What's in that box ?

What’s in That Box?

The Death of Individuality and Originality

A note to the reader: The opinions expressed in the article are entirely my own and do not represent my current employer’s standpoint on education or, for that matter, the IBO’s.

               Of all the curious, obscure phrases that have sneaked into our daily vernacular, it is the phrase “thinking out of the box” that strikes me as the most ironic, especially when one considers how it is flung about with a dash of self-righteousness in the field of education – where originality and individuality have been almost completely weeded out. My sources (www.brainstorming.co.uk) claim that the phrase originated from the 9-dot puzzle used by management consultants to gauge the level of original thinking in their applicants. The puzzle has three rows with three dots each, and it requires the applicant to find a way to draw four straight lines connecting all nine dots without lifting the pencil from the paper. This, naturally, can only be done if the straight lines you trace extend beyond the box.

            When a teacher or a student is advised to “think out of the box”, it is meant that he is to “think differently, unconventionally, from a new perspective”. It is the word “unconventionally” that defeats most academic establishments. The explanation for this is easily comprehensible if you comprehend that, in general, schools are run by those who have willingly put themselves through some sort of a “management course” that is modelled on the ever-idealistic, formulaic American notion of corporate management. The aim of this branch of management is to mobilise employees in such a way that productivity (read: revenue) can be maximised. In other words, if employees are conditioned to observe company rules and ethics to the letter, there is a minimum risk of their posing bothersome questions and therefore obstructing the money-making machine.

            The same tactic has been adopted by educationists and applied to school systems all over the world.  To disguise its unappetising tang, euphemisms such as “team player” and “underachiever” were introduced to make things a little more palatable. “Team player”, a term hijacked from American sport psychology, was welcomed by school managers from Amsterdam to Zagreb with open arms due to its (faux) positive ring. It suggests the school is a team that invites individual contribution, but what the word in fact means is: “One who is prepared to combine his or her efforts with those of others for the group’s purposes rather than for individual benefit. He or she may need to subordinate personal interests, possibly forfeiting individual accomplishments and honour for the sake of the team” (Cashmore, 2002). There is essentially nothing wrong with combining one’s efforts with those of others. The problematic terms here are “subordinate” and “forfeit”, both of which demand the death of the individual.

            Which is an unnecessary, wasteful death.

            Man had had to trudge through centuries of ignorance and unimaginable cruelty to arrive at the gate of enlightenment in the eighteenth century. Here he was finally able to see himself in his own image, to think his own thoughts, to perceive the world from his own unique perspective rather than that of an omniscient, impersonal God. Having this glorious achievement vulgarised by our unreasonable need for conformity and monetary gain, all in the name of “good education”, is the ultimate sacrilege.

It is also called hypocrisy when one does the complete opposite of what one preaches, and nowhere is this phenomenon more rampant than in education. We tell our students to “think out of the box” and “be their own individuals”, but we ourselves, the teachers, are manufactured by the million by the same droning machine using the same inflexible mold. We lie to our students and to ourselves when we instruct them to be original, because our antediluvian school mentality has long murdered the original in us – much like the hardcore communist regime that murders its thinking individuals.

            For it is a dark time in education when reactionary school managers who have no affinity with young people start telling teachers they must be team players or else. Schools worldwide are now nothing more than breeding grounds for that Nietzschean favourite of mine: “herd mentality”. Teachers are android-like beings who fanatically adhere to their rigid lesson plans; who agree with each other even though it is more sensible to disagree; who make up perfect test papers because every “good” teacher must do so; who say yes when the question clearly begs for no; who fall in line when it is apparent the line is crooked. It borders on the absurd when professionals who claim to nurture originality are themselves soulless automatons assembled by the big, bad machine. What, then, happens to the individual who does things just a little differently? He is sidelined and condemned as Meursault in Camus’ The Outsider, for not embracing the same ideals and sentiments as the masses. He is branded “unprofessional” and effectively silenced.

            So how does a teacher find solace amidst all this oppression? He keeps an eye out for that unusual student who dares to pose questions and challenge authority for the right reasons. He tells himself that exceptional personalities do surface now and then despite the weight. The teacher knows, purely through the wonder of common sense, that the student who will make a difference in the grand scheme of things is not the one who scores 35 points and above, but the one who scores 35 points and above, and understands that examination grades do not and never will measure a man’s worth.

           Edward Ong

           English A1 HL/SL