Over the years, I have been writing about misconceptions regarding the schooling process. The purpose of these posts is to explain why I disagree with various comments that I have heard people make about schooling. These are meant as personal thoughts rather than conclusive proof, and I will admit that I'm not always the best at explaining my thoughts. Regardless, I have decided that I should be willing to share these posts when I encounter someone online who makes an argument that I have already discussed.
When people talk about being rewarded for hard work, they frequently discuss their school years. They worked hard in school. When they were in college, they worked to pay tuition. In their minds, this shows that you have to work your way to success.
In reality, schooling is not an accurate measure of work ethic. I don't deny that schooling performance reflects effort more than intelligence, but schooling does not reflect the entirety of willingness to work. For example, if someone puts an insane amount of work into learning a passion, that person would likely have less time to invest in schooling. Such an individual would generally be viewed as having a poor work ethic due to limits in effort aimed at schoolwork.
For families that have money, there is no need to obtain a job to pay for college. Wealthy families can succeed with a much lower work ethic. I can take this a step further and say that rich families can buy success, allowing them to avoid the work required for disadvantaged families.
Although work ethic is a factor in schooling, working your way through school is not the same as working hard to obtain a good job and a good life. The schools have effectively eliminated the opportunity for some to work their way to the top. If you don't fit our single rigid schooling model, your work ethic becomes irrelevant.
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