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What’s an Education For?
- The University Press of Kentucky
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243 What’s an Education For? A friend of mine told me a story a few years ago about an incident that had taken place between his father and himself when he was a young lad. As Bernie tells the story, he and his friend were playing catch in their backyard. Bernie said that he had what could generously be described as a “bedsheet with fingers on it” for a baseball glove, a glove that had been handed down by two older brothers. His friend had just gotten a brand-new mitt. Bernie was complaining about the glove and how hard it was to catch the ball with it when he suddenly realized that his father was standing behind him. “What seems to be the problem?” his father asked. “This,” said Bernie, pointing to the glove. “I still don’t see the problem,” said his father, “I see a glove.” “Well, there is nothing to it,” complained Bernie. “Well, I have never played baseball,” said his father, “but tell me what you think a baseball glove is for.” “It’s to help you catch a ball,” said Bernie. “Then I still don’t see the problem,” said his father. “In what way doesn’t yours help you catch the ball?” Bernie told me that the answer to that question was obvious to him, so he quickly replied, “It doesn’t protect my hand.” “Ah,” said his father, “it seems to me that that is where you are wrong. It seems to me you ought to be able to catch the ball barehanded. The way I look at it, you don’t use a glove to protect your hand, but to give you a bigger hand to help you catch balls that are more difficult to reach. It seems to me that you only need a glove to give you a bigger hand to catch baseballs you might otherwise miss.” This is an edited transcript of a commencement speech given in the 1960s at the Milton High School Awards Day Program, Milton, Massachusetts. 244 Cultivating an Ecological Conscience I think that Bernie’s encounter with his father can serve to help us refocus the debate that has been taking place since the mid-1960s concerning the value of education. Economists and journalists tell us that education isn’t worth the price we are paying because we cannot establish a clear correlation between a college education and successful employment. I’m still not quite sure why it took an economic analysis to tell us that. Most of us who urge young people (and for that matter older people) to get as much education as possible know there is no simple correlation between a college education and success. We could never have promoted such a fantasy in a world where so many men and women have succeeded without the benefit of a formal college or university education, and where so many others did go to college but succeeded in fields other than the ones they majored in while they were in college. Buckminster Fuller, one of the most creative futurologists and inventors of our time, never finished college because he was twice kicked out of Harvard—once for irresponsible conduct because he went to New York and spent all of his tuition and expense money on a party that he threw for the Ziegfeld Follies cast, and once for exhibiting “no noticeable interest in education,” as far as the Harvard faculty could determine. John James Audubon, the greatest artist-naturalist in this country and the man for whom the famed Audubon Society was named, never went to college or an academy of arts. He was, in fact, considered a failure at the age of thirty-five and was thrown in jail for not paying his debts. Alexander Hamilton also never earned a college degree. He began working full-time at age ten in an import-export office. Later he wanted to go to college, and he studied under a private tutor to prepare for the college entrance exam, only to have his college education interrupted by the Revolutionary War. He never returned. So there is no clear correlation between education and success. However , the conclusion that education is therefore not worth the investment is a false conclusion. That is like arguing that a baseball glove is worthless if it doesn’t protect your hand. What’s a glove for? To protect your hand? No. It’s to give you a bigger hand so...