What does education mean?

I think savvy employers can spot people with potential,

I can pick out who is going to make his mark in business, you see the Dragons doing that on TV, their product is not going to be useful but they are.

Doesnt matter wether they are 18 or 30 they are different, much more confident, so far 4 of my GC have been to Uni, 2 did well but no graduate jobs yet. I also have an 18 yr old mature far beyond his years he is going to be the highflier. He left grammar school at 16 straight to technical college, not interested in Uni, his sister is smart too, will get top grades.

David49

growstuff

David49

Royalty in the UK certainly get better much better education than most some of them use it usefully.
Billionaires certainly are, in their own way they are highly intelligent, whether it is broad is another matter, they are often patrons of arts which keeps their social set happy and all the politicians too.
It’s not relevant to everyday people.

But presumably most billionaires ensure their children inherit something. In those circumstances, it's unlikely the children would need to work, although I expect most of them do. The question is why do they need any education, if education (according to you) is acquiring the skills to earn money to put food on the table.

More down to earth royalty and the aristocracy do educate their children highly for social reasons, whether they need to work or not. Most aristocrats are small fry in the wealth scale and they usually do have working lives, their social style is very costly. But they pay privately for that kind of education, nothing to do with churning out workers they are the chiefs.

According to you, they don't need an education.

Now you're adding an appearance of being educated to the reasons. Maybe being able to hold an informed conversation is as good a reason as any.

Education is learning that is neither training or indoctrination. In practice, an educated individual has the mental tools for reasoned , understanding, and well judged decisions.

The level of formal education is often involved but not necessarily.

Ziplok

I would add, education is not down to a privileged lifestyle, either. Every single one of us has an opportunity to keep learning/discovering new things - life is a learning curve, surely?

In some countries, formal education is a privelege. Let's not forget that and the hard work of people who work to change that.

I would add, education is not down to a privileged lifestyle, either. Every single one of us has an opportunity to keep learning/discovering new things - life is a learning curve, surely?

Surely, education is ongoing? It’s not limited to school/college/university learning.

We are forever learning new things - about ourselves, our world and beyond.

Obviously, schooling provides a baseline, but I feel that until our dying day there will be opportunities for us to learn something and it’s not limited to gaining educational qualifications.

Education should be growth, change, improvement and enhancement and a lifelong endeavour.

It should always have an open mind.

It should never be narrow-minded, Never be the pursuit of reinforcements to outdated opinions.

growstuff

David49

Royalty in the UK certainly get better much better education than most some of them use it usefully.
Billionaires certainly are, in their own way they are highly intelligent, whether it is broad is another matter, they are often patrons of arts which keeps their social set happy and all the politicians too.
It’s not relevant to everyday people.

But presumably most billionaires ensure their children inherit something. In those circumstances, it's unlikely the children would need to work, although I expect most of them do. The question is why do they need any education, if education (according to you) is acquiring the skills to earn money to put food on the table.

More down to earth royalty and the aristocracy do educate their children highly for social reasons, whether they need to work or not. Most aristocrats are small fry in the wealth scale and they usually do have working lives, their social style is very costly. But they pay privately for that kind of education, nothing to do with churning out workers they are the chiefs.

Macadia

I may have it wrong here, but I think education (literature, history, humanity, arts) was once only for the wealthy, who had no need to earn wages but had time to broaden their mind and learn about the world. The people who were not allowed to be educated were the ones who worked to afford a home to house a table.

I don't think you're wrong at all.

Mollygo

Elegran @ Today 11:49 and further posts.
Very well put.

Education is also the ability to apply and use what you have learnt
You don’t need to do that or retain everything you learn, e.g. I learnt how to patch holes in my car with fibreglass patches and coating, a necessary skill, but one I no longer need.
Experience is a great teacher, but you have to have the opportunities to gain that experience.
The infamous job hunting feedback “We need someone with more experience.” highlights the difficulty we sometimes face in trying to learn by experience.

I think savvy employers can spot people with potential, even if they don't have experience. My son, who has a First in Politics and Economics and Masters, was snapped up by a company and has had two promotions in a year. When he told me that he had a job and I asked him what it was, he admitted he didn't really know what he was going to be doing. To say I was little concerned would be an understatement, but the company has a brilliant trainee/mentoring scheme in place and it's obvious now that he had the skills they needed to fill a gap. The skills have very little to do with the actual content of any of his courses, but he developed them as he was studying. The company is now paying for him to do a professional qualification and my concerns have evaporated.

Meanwhile, my son and I have silly conversations in German and Latin (his Latin is better than mine, but we both know enough to make puns), discuss history (usually Anglo Saxons or Corn Laws) and we both enjoy conversations with my son-in-law about genetics - none of which is of any financial gain to us. Other people discuss soaps or celebs or football or whatever floats their particular boats. That's all part of a wider topic known as "education" (IMO).

I may have it wrong here, but I think education (literature, history, humanity, arts) was once only for the wealthy, who had no need to earn wages but had time to broaden their mind and learn about the world. The people who were not allowed to be educated were the ones who worked to afford a home to house a table.

I think maybe we are mixing up intelligence and education. You can be educated with poor marks and you can be non-educated and have a brilliant mind.

