To think there is too much stress and importance placed on education?

[CharlotteWebb]

I think education is important - of course it is.

BUT

I work a lot with young people and find that an awful lot of youngsters are suffering more and more with anxiety and all sorts of negative feelings because they feel they under so much stress to excel in their schooling.

As a parent I encourage my children to complete homework and try their best, but if they don't do well in exams, it's a shame but not the end of the world.

I think sometimes it's too easy to put pressure on our youngsters and they feel there are no alternatives?

I know of quite a few adults who are actually not academic at all - left school with no qualifications and are now rather successful either working for themselves or retrained later in life as an adult?

WIBU to think although individuals should do their best, it's also not a massive deal if one doesn't get high grades in their exam?.

Not everyone is going to get amazing gcses and go to Oxford though, they just aren't. I don't agree with this everyone goes to uni ethos we have. People who aren't naturally academic should have different opportunities. This is why I agree with the old grammar school system (not this ridiculous who pays the most for tutoring because mummy doesn't want me to go to the comp with the council estate kids grammar system we have now)

I think there are huge problems with the messages we send young people- one of the most obvious is that education is incredibly important and completely determines your future. Actually, studies show there is less social mobility now than in the past, and much of the success enjoyed by well-educated young people is the success of the wealthier, better connected middle-classes which is not solely about education per se. So, being well-educated is definitely a prerequisite for success, but it doesn't determine success on its own and a lot of young people find this hard to accept. I see a lot of young people at university who have been sold the 'just work hard and the world will be yours' and are now struggling a bit.

Whatever we are doing, we are doing something wrong. There are millions of people on anti-depressants, and there's a huge mental health crisis amongst the young people I see at university- even the ones who are doing well just tie who they are in themselves to their achievements. Hence it comes crashing down when they don't get the grades, get sick, parents die, they get ill- there is a lot of blame in our society towards those who are not conventionally successful and they rightly fear this life for themselves. They have internalized the message that they = their educational achievements, as have those who have achieved far less. It doesn't benefit anyone and we seem to have moved further and further away from the more rounded life even my parents had as teaching professionals who were home most days by 3.30 and did not work the long hours and under constant pressure just to stand still financially.

My DH didn't go to school but has so many more useful skills than I have - one of which is fixing the car (mine)!

I had a horrible feeling there would be something like this going to come out. I assume you think your husband did well for himself despite his lack of education? Again, he grew up in a different generation and world to your kids.

Is there a reason he wasn't schooled?

I just think you're underestimating its importance, and minimising the impact of educational failure on young people. Yes, some will go on to resit and succeed, but how long will it take them and with what effects? I'm good friends with at least three people doing access courses in their thirties, with whom I was at school, all certainly bright enough to have passed exams and gone to uni first time round. Now the opportunities open to them are far more limited.

noble my mistake - I read the OPs response to your question as the OP asking that question. Just ignore me whilst I back out of the room quietly.

As you were.

Yes of course education matters....

but I do know (and know of) parents who do place this unrealistic expectation on children (of all ages)- of which for some it is beyond their academic capability. That's what I think is unreasonable.

I deal will some children who are in pieces (emotionally) because they know they cannot get high grades despite working hard and when I try and reassure them that their best is all they can do they are 'afraid' of parents reactions. It's like some children have the 'failure is not an option' fear drummed into them. That's what I fond very sad. Some children do seem to think they're self worth is somehow directly linked to excellent results.

I think op is trying to say that an attitude of saying its the end of the world if an exam goes wrong. Yes it's not ideal if you think your child capable of an A at A level in chemistry and they get a D. It's far from Ideal. But having them built up to the point where they are sobbing wrecks saying they may as well be dead like a child of someone in my family was over their gcse results whilst the parent looked on saying 'well you should have worked harder' is abusive parenting imp

Bluntness why so rude?

Education is important. Education is not more important than, and shouldn't take priority over, mental health.

I say that as a former high achiever who crashed and burned at GCSE due to the combination of relentless overpressure from school and tendencies towards anxiety and perfectionism. I dropped out and became a NEET. The education can be caught up on later (I now have an MA) but the damage to mental health and self-esteem have very long-lasting effects. Some children thrive under pressure and will be fine, I know, but plenty don't, and the system is worse today than when I was younger.

