Lets be honest: our education system is fucked.

I mean, almost all of the important history I learned between grades 5 and 12 I could probably find on
Wikipedia and understand within a few weeks now. And pretty much any basic scientific knowledge you could
ever want to learn is explained with pretty videos on YouTube. On top of that, you have the most unstable job
market in almost 100 years, technology developing so rapidly that robots will be doing half the work in another
decade, college degrees that some argue are now worthless, and new industries and technologies being
invented practically every six months.
Yet were still pushing kids through the same curriculum their grandparents went through.
Its cliche at this point to say that the most important things you learn in life you dont learn in school. I know
in my life, the most important things Ive learned I had to figure out on my own as an adult.
But why couldnt these things be taught in school? I mean, if I had to spend six months learning about Chaucer
and Renaissance painters, why couldnt I spend six months learning about how to save for retirement and what
sexual consent was? Or why didnt anybody tell me that by the time I became an adult, a large percentage of
the job market would either be performed by robots or sent overseas?
Call me bitter. Or maybe just an entitled Millennial. But seriously, where were these classes? You know, the
ones with the shit I actually needed to hear? 1
Obviously, when I rule the world which should be any day now, waiting to hear back from some people
we wont have these problems. I will craft a curriculum of the perfect life knowledge to impart upon the
populace. And you will all thank me and give offerings of milk and honey and sexy virgins and maybe even
slaughter a goat or two in my name (sorry vegans).
But before I get carried away fantasizing, lets get real. What are the classes we should have had to take in high
school, but didnt? Here are five off the top of my head.

1. Personal Finance
Curriculum Would Include: Credit cards and interest rates and credit ratings and retirement accounts and
why you should start saving like $100 per week when youre 18 because by the time youre 50 youll be like a
quadruple-gajillionaire.
Seriously, compound interest runs the fucking planet. How did I not even hear about this until I was like 24?
Why Its Important: Because the average American household has over $15,000 in credit card debt.2 Because
36% of working Americans have NOTHING saved for retirement.3 Because this video exists:
Note: If you would choose the chocolate bar over the silver, and dont understand why this is a horrible
decision, meet me at this footnote. We need to talk. Now.4
If managing your own money was a school, the majority of the US population would be riding the shortbus.
And failing. And dropping out entirely.
This financial illiteracy is actually a really big problem. Because, see, if you have a society full of people
buying a bunch of crap they cant afford, retiring with no savings, getting sick and not being able to afford
health care well, that screws all of us in a major way.

You know, like exactly what is happening right now.

2. Relationships
Curriculum Would Include: Communicating your feelings without blaming or judging each other; how to
spot manipulative behavior and cut it off; personal boundaries and not being a pushover; honest discussions
about sexuality and how it relates (or doesnt relate) to love; Fuck Yes consent and how the experiences of
men and women differ.
Basically everything most of us learn by going through excruciating breakup after excruciating breakup.

Why Its Important: Because when youre in bed dying of nutsack cancer, youre not thinking about how
Napoleon got over-zealous in Russia or how the Meiji Restoration totally changed the face of Asian geopolitics
or how organic compounds are conspiring to make your brain rot.
Youre thinking about the ones youve loved in your life and the ones youve lost.
Many things make for a happy life, but few things have as much influence and impact as our relationships do.5
Learning how to not stumble through them like a drunken asshole and how to exercise some conscious control
of how you express your emotions and intimacy is possibly the most life-changing skill set Ive ever come
across.
Because were not just talking about how to get wifeyd and have sexy time. Were talking about capital-R
Relationships: how to be a good friend, how to not treat your family like dog shit, how to deal with conflict at
work, how to take responsibility for your own emotions and problems and neuroses without dragging the rest
of the world down with you.
As humans, we are fundamentally social animals. We dont exist in a vacuum. We cant. Our social bonds
make up the fabric of our life. The question is: are yours made of smooth silk or cheap polyester?

