried me was the speaking. Towards the end of the speaker's talk before me, my legs had started shaking and my hands were trembling. Suddenly, the esteemed psychiatrist's talk was over, I was called to stage, and I was standing there, with the lights closed, while my friends from the organizing team pushed the piano to center stage. That's when it hit me: this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and I should make the best of it, and then I knew that no one could tell my journey through music better than me. I wasn't nervous anymore, just excited; excited to be there, excited to be sharing my journey with this many people, excited to have this opportunity.
So I was carried away in the graceful hands of my "story to tell" and my passion for music, until I played the last chords of the Alla Turca Jazz, and the audience started to applaud. With the blink of an eye, the event I've been preparing so hard for for the last month was over...
Yes, it really was over, but when I sat back at my seat, our principle who helped me a lot with my talk smiling at me, my fellow speaker friends and classmates hugging me, I saw my two best friends sitting at the back, applauding vigorously, another speaker, vice president at TAI (Turkish Aerospace Industries) shook my hand and told me over and over again that I was very good, I was happy, of course, and proud of what I had accomplished. I still had some doubt until the coffee break, in the end, they were my friends and they weren't going to tell me that I did horribly, but when I was exiting the hall, quenched, to get a drink, one of my friends from the organizing team came up to me and told me that the esteemed psychiatrist who talked before me loved my talk and told them that he enjoyed it very much. That, and the numerous amount of hugs and congratulations I got from both my friends and people that I've never met before in the coffee break, was enough for me to be satisfied with what I've done. I would do it again and again, if I could, because I've never experienced anything better than doing and telling what you love for people who are willing to watch and listen.
Get up on stage and perform an excellent talk, check.
Be happy for yourself, check.
The microphone, check. Hair, check. Piano at the right place, check. Sheet music, check. Confidence, check.
I will never forget last night, the night of February 27th, 2013. It was my first TEDx conference, and even my first experience at public speaking. Until last night, the biggest assembly I've ever talked to was my 40-people committee in MUN conferences. Last night, I talked to 150 people and soon, the whole world will be able to watch my talk named Life in A Major.
The theme of our TEDx event was A Journey to Tell. I talked about my journey through music, how I started playing the piano, my wonderful teachers, how I played and what I played on the piano, and I ended my talk with a full performance of Alla Turca Jazz by Fazıl Say. Now, I said full performance because my whole talk contained bits and pieces of piano, me re-enacting my first concert, playing pieces from different genres, showing how you can experience and live the music on a Chopin piece...
I wasn't worried about playing the piano in front of a crowd, in the end, I do that all the time. What worried me was the speaking. Towards the end of the speaker's talk before me, my legs had started shaking and my hands were trembling. Suddenly, the esteemed psychiatrist's talk was over, I was called to stage, and I was standing there, with the lights closed, while my friends from the organizing team pushed the piano to center stage. That's when it hit me: this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and I should make the best of it, and then I knew that no one could tell my journey through music better than me. I wasn't nervous anymore, just excited; excited to be there, excited to be sharing my journey with this many people, excited to have this opportunity.
So I was carried away in the graceful hands of my "story to tell" and my passion for music, until I played the last chords of the Alla Turca Jazz, and the audience started to applaud. With the blink of an eye, the event I've been preparing so hard for for the last month was over...
Yes, it really was over, but when I sat back at my seat, our principle who helped me a lot with my talk smiling at me, my fellow speaker friends and classmates hugging me, I saw my two best friends sitting at the back, applauding vigorously, another speaker, vice president at TAI (Turkish Aerospace Industries) shook my hand and told me over and over again that I was very good, I was happy, of course, and proud of what I had accomplished. I still had some doubt until the coffee break, in the end, they were my friends and they weren't going to tell me that I did horribly, but when I was exiting the hall, quenched, to get a drink, one of my friends from the organizing team came up to me and told me that the esteemed psychiatrist who talked before me loved my talk and told them that he enjoyed it very much. That, and the numerous amount of hugs and congratulations I got from both my friends and people that I've never met before in the coffee break, was enough for me to be satisfied with what I've done. I would do it again and again, if I could, because I've never experienced anything better than doing and telling what you love for people who are willing to watch and listen.
Get up on stage and perform an excellent talk, check.
Be happy for yourself, check.
Friday, February 8, 2013
Profile of The Student
In The Student's mind, every week day is equal, but some are more equal than the others.
The Student procrastinates relentlessly, until the very last day, and then complains about how much homework it has.
The Student's biological clock is in Tokyo time; can't wake up in the morning, sleepy the entire day, wide awake at night.
The Student has no free time, it only has time that should be used to do the homework. There is always homework.
The Student on snow: as soon as the first sprinkles of snow start falling, the student starts calculating the chances of there being a snow day and which home works not to do.
The Student never copy-pastes. It just believes in the sharing of information.
The Student never forgets to do its homework; there was no internet, the email was not received, the innocent little dog ate it.
The Student is never perfect. Even if it gets a 99, there is no pleasing the parents.
The Student forgets about any homework for that moment as soon as the teacher mentions the words "due next week".
In the face of trouble, The Student's imagination knows no boundaries.
The Student decides whether it likes a teacher or not in the first class. And that impression doesn't seem to change.
The Student never forgets anything it learns, it just puts the information into a place in its mind and then forgets where it put it.
The Student knows that it is doomed when Google doesn't know what it searched for.
The Student tends to round its grades: mostly in the upward direction.
The Student never studies enough for a test, the teacher always asks something they hadn't learned.
When The Student gets a low grade on a test, when announcing to the parents, everyone else's grades drop suddenly.
The Student decides read an assigned book only if there is no Sparknotes of Cliff Notes page on it.
The Student always watches the movie of the book. Sometimes only the movie.
The Student is an eccentric creature living on procrastination, adrenaline and junk food, in the midst of unending stress and expectations.
The Student procrastinates relentlessly, until the very last day, and then complains about how much homework it has.
The Student's biological clock is in Tokyo time; can't wake up in the morning, sleepy the entire day, wide awake at night.
The Student has no free time, it only has time that should be used to do the homework. There is always homework.
The Student on snow: as soon as the first sprinkles of snow start falling, the student starts calculating the chances of there being a snow day and which home works not to do.
The Student never copy-pastes. It just believes in the sharing of information.
The Student never forgets to do its homework; there was no internet, the email was not received, the innocent little dog ate it.
The Student is never perfect. Even if it gets a 99, there is no pleasing the parents.
The Student forgets about any homework for that moment as soon as the teacher mentions the words "due next week".
In the face of trouble, The Student's imagination knows no boundaries.
The Student decides whether it likes a teacher or not in the first class. And that impression doesn't seem to change.
The Student never forgets anything it learns, it just puts the information into a place in its mind and then forgets where it put it.
The Student knows that it is doomed when Google doesn't know what it searched for.
The Student tends to round its grades: mostly in the upward direction.
The Student never studies enough for a test, the teacher always asks something they hadn't learned.
When The Student gets a low grade on a test, when announcing to the parents, everyone else's grades drop suddenly.
The Student decides read an assigned book only if there is no Sparknotes of Cliff Notes page on it.
The Student always watches the movie of the book. Sometimes only the movie.
The Student is an eccentric creature living on procrastination, adrenaline and junk food, in the midst of unending stress and expectations.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)