I often wonder about the value of education. While I was growing up, my family constantly emphasized how important education is. My dad used to say that education is the most important investment you could make. My mom used to put teaching me English above everything else because she believe it is the key to the world. In essence, I was raised in an atmosphere that framed education as the holy grail of life. I believe I took that for granted.

As I became older and had more contact with the outside world, both professionally and culturally, my perspective shifted. I gradually realized that not everyone and not every culture shared my family’s dogma. In time, I got to meet people whose goal in life was to be rich, to settle down with a partner and kids, or to climb the career ladder. The world was not about knowledge. That sounds trivial to 36 year old me. But, back then, it made me bewildered.

I am in no position to judge what people want to be in life. To each their own. What interests me however, is to ponder the collective’s opinion of education. While the individual has every right to pursue their calling, society averages out the trend. And so, if it as a whole statistically marginalize a certain aspect of life, that indicates a systematic issue worthy of investigation.

One cultural shock that I had when I moved to the US is realizing that the vast majority of those doing a PhD there are foreigners, rather than a locals. I have found that to be an interesting phenomenon. From my perspective, it appear that American society values hard work more than education. But, there is a major factor at play here: The expense of education.

American schools are some of the most expensive ones on the globe. When it comes to higher education cost, the US is an outlier in the western world. Most European countries have free universities funded by taxpayer money. Americans, on the other hand, need to take huge loans to put themselves through college, making them eager to join the workforce afterwards to payback that loan and build wealth.

The US society seems to be structured around making money. US Education, the way it is administered now, does not usually serve that paradigm. I am not here to judge a culture. I believe all cultures have their pros and cons, and it depends on your perspective. But, I personally believe that a society that does not value education aggregately is a society that will face many social issues and be challenged to solve them. Solutions start at the individual level. If the individual is not educated, then change will not come easily.