Yes, it does exist! Years of careful research and painstaking observation have confirmed that, although it has appeared increasingly elusive, life after exams is in fact a reality and not a mirage in the desert. Unfortunately, lots of students don't discover this fact because, right after CAPE or SATs, they are off to another school and exam experience, in a tertiary education institution. The concept of taking a year off after finishing secondary school has almost disappeared. In fact, many people are actively hostile to the idea. The main argument against taking time off seems to be that if you do this, you will never go back to school. Suppose you start working and really like your job? Suppose you're having a really good time and don't want to stop? Suppose you just end up never pursuing tertiary education? That argument seems to imply that education is a torturous, miserable exercise. You have to be forced to plunge in, like ice-cold water, and once in, you have to keep going without pause. If you ever get out into the warmth, it will be much harder to make yourself go back in. So you must keep driving yourself until the whole ordeal is over. Then, and only then, can you pause and breathe.
This is part of the same misguided attitude towards education which this column noticed some weeks ago, when we noted that the popular idea of education is relentless drilling and cramming. This same attitude cannot fathom that someone might actually enjoy education and be looking forward to continuing. It's all a grim exercise, so let's get it over and done with, eh? Are parents eager for their children to finish so they can be free of the financial burden? This would be reasonable, except that, even now that education is free, parents are still frantic for their children to move on to tertiary as quickly as possible. So this attitude has become part of the culture and no-one questions it. First of all, to allay some fears...Where students are eager to enter a course of study, and this is based on realistic ambitions, then taking a year – or more - off will make them more eager, not less. A generation ago, before scholarships to American universities were easily available to non-US citizens, and before free tertiary education, students often took time off simply because they needed time to accumulate funds to pay for their education. Parents also needed time to do the same thing – in those days, there were no text book programmes, and books for primary and secondary school added up to thousands of dollars. And there are many, many inspiring stories, from then and earlier generations, of people who struggled for a long time to acquire the necessary resources, but who never lost sight of their ambitions. These people aren't heroes or well-known names, simply people who had to work a little harder to achieve their dreams.
Furthermore, any young person who is going to be turned away from tertiary education because he or she is having too much 'fun' working and/or liming, probably wasn't ready to start that phase of education in any case. Perhaps s/he was only doing so in response to parental pressure or expectations. Or perhaps interests changed or the young person came to realise that his/her ambitions were dreams rather than reality. Certain professions have considerable glamour and status attached to them, fuelled by ideas from the popular media and by attitudes in the society. However, the reality of these professions and the training needed for them, is vastly different – not glamorous at all. So a young person who changes his/her mind, or who decides not to enter tertiary education after all, may have very good reasons for doing so. And when they feel the desire strongly enough, they will find a way to continue studying. More next week...