Am I ready for the real world, will I pass the test?
You know it’s a jungle out there
Ain’t nothin’ gonna stop me, I won’t be second best,
But the joke’s on those who believe the system’s fair, oh yeah
People go back to school in increments in Winnipeg. Students at the college already began last week, the rest start this week, while my nephew and other uni students start in September, along with the rest of the school kids across the grades.
I know my Library Tech, and teacher friends already went back in the last three weeks of August, getting their classrooms and libraries ready, the new school year like a blank page stretching towards far-off December. Everyone knows December comes fast and comes hard, although it’s hard to think about it during a pleasant Labour Day Monday.
After the looser schedules of summer, it’s time to plan, meet, assign depending on the student or the teacher. It’s agendas filling up with to-do lists, projects and deadlines, books to read or an article to discuss. One of my favourite Twitter feeds features the jaw-dropping creativity of welding students. You read the right, I saw some amazing things with metal beyond the structural people usually associate with the trade.
On my end, it’s library instructions to deal with overwhelming information; how to filter, sift, and limit plus try to do that if English is not the first language. I read hot take after hot take about students not ready for post-secondary, and it makes me wonder, especially looking back at my own experience if this readiness we always idealize exists. Can a person take the right class or read the right book? It’s possible. It takes people like teachers, principals, instructors, profs, librarians, library techs, library clerks, education assistants and a combo of reading, writing, creating, and experiencing to swing from tree to tree in the jungle.
Unpaused Life 