3. Logic and Reasoning

Curriculum Would Include: This question:

True or false: If all Biffs are Croons and all Croons are Darns, then all Darns are Biffs.
The answer, of course, is false. 6
Questions like this always felt annoying on standardized tests. But our ability to think through them actually
has major repercussions on our beliefs and how we lead our lives. For instance, following the same logical
progression as above, but with real-world examples:
Cindy creates conflict at the office. Cindy is a woman. Therefore women create conflict at the office. 7
Or:
Most criminals are poor. Most poor people receive welfare. Therefore most welfare goes to criminals.
These things are false, yet you see them reported in the media as fact, debated by leaders as if theyre valid
arguments, and become the foundation of many peoples biases and prejudices.
Just the other day, I saw possibly the stupidest article Ive seen in months. It tried to argue that sexual
objectification of women is wrong while sexual objectification of men is fine. Why? Because men arent raped
as often as women are.
Thats like Swiss-cheese territory of logical holes and fallacies.8
Why Its Important: The point is, were making these logical fallacies all the time. And often in subtle ways
that go unnoticed by us. And often regarding important decisions and beliefs that have life-or-death
consequences. They creep up in political campaigns (X is good at making money; governments need to make
money; therefore X will be good at government), civil rights issues, moral and ethical decisions (Bob lies to
me, therefore I should be able to lie to Bob), dealing with personal conflicts, and so on.
These logical fallacies then infiltrate our lives by causing us to make dumb decisions. Dumb decisions about
our health, our relationships, our career, pretty much everything.

Spock says that any disagreement with this article is illogical.

The problem is in school were rarely taught how to actually think or problem solve. Instead, were taught how
to copy and memorize things and then promptly forget them.9 This poorly suits us for sorting through the
complexities of adult life. And especially because in the 21st century, life is getting really fucking complex. I
feel like maybe the intellectual retreat were seeing recently into religious fundamentalism and other simpleminded cultures comes from this complete lack of preparation for a complicated postmodern world.

4. Self-Awareness
Curriculum Would Include: I know what youre saying right now. How the fuck do you teach selfawareness? But seriously, it can be taught and practiced like anything else.10
Self-awareness is the ability to think about how you think. Its the ability to have feelings about your feelings.
To have opinions about your opinions.
For example, I might think something like, I hate every person named Steve. People named Steve are bad
people.
This is a classic example of bigotry, a simple channeling of hatred through some superficial stereotype. And if
you lack all self-awareness, you will take this prejudice at face value.

Fuck you, Steve.

But if one is self-aware, theyll catch this thought and question it. Why do I hate people named Steve? Is it
maybe because my ex-boyfriend is named Steve? Is it because my fathers named Steve? Am I perhaps
channeling my anger for the Steves in my life onto all of the Steves of the world? I feel embarrassed at how
hateful I am. I should visit a shrink.
This is me thinking about my thoughts. Its me having feelings about my feelings. Its me having opinions on
my opinions. Its self-awareness. And the majority of people go through most of their life having very little of
it.
But it can be learned, like anything else, through practice. Basically anything that requires you to think about
what youre thinking, to have feelings about your feelings, is developing your ability to be self-aware. That
could be meditation, talk therapy, journaling, or just having a person really close to you point out your biases
and prejudices with some consistency.

Why Its Important: A high degree of self-awareness has been found in research to benefit, well, just about
everything. People who develop meta-cognition skills are better planners, more disciplined, more focused,
more attuned to their emotions, better decision-makers, and better able to foresee potential problems ahead.11
I also make the point in this article that self-awareness is possibly the most important trait in making a
relationship work.
In everything we do in life, theres only one tool that stays with us from beginning to end: our mind. It is the
great filter. Everything we do and everything that happens to us is filtered through our own mind and thinking.
Therefore, we need to invest the time and energy to understand our mind as well as we possibly can, because it
affects everything. Maybe you are quick to get angry and judgmental. Maybe youre laid back and overly
detached. Maybe you suffer from anxiety in a number of ways that are subtly holding you back. Maybe you are
impulsive and an expert at bullshitting yourself.
Whatever it is, we must all figure out our own tendencies and then learn how to monitor them and then adapt to
them.

