Assignment #7: The Perplexing Benefits of Glorified Education- Kelly Landry

         I think the education system is pretty ridiculous. Students are expected to go to school for 12 years, for over 9 months a year, get outstanding grades, participate in clubs, and do community service with not much of a struggle. Finally we take a test, which might I add is an achievement test (an assessment of skills and abilities on specific fields of knowledge) and not an intelligence test (an assessment of intellectual functionality and potential), which essentially predesignates what our future will look like because our score determines what colleges will accept us and what scholarships we are eligible for. Students go to years of preparatory school to go into an excessively expensive glorified "big boy/girl school."
         That said, education is still extremely beneficial in several regards. School provides a place where students can aspire to learn, build community, and discover new information.
         Psychology: the scientific study of the human mind and its functions. I find this subject endlessly intriguing because it provides an explanation for mundane occurrences. These include the phenomenon where hindrances to the accomplishment of work exist due to the presence of a collaborative group which is caused by the diffusion of responsibility, also known as social loafing. However psychology divulges the rarer inner-workings of the human mind such as conversion disorder, a disorder in which someone develops physiological symptoms such as blindness or paralysis without actual medical explanation.
         With a degree in psychology I hope to help others. I am an unbelievably indecisive person so I don't know what career path I want to go down, however, my top choices are criminal psychology (my top choice at the moment, probably due to all the crime shows I've been watching recently), industrial organizational psychology, therapy, and psychiatry.