A Favourite TED Talk

I am a frequent visitor to the TED website. Last year I spent my year living overseas and working full time as a waitress which left much to be desired on the intellectual stimulation front. Enter TED.

One of my favourite talks in Ken Robinson’s Schools Kill Creativity, which explores how the education system is structured to produce one very specific type of intellect. Robinson says in the talk something to the tune of “If we really thought about it, the education system’s main goal is to produce academics”. It seems to me that the education system is so geared towards producing a standardised student, and that the risk of straying from the traditional model and jeopardising a student’s ability to thrive in society is so great in the eyes of the institution, that we are really losing an opportunity to maximise the skills of the individual.

I know that amongst my friends, we all have very different conditions under which we thrive as students, thus my distress at the seeming trend towards max standardisation.

That being said, Robinson’s talk is one of the most viewed on TED so maybe there’s hope for us all yet. Take a look for yourselves.