Sometimes I think I'm in a parallel universe because I genuinely, GENUINELY want my dd to be happy and content above all else in the world. I don't think a lot of parents can honestly say that.

Obviously pressuring your children to the level where they are quivering wrecks - about anything - is wrong.

I think the education system has totally lost its way. It is no longer about learning, achieving your potential, discovering, or even about making sure that everyone has a certain basic standard of knowledge and skills. It's all about fucking levels and scores and ticking things and grades and marks and rankings and it sucks all the natural joy of learning out of so many children it's an absolute joke.

I remember when I was in my early 20s, I'd come back from university and a couple of lads who were a few years older than us were drinking in the pub, they were giving it the big I am, how they were earning good money labouring and van driving and we were wasting our time on university and they'd done fine with no gcses, until my mate pointed out that was all they'd ever earn in those jobs even of they'd worked at them til they were 65.

Genuinely, I didn't mean that rude, it was an honest question, I have no idea what your husband does, so my assumption was you felt he had done well despite his lack of schooling? It's genuinely not intended as a rude question, just if your view point was anchored in your husbands life experiences,

Education is critically important to lots of things, including their health and well being. They don’t need to be the next Einstein or aiming for Oxford, but they do need to find something they’re reasonably good and and can get a qualification in, otherwise they’re virtually unemployable in anything other than a minimum wage job for the rest of their lives.

WomanOfTime - glad you managed to catch up on your education at a later date. Can I ask you what a NEET is?

JeanClaude - I am totally the same with my kids, and also believe we as parents are in a minority

To be fair though everyone's getting slated on here for saying these type of things, and I don't think it applies to everyone in this situation at all, but the richest person I know is in property and started off as a construction labourer with about two gcses in the early 90s. He now owns a nationwide business and has several holiday homes, his kids are set up for life etc

I guess qualifications don't always actually accurately indicate intelligence and resourcefulness?

I want to be the sort of parent who prioritizes mental health but I do worry that the fear of what they will be able to do without good grades will takeover and really wish it wasn't like this.

YANBU. This is what I got all through my childhood. I want my DC to be happy first and foremost.

Actually, I got it into adulthood as well. My grandmother when my cousin went to university: "You could have gone to university."

1. No, I couldn't.

2. I didn't want to.

Jean I have to say that I think telling children that ‘all you want is for them to be happy’ is placing a different kind of expectation on them. Happiness is often not easily found and people start to lie to their parents, pretend everything is fine, because they know that that’s what their parents want to hear. I have to say, if you actually tell your child what they’ve posted here you’re heading for getting an Instagram filter of their life, whilst they battle with knowing that their life is not living up to your impossible standard of ‘just’ wanting your child to be happy.

jean Sometimes I think I'm in a parallel universe because I genuinely, GENUINELY want my dd to be happy and content above all else in the world. I don't think a lot of parents can honestly say that.

I think that's what most parents want.

But also most parents think that a good way to give a good chance of that happening is for their child to get the best education they can. It gives them more options. If you have A levels and a uni degree you can do degree level jobs or entry level jobs. If you have no qualifications, the choices you have are way more limited.

When my DDs are y11 they may be happier short term watching TV, but for long term chance of happiness I want them to do a good amount of revision!

Everyone wants their kids to be happy and content. But not just in the school years, for their whole lives. Working, stress, paying the bills, a job you want to do and enjoy, adequate housing, whatever is a factor of adult life.

And whether we like it or not, educational achievement is simply a key to unlock that door for many many people.

I think there is in state schools and some private.
Education for the sake of it is very important. Education to pass exams, not so great.

I was very fortunate to have parents who believed that "success" was different for each person.

In the area where I live, once you get in Grade 10 (age 15) you have a choice between academic or non-academic streams for core subjects. (It is possible to start in a non-academic stream and later switch to academic, or to complete high school in a non-academic stream and later take the academic courses by returning to high school or taking them at a college.) My sister and youngest brother took non-academic math. They simply didn't have the math skills to do the academic stream. My parents were okay with that. They believed that success meant achieving according to your potential, whatever that potential was, and for some kids that simply didn't mean all As - and that was okay.

Everyone says they want their kids to be happy. That is a more unrealistic expectation than kids getting qualifications. Life is a mixture of happiness and sadness.