Schooling and Depression

Schooling is clearly detrimental to mental health. Today, I found a link to a webpage that sheds light on the problems with depression in adolescents. It can be found at:
http://www.doh.wa.gov/cfh/adfactsheets/whatsup_depression.htm
Let me point out three statistics.

1. On the Washington State Healthy Youth Survey, nearly 1-in-5 6th and 10th graders report that they seriously contemplated suicide in the past year.

Let me emphasize that 20% of students in these grades REPORTED that they SERIOUSLY contemplated suicide in THE PAST YEAR. What if you added students that refused to admit to suicidal thoughts, students that didn’t feel that their suicidal thoughts were strong enough, and the students in these grades who had these thoughts far enough in the past? The numbers would certainly be higher.

2. Of these, over 60% say they made a suicide plan. (About 12% overall)

It’s remarkable how many people view their school years as the easiest years of their lives. This number is significant, and I can honestly say that this makes a lot of sense. Keep in mind that I had to go through the schools myself. I didn’t reach that point, but I definitely had problems.

3. One-third of the youth suicides with firearms occur during the hours right after school: 3 to 6 p.m

This might be a little specific, but think about it for a second. A significant portion of suicides are quick ends after a day at school filled with unnecessary stress. It appears that schooling is one of the bigger contributors to mental health problems for adolescents.

How Did Schooling Affect My Mental Health?

One of the best ways to explain my concerns with the mental harm caused by our schools is to explain what I have encountered first hand. Let me start by saying that I never seriously contemplated suicide. Some dark thoughts had entered my mind, but I will get to that later.

In middle school, I started to understand the difference between schooling and education. I did well in school, but I was complaining frequently. I knew that my educational needs weren’t being met. Meanwhile, everyone around me insisted that my entire future relied on my current grades.

Things got worse when I reached high school. After every single year in school providing the exact same lessons, I was fed up with the repetition. I was also starting to realize that the approach that the schools take was negatively affecting my mental ability.

When I tried to address my mental shortcomings, my efforts moved from schoolwork to education. Needless to say, my grades dropped significantly. The stronger my mental ability became, the more I realized that I could no longer handle the work assigned by my teachers. My teachers bombarded me with the argument that my attempts to better myself would ultimately prohibit me from making a living. In a money-driven world, future survival seemed to be at stake. I lost a lot of hope. At one point, I was unaware of any options that would have enabled me to finish school. I eventually entered a monitored home-schooling program where I completed the work required for a high school diploma.

Starting in my freshman year at high school, I have develop an extensive set of educational beliefs. There is no denying that the schools negatively impacted my mental ability. There is also no denying that the schools negatively impacted my mental health. I feel that some of my actions prevented some long-lasting damage that is quite widespread, but I have never fully recovered.

In my darkest hours, my thoughts might have gotten a little out of control for me. At one point, I basically wrote down exaggerated thoughts of how I had no hope in life. There was another time when I ran through the idea of faking a suicide with a note revealing my problems. It seemed like a quick way to raise awareness of the problems that our schools are causing. It was also a flawed concept that didn’t last when I regained control of myself.

Today was one of my darker recent days. I read about the problems with depression, and something hit me pretty hard. What if things would have been a little bit different for me? What if I hadn’t seen the mental harm? What if I hadn’t taken steps to prevent more significant damage? What if I wouldn’t have graduated on time (without the realization that finishing school was a mistake)? In all honesty, I don’t know if I would have been strong enough to overcome my emotions.

The primary problems right now are excessive emotional abuse and high levels of unnecessary stress. I should also point out that the elimination of fundamental human rights is also a factor, but I’m not going to go into that right now.

Stress is primarily the result of significant work assigned to students that the students are forced to complete. While this has always been a problem, more homework and new tests are adding to the problem. I would be surprised if the rate of depression has not increased since I was in school.

Children are pressured into conformity through threats aimed at their entire lifetimes. This is irresponsible and inexcusable. Mental harm is an unavoidable result of this form of abuse.

There are people who actually support the reintroduction of physical abuse to our schools. The depression rate indicates that we’re already too abusive. We don’t need to beat children into submission.