The Australian Education System Sucks

The room they sat in had four walls, two doors, and a roof. In case of a fire it was important to remember to exit through the left door only, because if you scurried out the right door, you would be trapped, and die. The walls were of fine white painted brick, of the large concrete family, piled at least 21 high, and more than twice that wide, many people sat in this room.

Taped to the wall, no push-pin could penetrate a perfect mix of paint and pores rock, was a littering of patsy papers, some with portrait prints of famous, promiscuous, dead people, some catchy quotes and slogans to live by, and the random sauce picture of someone far less fortunate then yourself.

A large dirtied writing board sat at the front of the room, anchored and fastened to the wall, whilst it was a black one? Dusted with dinosaurs? Or a fancy white one? Creamed with chemicals? Is of little importance, but what it read meant the world to those people. At least it did until a sharp siren echoed through he carbon copy rooms some 70 minutes later.

The words marched through one ear and out the other, except with the rude boys that sat in the rear right of the class; parts of the lesson sometimes meandered out other orifices in their body. Could anyone in this so called class remember 20 minutes past the 70 minutes why they had to learn about sex appeal, in their advertising unit, of their grade 11 English class, or why their acting ability was worth more of a mark, then their ability to put together a coherent, properly formatted sentence, or better yet why do they have to act in English at all?

Some of the famous dead people that portraits plaster the walls wrote some plays, that was the teacher ladies excuse.

Not a play does the same as a tale, it weaves a web of wonder, it sings a sorrow filled song, lets loose a story of love. She didn’t even state the obvious, well she did, but it was the wrong obvious. A play tells a complete story, beginning, middle, end, and is written and told completely in dialogue. The way the people talk uses literary devices, amazing alliteration, iambic-pentameter can even add sophistication to the rich.

None of this was said, but was said was make a play, it will be fun.

These 70 minutes, plus 20 minutes, plus 50 minutes, plus days and nights later, I still wonder, why?