Perhaps these are just my "American" values showing, but I would gladly trade a stifling order for more leeway and happiness in the lives of individuals.
I know because I grew up like that too, constantly being compared to others or told not to be anything but the best,
as well as learning most from the rote memorization method as opposed to being encouraged to apply critical thinking and being taught how to apply what I learned.
There were the good grades, but there were also few outlets. That's all I will say about that.
When you take away civility, you take away from the freedom of others. I mean sure, perhaps the methods they are teaching are outdated, but the drive behind education is the most important. You should be compared. When everything becomes "you are special" and "being wrong is right" then you become babied. As far as outlets go, that goes into entertainment and family and recreation.
What I'm saying is that parenting and the culture behind it is a major driver of education, as opposed to just looking at the system itself like many of you are.
Umm. My main point was that it wasn't the education system but instead the culture behind it. I apologize if I made it seem otherwise. When I went to Japan, they were learning stuff at the exact same level as I did in Oregon, however all the class understood it, as opposed in the United States where most students don't get it and miss 70 percent of the material and beg for extra credit.
There is a consistent generalization that Asian Americans all become doctors and lawyers,
and for the last two generations or so that has been mostly true, with few notable outliers,
although the Obama administration has given a high degree of visibility to a number of talented Asian American government officials and staff.
Putting people in office because of their skin in order to show that they aren't racist is racial. If they make it into office... fine.
When it comes to my school, (an art school) there are a large number of Asian students,
but they are all the aforementioned expatriates from the PRC or South Corea and come from backgrounds of financial and social means that de-stigmatize the pursuit of art.
Few AAMs go down this road because there is still a great deal of stigma against individuals like myself
who choose to turn our backs on the traditional prestige occupations, owing to the persistence of certain prevailing mindsets from the
older generations (parents) that have to do with socioeconomic concerns about job security and other reasons
(a child that becomes a doctor can help take care of you in old age; putting elders in homes is still anathema for many,
something I have mixed feelings on for a variety of reasons, but that will require more paragraphs).
I prefer providing for my family above all else, as it is the more fundamental basis for humanity. I like the quote, I must study politics and war, that our sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy... in order to give their children a right to study [art].
Becoming an artist is great though. However to abandon your family to become one I wouldn't recommend. I doubt you did that though.
To this day, most Asian Americans seeking higher education pursue degrees (for the prestige occupations)
at State Universities, mostly in California, as we have the most prestigious schools in the country
and the intake of Asian American students who later go into pharmaceuticals, law or other high-end fields continue to bolster the reputations and prestige of these schools, forming a cycle.
The emphasis on education is deeply ingrained across nearly all the Asian communities that have roots from the Sinosphere (Chinese, Corean, Japanese, Vietnamese)
but there is much less emphasis on emotional or social development, something I perceive as negatively impacting my community.
Happiness is a good thing. Always good to strive for that. I wouldn't lessen educational and ethical rigour for "emotional or social development" though. Obviously if something is bad, make it better. Emotional and social development doesn't happen behind closed doors though, it happens through the community and with family.
Please bear in mind that this is not an endorsement of the American education system, which I am highly critical of, for its varied problems by region, but namely the issues of racial hierarchy,
social stratification, the correlating problem of district demographics and the phenomenon of white flight,
modern social network bullying, budget cuts and the issue of rising tuition which further keeps higher education out of reach for many.
It's only that I wanted to point out the fallacy of making such a blanket statement about the Japanese education system without looking at a larger array of factors.
I apologize, but the comparison between all the problems with America's education and education culture and Japan and the Asian societies in America's position is... well, the Japanese still seem immensely... more successful.
Ethics and morality are too important to be left to the people.
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