What is Education?


Neither of my parents had encouragement from their families to receive a formal education. It was something that wasn’t important to most people during and after World War II. I didn’t know that my father had graduated from high school until after I had been married for several years. I don’t believe that he valued formal education. Dad would never talk about school. I learned later that during his senior year he had been asked not to return until he could make a commitment to attend regularly. He was not attending because he had a good job at Central Market as a meat cutter. Dad did go back the next year and graduated. Graduation was required if he was going to be a pilot. He was a brilliant man and was well educated in several fields. He was an electrician and was a religious leader that had to know many different things, which he did.
My mother married my father before she graduated from high school and did not continue formal education then. In 1962, a year after I graduated from high school, my mother went back to school and graduated. She didn’t tell my father and my brothers and sister were sworn to secrecy. It was not like it is today, where you can go to an alternative school and get credit. She had to go to the regular high school with the regular students to get credit. She must have thought that it was important enough to go back with the regular students and graduate.
My father was quite surprised when my mother came home from school at the end of the semester with her report card and handed it to him along with her children’s cards to be signed. He said why didn’t she just sign them, but she wanted him to do it. When he came to her report card, he was surprised and then he found out what she had done.

Jim and picture of Low Tech by James Christensen
My wife and I both valued education and thought of only formal education. My wife and I both received an M.A. from Brigham Young University. We encouraged our children to continue on to college and some of them did. Though we had a college degree, we or at least I, was still a slow learner. There are so many more ways to get an education than the traditional formal way. If I were to do it all over again, I probably would have stayed with the grocery store. I really enjoyed that work, and I learned about it and how to be successful. Some of our children have chosen the non-traditional paths of education. They are successful and seem to be happy in their choices.
Much like my father, I, early on, determined how to become successful. I chose a different path than his, but he was just as successful and happy in his work as I was. Luckily, I was able to see the merit of all kinds of learning and growth. I am much more at peace with this knowledge that I have. We all have a path to travel, and it is up to each one of us to choose the direction and how we are going to get there.    

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