DISCLAIMER: This post is half rant/vent, and half of how everyone else feels. This article is going to be a hefty one, with a bunch of paragraphs to read through. This is something that is important. This post is 100% serious by all means.

PART I: Expectations & The Weight Of Judgement

School is marketed as a place for students to grow intellectually, discover passions, and to eventually develop into future innovators, and shape the world as time passes on. Schools promise opportunities for students, success, and personal and academic development. However, this image hides a less visible reality, in which students are constantly feeling pressured, and being weighed down by judgement from parents, teachers, or students with a higher academic level. Students often worry about their grades, and what others will think about them if they get a 56% on their geometry test, or if they have a worse report card than last year. Expectations are solely based on grades, which can induce stress, create an inaccurate image on students academic levels, and don't fully reflect on students' true abilities. It wouldn't be fair for a skilled guitarist to be judged by his science essay in which he got a B. The system can create stress for many, and a fear of failure. Many people fail to realize that failure is not how you define someone, but rather an event that can be made up for.

On top of that, students can often feel like their voices are ignored, or that their opinion is nothing to those in a higher position. Sometimes, students try to express how they feel about stress, overload of work, but it never reaches anyone, and they can often be dismissed as just overreacting, or complaining. How is it that nobody wants to listen, yet they blame us for not succeeding. Students can also feel tired of the routine they are constantly forced to when it comes to school. Schools often state that all students learn differently, but if that truly were the case, then why hasn't any action been taken, and why is everyone still forced to sit down in desks that are positioned in neat rows, raise up their hand just to ask a simple question, and follow the same schedule for every single day. The student who has goals to be a world-class programmer wants to develop on his skills and not be forced to sit in history class to learn about the Great Depression.

PART II: Definition Of Success

For schools, success is defined as a grade. Reduced to a number that supposedly adjusts your future. These can measure certain academic skills, but the definition for succeeding is too broad to be meaningful. They fail to capture the full potential and range of a student's capabilities, creativity, and potential. Intelligence is not based on numbers. It is built by growth. What schools fail to recognize, is that a few numbers can shift somebody's life, but they don't capture what they can actually accomplish.

This narrow definition can make students feel like they are not “good enough” if they don’t meet a certain standard. A student who is talented in music, art, coding, or other skills may feel overlooked simply because those strengths are not prioritized in the same way as traditional subjects. As a result, students may start to doubt themselves, even if they have strong abilities in areas that aren’t being measured.

In addition, this focus on grades can shift the purpose of learning. Instead of learning to understand, explore, or improve, students may begin learning just to achieve a high mark. Memorization replaces curiosity, and short-term performance becomes more important than long-term understanding. This can take away from the original purpose of education, which is to help students grow as individuals, not just as test-takers. If schools truly want to prepare students for the future, they need to recognize that success is not one dimensional. Intelligence, creativity, and skill come in many forms, and the system should reflect that rather than forcing every student into the same definition of achievement.

PART III: Lack Of Real-World Preparation

Another major issue with the school system is that it often fails to prepare students for real life. While students spend years learning academic subjects, many leave school without basic life skills that are essential in the real world. Skills like managing money, understanding taxes, handling stress, communicating effectively, or making important life decisions are rarely taught in a meaningful way.

Instead, students are expected to memorize information that they may never use again, just to pass tests. While some subjects are important, the balance feels off. Students can solve complex equations, yet struggle with real-world responsibilities that affect them every day. This raises an important question, what is the true purpose of education?

PART IV: Disengagement + Uprising Of AI

With the rise of AI tools, more students are turning to technology to complete their work. While some may view this as laziness or a lack of effort, it also highlights a deeper issue within the school system, which is disengagement. When students feel disconnected from what they are learning, they are less likely to invest time and effort into their work.

In many cases, assignments feel repetitive, irrelevant, or disconnected from students’ interests and future goals. As a result, students may turn to AI not just as a shortcut, but as a way to get through work that they do not find meaningful. This raises an important question, if students are constantly looking for ways to avoid the work, is the problem entirely the students, or is it the system itself.

Using artificial intelligence tools for work is not justified, but it shows how schools fail to engage you, and that students would rather be doing something else. Instead of exploring topics of what the students are interested in, instead they are conditioning everyone to focus on a big package of just about everything. And with the lack of engagement with teaching, are the students really to blame for using technology to complete the work that they don't even care about.

PART V: Conclusion

After looking at the pressure students face, the loss of curiosity, the lack of real-world preparation, and the growing disengagement shown through the use of AI, it becomes clear that the issue is not just with students, but with the system itself. Education, as it currently stands, does not fully reflect the needs, abilities, or realities of the students it is meant to support.

If schools truly want students to succeed, then change is necessary. This could start with listening to students more seriously, reducing unnecessary pressure, and creating learning environments that encourage curiosity instead of memorization. Schools should also place more value on real-world skills and recognize that intelligence and success cannot be measured by grades alone.

Education should not feel like something students are forced to survive, but something that helps them grow, think, and prepare for the future. Right now, too many students feel stressed, unheard, and disconnected. That needs to change. If the goal of school is to build the next generation, then the system must evolve to support them, not hold them back from a bright future.