Whenever I ask students to discuss what is wrong with our schools, a significant minority say that the main trouble is that classes "aren't fun."  They may word it a little differently – classes aren't "interesting" or "entertaining" enough – but it's all the same idea.  If what goes on in the classroom isn't fun or entertaining, they're going to tune out.  Indeed, they feel they are entitled to tune out.  Classes are to be treated like TV shows.  If the math channel or English channel isn't entertaining, the appropriate response (so they think) is to mentally switch channels to something that is, perhaps to the cartoon network of text-messaging their friends.

Many blame the high dropout rate among students on the low entertainment value of schoolwork.  According to this view, kids drop out of school (or at least cut classes) for much the same reason that people leave a party that they consider boring.  If what people are doing or talking about doesn't interest them personally, there is no reason to stay.  Of course, it doesn't occur to them that one should not apply the same criteria to a class as one applies to a party.  It's all about having a good time, and anyone who thinks otherwise is a stuffed shirt and a party pooper.

Behind this viewpoint is another premise – what is covered in school must be only what children want school to cover.  To put it another way, what is taught must be what kids have already decided that they want to learn.  The idea that we all need to learn certain things, whether or not we are interested in them, is tossed aside.  If reading, writing, math, science, history, or anything else doesn't interest students, they may opt out.

An equally absurd premise is that children and young people have a rather good idea of what they need and where they are going.  This idea is absurd because it assumes that children and youth are mature enough to know these things, whereas thay are, by definition, not mature.  They are not experienced enough and don't know enough to foresee what they may need.  Indeed, many young adults change direction dramatically as they have more experience.  They change majors in college; they shift to new careers that they never even considered previously.  What we learn by opening our minds can often shape and reshape the roads we travel.  What we're studying may be boring or uninteresting at the time, but nothing is more monotonous and boring than the easy path, which has no pitfalls and therefore no challenges.

Probably because we want our children to be happy, we adults are tempted to buy into the idea of making everything easy.  Well-intentioned parents feel compelled not only to give children whatever they want (or at least as much as the parents can afford) but also to avoid forcing them to do what they adamantly do not want to do.  (This tendency to put children in charge is examined in another article.)  We become conspirators in their pursuit of the easier, softer way.  It is sort of like letting them eat nothing but junk food, even though we know that doing so will jeopardize their future health.

We adults know, or should know, that we must often do things that we don't want to do – sometimes things that are very difficult or unpleasant – to obtain the things we want.  To afford both necessities and our adult "toys," we have to work, and work can sometimes be unpleasant or difficult.  That's why it's called work.  It is nice if our work is interesting or enjoyable, but we don't expect it to be.  When it isn't, we look upon it as a means to an end.  If we are fortunate, productive work and self-satisfying pleasure begin to overlap, but this is more likely to happen if we have "endured" the rigors of education.  The educated person has more choices, so the payoff is not just the possibility of more money but the increased chance of doing work that is more than just a job.

A student commented, "Life is painful and hard enough.  There's no good reason why school should be hard and painful as well."  This student misses the point.  All those years in school are supposed to be preparation for life, not an escape from it.  If it's all, or even mostly, fun and games, it can hardly accomplish this goal because life is not all, or even mostly, fun and games.  Besides, if all we do in school is play, our lives in the years beyond school will be even harder and more painful.

Let us hasten to add that we shouldn't go out of our way to make the school years more painful and harder than they need to be.  Most of us don't purposely make life itself difficult.  We seek happiness and contentment, not misery and pain.  We seek entertaining and interesting activities and shun drudgery and boredom.  Nevertheless, we learn from experience that a certain amount of misery, pain, drudgery, and boredom is unavoidable.  We may try to minimize these elements, but no human being has successfully eliminated them.  That's the way it is.

Ironically, the more we work in school, the more likely we will be to minimize the negatives of later life.  We become more adept at converting boredom into something interesting.  Obviously, the more interests we have (something that education is supposed to provide), the less likely we are to be bored.  The more skills we have (something else that we develop largely through education), the less more likely it is that seemingly insurmountable difficulties will become merely challenges that we can meet, often with considerable satisfaction that we have met them.

Whatever happened to the concept that meeting challenges and overcoming them can be a source of gratification?  Whatever happened to the pride (and joy) of mastering something difficult.  Are we so addicted to instant gratification that these concepts are now meaningless?  Whatever happened to the idea that learning is an achievement, that when we learn something, we have accomplished something worthwhile (even if, perhaps, we never use what we have learned)?  Has this been replaced by the idea that, as long as we possess the piece of paper that called a diploma or a degree (which is, after all, just a piece of paper), nothing else matters?

Well, yes, apparently something else does matter, and it matters very much to some students.  The something else that matters very much is that they had fun getting the diploma.   If they didn't, it was a waste of time.