No matter how smart you are, how well you excelled at school, there are bound to be things you wish could have been different. And if you didn’t mesh well with the strict boundaries of school to begin with, then you probably have more than a few complaints of your own.
These 14 people are ready and willing to share the things they disliked the most about their time in school (even if they’re still there), and I have to say, it’s pretty hard to argue.
14. You can fly under the radar.
As long as I got As and Bs any extenuating circumstances in my life weren’t a concern to them no matter how much it impacted my mental health.
I suffered the unique hell of being a “gifted kid” who went through severe depression in my teenage years, but I managed to keep my grades up for the most part so no one cared.
I spent every day thinking about how much I wanted to die but I was still getting A grades
13. They’re not handled very well.
Bullies.
It actually took me a long time to realize that I was bullied. My perception of what bullying is was extreme back then, I thought that other people had it worse and that I was just overreacting.
I didn’t want to consider it bullying since I considered my bullies to be my friends and at rare occasions they were actually kind of nice to me. But, they constantly talked bad about me in front of me, saying horribly mean things to me and laughed at me almost everyday.
It has impacted my mental health and self esteem so much till this day. All form of bullying should be taken seriously, even if it isn’t as “bad” as other cases.
12. You can get caught in no-man’s land.
I had the opposite experience. Failing grades? Couldn’t be a learning disability, probably this kid just isn’t aCtUaLLy ApLLyInG tHeMsElVeS. No chance there might be extenuating circumstances! Let’s just keep having the same lousy conversation with their parents for 12 years, “your child is so bright but they just don’t seem to be paying any attention, we’ve tried all kinds of discipline and it doesn’t seem to be working, but we’ll keep trying the same disciplinary tactics and see if they eventually snap out of it.”
Yeah no, took until I was 30 and several failed attempts at going to psych sessions to get diagnosed with ADHD, and after I was and I got a bit of correct counseling and tried a few meds, managed to educate myself enough to get a job in something that I’d been flirting with my whole life and everyone treated like an academic distraction instead of a potential life-skill (programming, specifically made a career of being a web dev).
I’m sure a lot of people get some Very Valuable Experiences(tm) out of public schools but they aren’t really prepared to assess the children in their system beyond some ratio of grades-to-behavior. Grades high, behavior acceptable? Must not be a problem.. low grades, kid acting out?? Welp, better fix the grades and quash the behavior.
It’s like turning up your car radio to block out that annoying sound your engine is making; you aren’t experiencing the symptoms, so the cause must be addressed. It’s soup brained but it’s the way they seem to want to handle things.
11. The nightmares never end.
The fact I graduated years ago and still wake up thinking I have an end of term paper due that I haven’t started yet and just ignored all semester.
10. As an instructor.
Former college professor here. I might return to teaching at some point in my career, but I’m working elsewhere for now.
My philosophy as a teacher was that I was ready to give A’s to 100% of my students, if they performed well. I did not grade on a curve. I believe that students should not be competing against their peers; they should be trying to master the material.
With that said, here’s what I disliked about school, as an instructor:
Students who would not come to me for help with problem sets, even though I had flexible office hours, and would personally reach out to students by email if I knew they were having trouble.
Students who plagiarize in their final projects. And there were a lot of them. Seriously, folks, the school told you they use Turnitin. We will know.
9. So many lies.
All the f**king lies.
In elementary school, it was “If you don’t hand write your work, you’ll get a 0 in high school.” or “You can’t do math in pen, you’ll get 0 in high school.” or “You have a permanent record that follows you to university or college.” or “I’m not repeating what the homework was because in high school they won’t repeat things that you miss for you.”
Worst lie of all was “Teachers don’t have favourites.” Yes. You. F**king. Do.
8. They can’t keep up.
How horribly outdated and inefficient the education system is
7. They do no good.
Exams, ruins it all 🙁
And then a few days after the exam, we’ll all forget what we “learned” about. Truly a pointless thing and a waste of time.
6. Discipline is hit and miss.
How bullies got zero consequences for their actions, and only the bullied were punished.
It took me almost a decade to learn to love myself, even with the help of my family.
5. So many hours.
Long hours and the curriculum.
I spend way less time working than I spent in class/studying/doing homework.
4. No one trusts you.
I hated feeling chaperoned all the time. Hated being grouped in with kids who refused to mature (peaking mainly of high school)
Adults watching our every move and making sure we’re in a safe environment I.e. school dances and such. I mean I get it, I just felt like for me it wasn’t really needed, and I hated the “sheltered” feeling as I was never sheltered early on and maybe saw too much and grew up a little faster, so around high school I was living in a different household where they’d try to “shield me from the world” and I found it ridiculous.
High school was the same way. This all sounds like a ME problem I know but these are just my thoughts about it lol
3. That’s definitely not the best.
the fact i’m anxious 24/7 about it
2. Learning isn’t paramount.
Learning isn’t about discovering and growing like it should be. It’s about memorizing information and then passing a test.
It takes the fun out of learning and makes it obligatory.
1. There are so many of them.
People.
“People” individually are fine, but in a school where interactions are self contained amongst a few hundred people at most who spend a ton of time around each other, it leads to reputations spreading fast, cliques forming, social hierarchies, etc.
There are so many things we could do better in education, and it’s frustrating that changes come so slow or not at all.
What were your least favorite things about school? Let’s lengthen our list in the comments!
