Right
Unless you are an unfortunate citizen of a totalitarian state, knowledge and understanding, as a general rule, are defining factors in the overall success of your existence. The ability to read, write and complete basic mathematical tasks is vital to the mere survival of the modern civilian and I am sure that nobody reading is in the business of manslaughter.
The restriction of education has always been used by governments perusing policies of ethnic and social cleansing. In his novel 1984, George Orwell famously describes a state in which the only source of information is Big Brother and civil servants actively reduce the size of the dictionary in order to restrict the human mind because ultimately, knowledge is power.
Every student at the University of York has benefited from an environment in which they have been encouraged to explore the human condition, form opinions and fulfil potential. For this we are immensely privileged but it is wholly obscene to assert that education is a privilege.
Firstly, who has the right to decide who deserves an education? I do not want to see the day people have the quality of their education dictated to them by an education judge. Moreover, what kind of person will be denied schooling? Criminals? The poor? The work-shy? Education is bound up in so many of our human rights that it seems insane to even question its assumed universality. By educating, we pass on the soul of our society to the next generation in the hope that they will continue to build on existing achievements. Every day students rub shoulders with the engineers, the scientists and the writers of the future so why restrict this cycle?
All the clichés are true. To educate is to draw out what is within. Education is the progressive discovery of our own ignorance. Simply, the right to universal education undercuts the inequality and unfairness of capitalism and inspires people to change their lives for the better.
Finally, ignorance is the most corrosive part of a modern society and education has a vital role to play in the eradication of unawareness and misunderstanding. All types of bigotry are founded on misinformation and slander that are easily combated with a detailed explanation – education provides this.
To conclude, education must never be restricted. The censorship ruins lives and condemns many to perpetual poverty across the world. Nobody owns education and, certainly, nobody has the right to decide who is entitled to better themselves.
Privilege
Whilst you are reading this, YUSU will be busy preparing the buses, painting the posters and manning all stations for “#demo2012”, the NUS’ brainchild of a protest march on the streets of London on the 21st November. Their protest is aimed at hammering home a message of “scrapping fees and cuts” to name one of several soundbites.
This protest raises more questions than it is bound to answer, with the overhanging one being the “right to higher education” conundrum. In short, there has never been, and never will be, a right to Higher Education. It is a privilege, a fantastic one at that, and that is exactly how it should stay.
As far as ‘rights’ go, Local Education Authorities (LEAs) have a statutory duty to ensure that education is available for all children of compulsory school age (5 to 16 year olds) in their area. This does not include Higher Education, or even A-Levels. So on a very basic, legal level, there is not, and has never been a right to Higher Education. This is not to say that I don’t believe there is no right to an education. On the contrary, between those ages everyone, regardless of circumstance, should have free and simple access to education.
However, when Labour came to power in 1997, they declared an ambition for 50 per cent of school-leavers to go on to higher education, and it was this demand that has ultimately caused grave issues. It cannot be denied that every pupil should have the right to sit exams to gain entry to university, but such a concept is different to the right to go to university.
This insistence on steering school-leavers towards university has created a generation of young people who feel university is the only option to forward their careers. Long gone are the polytechnic colleges that offered practical qualifications for those who weren’t the brightest at school but possessed real talent in more hands-on fields. Now apprenticeships are seen as a less desirable option even though they are a real alternative route to a professional career that doesn’t have to involve Higher Education in its traditional format.
The move towards university as the only viable option has undoubtedly led to the feeling that it is a right that students must obtain a degree in order to progress up the life ladder. And what’s more, #demo2012 want you to believe it should be cheaper, if not free, and everyone should be able to access it. But that’s the problem. The movement for a right to higher education has already harmed a generation of students who sleepwalk into university because they feel it is their only option. Let’s not create another generation of the same.