Elegran When you mention the Morlocks and the Elim (in my copy it is Eloi but no matter) why do you say 'If that means nothing to anybody read HG Wells "The Time Machine"?

In my experience, many of the GNs are very well read so I think it extremely likely that quite a few of them would have read the book. Uneducated though I am, even I have read it.

they all have devices where information is instantly available
Another generalisation that was shown to be only variably true during Covid.

David49

Royalty in the UK certainly get better much better education than most some of them use it usefully.
Billionaires certainly are, in their own way they are highly intelligent, whether it is broad is another matter, they are often patrons of arts which keeps their social set happy and all the politicians too.
It’s not relevant to everyday people.

But presumably most billionaires ensure their children inherit something. In those circumstances, it's unlikely the children would need to work, although I expect most of them do. The question is why do they need any education, if education (according to you) is acquiring the skills to earn money to put food on the table.

“We should not be just churning out workers, we should be broadening children's horizons. Some children live in homes without a book.”

Quite right they don’t but they all have devices where information is instantly available, they have far more access to knowledge than we ever did, if the use it constructively

Elegran @ Today 11:49 and further posts.
Very well put.

Education is also the ability to apply and use what you have learnt
You don’t need to do that or retain everything you learn, e.g. I learnt how to patch holes in my car with fibreglass patches and coating, a necessary skill, but one I no longer need.
Experience is a great teacher, but you have to have the opportunities to gain that experience.
The infamous job hunting feedback “We need someone with more experience.” highlights the difficulty we sometimes face in trying to learn by experience.

Royalty in the UK certainly get better much better education than most some of them use it usefully.
Billionaires certainly are, in their own way they are highly intelligent, whether it is broad is another matter, they are often patrons of arts which keeps their social set happy and all the politicians too.
It’s not relevant to everyday people.

Education should never be taken for granted, I could weep for the many girls who are denied an education due to Islamic extremism and the many children across the world who will never experience sitting in a classroom.

To me education is everything, our children went to great schools but a lot of their education was at home, conversation over the dinner table, the holidays we had the books they read and our wonderful friends who all contributed to their childhood.

The broad education and learning and training you get at school enables you (or should do) to do simple work under supervision and earn money to pay for food, housing and other trivialities.

I could translate Latin but never learnt to cook at school.
David49 might consider that was time wasted when I could have been learning a subject which trained me to do simple work or feed my potential family.
Did English literature help me when job-seeking or was it an unnecessary frivolity when learning the basics of English Language should suffice?

We should not be just churning out workers, we should be broadening children's horizons. Some children live in homes without a book.

For me education is what someone else provides.

A parent educates a child in eating, keeping themselves clean and healthy etc..

A teacher educates according to the social and political expectations of what children should learn, ie an ethos or a curruculum.

Universities educate through promoting knowledge, skills, and expertise.

Employers educate through training.

However, learning is what you do for yourself using reason and judgement, with some knowledge acquired on the way...

I actually think that formal education is only the beginning of your life long learning. The advantage of a higher level of education as anyone who has been lucky enough to experience is that it gives a much bigger base on which to build further learning as you pass through life.

David49

growstuff

David49

The broad education and learning and training you get at school enables you (or should do) to do simple work under supervision and earn money to pay for food, housing and other trivialities.

Children then can choose to continue learning a skill that will enable them to earn more and improve their lifestyle. Many go to university they have been told that graduates have higher wages. You only get those higher wages if you find a graduate job so choose your course carefully

When I started the thread, I wasn't intending to limit the discussion to education at school.

If your definition is correct, presumably you think people's education stops when they reach school leaving age or leave college/university.

I agree with others that everybody learns throughout life, but that's possibly best described as experience rather than education.

Since retiring, I've actively participated in a number of more formal courses. Unfortunately, they're expensive and I don't expect anybody to pay for me. Why would I do that as I don't want to do paid work?

We all learn something every day it’s called experience, it’s not formal it’s part of the activities we are doing, today most of us get a lot online through social/news media of some kind.
It’s great if you enjoy history, Shakespeare, travel, sport or any other activity but that is incidental to your main need which is paying the rent and feeding the family.

Is education necessary for the offspring of royalty and billionaires?

Education can be learning a new task by watching, reading, experimenting etc.
Exactly, ayse, like great artists who experiment and practise over and over in different ways. No one instructs them what to do. To try to educate them in techniques only stifles their creativity.

I think it was Van Gogh who said something like, "I am always doing what I can't yet do, so that I to learn how to do it." He received no education as such to make him a genius, he was constantly learning for himself.

Take courage, Whitewavemark2, you're following a great Master in perseverance!

Education for me is a life long thing, and it covers every subject that takes my fancy.

So as an example I have just ordered Alasdair MacIntyre’s “After Virtue” and will slowly make my way through that over the next few weeks.

I am also in the middle of teaching myself how to alter a dressmaking pattern, and then hope to tackle a winters dressing gown. All new stuff.

I constantly return to water colour painting and thst seems to be a life long bit of education😊. Just wish I was better at it.

There are myriad other things that I am interested in and constantly educate myself over.

Travel is another educational experience

That is the glory of being retired - time for everything and anything that takes your fancy.