If quality education—rooted in science and reason—becomes an option only for those who can afford it, society risks reverting to a dark past where knowledge was a privilege reserved for the wealthy and powerful, leaving the masses, illiterate and intellectually deprived, vulnerable to domination through power and fear.

We are reminded of the famous maxim, “Knowledge will set you free”, attributed to Socrates, and Miguel de Unamuno’s assertion, “Only those who know are free, and the more one knows, the freer one becomes”.

The emancipatory vision of public education—its aim to overcome inequality by enabling the working class children to access university—now appears fated to vanish like tears in the rain. The slogan “The worker’s child to university”, championed by this country’s political left as a means to guarantee equal opportunities, eliminate economic and social barriers, and promote democracy and social justice, has fallen into oblivion.

In the 1970s and 1980s, the “temples of knowledge” were filled with university students eager to prepare themselves, cultivate their intellect, and improve the world, many from uneducated and underprivileged families who, despite financial hardships, made sacrifices to fund their children’s education. They recognised that education was the surest path to a better future.

Our grandparents understood this clearly and would often say, “Study, so you can be someone in life”. With this refrain, they underscored that acquiring knowledge and a good education were among life’s most vital endeavours.

Today, however, we must ask: how have we moved from valuing education as the key to personal and societal well-being to undervaluing it to such an extent that even public education itself seems to have lost respect for its own purpose? Evidence of this decline can be seen in practices such as eliminating grade repetition for failing students, discouraging rote learning, discarding textbooks, and prioritising emotional over intellectual development.

At that point in history, the perception of education and higher studies was somewhat different from what it is today. Over time, we have witnessed the gradual devaluation of knowledge, supplanted by pseudoscience and self-help ideologies.

There was a significant economic problem at the time, and students primarily protested against the privatisation of public universities. Today, not only does this issue persist, but it is now compounded by apathy, a lack of intellectual ambition, and widespread disenchantment with knowledge and science.

This is the result of a public education system that no longer functions as a civic right or a vehicle for social mobility. Instead, it has been commodified, subordinated to the economic interests of private corporations, and governed solely by the same laws and practices that regulate the market.

If public school students are denied a robust education that fosters self-sufficiency, critical thinking, and informed decision-making, and if educational institutions become mere waiting rooms for unskilled labour, public universities will ultimately shut their doors to the working class. Children from these families will not only struggle to compete academically with their peers from private and semi-private schools, but they may also lack the desire to do so, having been deprived of an understanding of the value of intellectual growth—an appreciation their great-grandparents once held dear.

While some students are learning to solve quadratic equations, others are unlearning basic arithmetic, armed only with colourful markers.

For all these reasons, we must remember—indeed, memorise and internalise—that enduring slogan: “The worker’s child to university”. Failing to do so risks a return to a past where our futures are again bound by the constraints of our origins.

Source: educational EVIDENCE

Rights: Creative Commons