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Read Time: 2:00 minutes
We've exempted school from reality
Antoine de Saint‑Exupéry once said a goal without a plan is just a wish. One could say a plan without a goal is school.
Every real system starts with a goal. The goal defines the mission. If the solution stops working, we fix it because the goal defines the operating structure of the system.
Medicine is judged by whether people get healthier. Business is judged by whether people want the product. Government is judged by whether people's lives improve. Everywhere else, results matter.
School is the exception.
School was created to help people build a capable, meaningful life. That's the mission. That's the only reason for it to exist. But instead of being judged by outcomes, school judges itself by intentions and self defined metrics. It uses metrics it designed which are run by people who benefit from them and can always be changed to show a positive outcome.
When outcomes are bad, we explain them away. When people resist, we force them to be a part of it anyway. When the system fails, we blame the child.
No other institution survives this way. School persists because the law protects it and tradition convinces people it must be the only way.
A clear goal would make accountability unavoidable and a direction crystal clear. If school promised something measurable — financial independence by a certain age, or the ability to direct one's own learning — we could always measure it, test it and fix it if necessary.
But the system is not built to be tested. Soft goals like "well‑rounded" and "lifelong learner" aren't goals. They're escape routes. You can't measure them, so you can't fail them, so nothing has to change.
The vagueness is the shield.
Picture two wheels. One round. One square. Both in plain sight. Generation after generation chooses the square one. They strap children onto it, build rituals around it and when the ride is bumpy and painful, they don't question the wheel because someone at the very beginning decided the square wheel was the appropriate one to use and we've just gone along with it ever since.
They question the rider. Tell them to try harder, hold on tighter and insist this is normal.
Questioning the choice of wheel is never a consideration.
And then we do something even stranger. We debate the merits of the square wheel. We argue about technique. We argue about posture. We argue about how to smooth out the bumps. We argue about everything except whether using the round wheel is the better choice.
Meanwhile, the round wheel is being used everywhere else — in every other system, in every other field — and everyone agrees it's the better option. It works. It's obvious. No one debates it anywhere except here.
The round wheel isn't a new invention. It already exists and works well.
School doesn't need a new invention. It needs honest observation — the basic act of seeing the square wheel, seeing the round one and saying what's observably true.
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