5. Skepticism
Curriculum Would Include: Why everything we believe is most likely wrong to some degree; why our
memories are completely unreliable; how fields as seemingly sturdy as mathematics and physics are full of
unresolvable uncertainty;12 how were all terrible judges of both what made us happy/unhappy in the past and
what will make us happy/unhappy in the future;13 how the most important events in history are always those
that are least predictable;14 how its certainty and rigidness of belief that leads to evil and violence, not the
opposite;15 that much of what passes for scientific knowledge today is based on research that has repeatedly
failed to be replicated or verified;16 and so on.
Why Its Important: Pretty much anything good in life comes from uncertainty or a state of not knowing.
Uncertainty is what drives you to become curious, to learn, to test new ideas, to communicate your intentions
to others. Its what keeps you humble. It helps you accept whatever comes along. It allows you to see others
without unfair judgments and biases.
Pretty much anything bad in life comes from certainty: complacency, arrogance, bigotry and unfair prejudice.
People dont get together and form religious cults and then drink cyanide-laced Kool-Aid because theyre
uncertain about something. They do it because theyre certain. Governments dont starve and murder millions
of their own citizens because of uncertainty. They do it because of certainty. People dont fall into deep
depression, obsessively stalk their ex, or shoot up a school because theyre uncertain about themselves. They
do it because theyre certain.
Theyre certain in a belief that, like almost every other belief, is probably wrong.
Skepticism cultivates the ability to open yourself to alternatives, to withhold judgment, to question and
challenge yourself and make yourself a better person.
You dont actually know if Susy at work hates you or not. You dont actually know whether your boss is a dick
or just bad at communicating. Maybe his wife has cancer or something and he stays up crying all night. Maybe
youre the dick and you dont know it.
You dont really know if gay marriage will ruin the fabric of society or whether men and women really are so
different or the same. You dont know if that new job will make you happy, if getting married will fix your
relationship problems (Im betting on no), or whether or not your kid really deserves all those participation
awards.

Life is lived in the uncertainties. Our certainties are just strategies we use to avoid that life. To avoid adapting
and changing and flowing through it. Because education and learning shouldnt end when the last textbook
slams shut or when the diplomas are handed out. It should only end when we do.
Footnotes
1. Whenever I write articles bashing the US education system, I often get angry emails from teachers. I
just want to make it clear that Im not bashing the teachers themselves or the work theyre doing. There
are great teachers and there are shitty teachers. But theyre all stuck within a shitty system. And Im
sure many of them feel just as hamstrung with the antiquated curriculum as the rest of us.
2. As of July 2015. Pulled from the New York Feds Report on Household Credit Debt
3. USA Today. A third of people have nothing saved for retirement.
4. Hi there. Let me guess, youre having some money problems right now? Maybe own a few too many
flat screen TVs that you are having trouble paying off? Maybe a car you cant really afford but dont
want to give up? Maybe student loan debt five times higher than your annual salary? Well, the good
news is, things can get better. The bad news is that you manage money like old people fuck. Its not
pretty. You do know that ten ounces of silver is worth like $160, right? OK, look, Im not going to rag
on you. You need help. The best beginner-level book on personal finance Ive read is Ramit Sethis I
Will Teach You To Be Rich. Do yourself a favor and read it.
5. Vaillant, G. E. (2012). Triumphs of Experience: The Men of the Harvard Grant Study. Cambridge,
Mass: Belknap Press.
6. The way to approach these logic questions is to always replace the funny names with something more
tangible, like: All Eskimos are Canadian. All Canadians are North American. Therefore all North
Americans are Eskimos. When phrased this way, its obvious that there are tons of North Americans
who are not Eskimos. A surprising amount of students get questions like this wrong.
7. I love this example because it can be interpreted in both a misogynistic way and a misandrist way.
Chauvinist guys will say, Yeah, Cindy starts all the fights because shes a woman. Raging radical
feminists will say, Yeah, men pick fights with Cindy because shes a woman. Both conclusions are
logically incorrect (and bigoted).
8. This article was so infuriatingly dumb that Im not even going to link to it. Youre welcome
humanity.
9. For instance, most kids drop two grade levels in math over summer break.
10. In psychological jargon, self-awareness is known as meta-cognition.
11. Schraw, G. (1998). Promoting general metacognitive awareness. Instructional Science, 26(1-2), 113
125.
12. Godels Incompleteness Theorem showed that there are inherent limitations in any axiomatic system of
mathematics. Heisenbergs Uncertainty Principle shows that at a sub-atomic level, location and velocity
cannot be measured with precision at the same time.
13. See: Stumbling On Happiness by Daniel Gilbert for more on this.
14. See: The Black Swan by Nassim Taleb for more on this.

15. See: Evil: Inside Human Violence and Cruelty by Roy Baumeister for more on this.
16. The New Yorker. The Truth Wears Off.