Like every single time we go, it's a period of pure glee and joy and happiness. It becomes a symbolic place. Every year it provides me with an opportunity to reflect upon my year and continue forward where I'm lacking in mobile cell reception, unwanted visitors and all other forms of technology. I can reach a place where I'm so in touch with nature and my passions. I listen to music and surf and walk and every single day I fall asleep and wake up to a view of the beach. I can detoxify not only my body but my mind. I can hear the waves and have time for myself and have the support and connection with my closest friends and family. I laugh constantly and smile and feel free. I don't know anyone else. I don't know anywhere else I feel so at peace and at home. I know the area like the back of my hand. We have been for 8 years straight now. A fair few life stages.. for all eight of us. Many New Years Eves', countless surfs and rekky's (both successful and unsuccessful), the loss and gain of our nearest and dearest, new friendships, new careers, a new dog... or two.... but always a pleasure, every year.
The Australian education system is just simply unjust. The system as a whole in crisis...? The education system has failed 21st century students.
We've lost our competitive advantage, our ability to recreate, to learn and to absorb. Australia isn't teaching innovative creators but instead oppressed, spoon fed adolescents that come out of school with a negative attitude and an increased competitive psyche.
Knowledge has become a commodity, something that is used to motivate and encourage the Australian economy. School is no longer privileged as a place to learn, grow and challenge but instead a place to compete, become exceedingly psychologically unstable and become a artefact that can be compared with the mainstream individual. The creative imaginations that children once had, pre-kindergarten are no longer available.... our next generation is oppressed. We are restricted from our knowledge that should very well be constantly changing and growing exponentially. The extent to which our 'knowledge is free' has become essentially, a foreign concept. Our education system, the community of bewildered, repressive and unaware adults that use syllabus' as a way to stunt the rites of passage involving creative thinking and growth. Children are encouraged to memorise the planets, the stars, the periodic table of elements, however that can only take a person so far.
Our education system was created in an industrial era...an era that is increasingly outdated. We are living in the modern age, the 21st century, 2014... a fast paced technological period. We are using this mass production style of education... a process of standardisation. A system that suits the all rounded, mainstream kid.. the perfect kid of which 99% of individuals do not fit into. Apparently this is how we want to produce the next generation and the generation after that. How long will it take us to realise that it isn't working...? That 16, 17 and 18 year olds are suffering from mental illness and anxiety, psychological instability that pervades everyday life... not only during the HSC but also into their adult lives. Are our authority figures totally oblivious or just inherently incapable of recognising this expanding crisis? There is change that needs to be made but apparently the people that dominate and determine are just plain impervious.
But we, as students need to look at ourselves.... we have power, we can have authority if we set our minds to it. Why are we so paralysed by fear? We are we swallowing our words.
What makes us think that a group of adults have ultimate control over every aspect of our life?
I'm here to just write and create... about all the fun, groovy, good, little life adventures. I want to be a diary... an edited one at that. I love spontaneity and nature, the beach, music, festivals, genuine people ...
