Education

I am poorly educated.

Let me explain. I coasted through high school, without having to study much, picking up things by osmosis. When I got to college, I hardly studied at all. I went to a military academy, and I spent most of my time shining shoes, shining brass, making beds, ironing shirts, and buffing decks. I loved the military, the discipline, the rules, the regulations—most of my contemporaries did not. They were the smart ones—they paid as little attention possible to their shoes and brass, and focused their efforts on books. They understood what I didn’t: that in the long run, the only thing that matters is your grades. 20 years from now, nobody will give a flying fuck how shiny your shoes were in college. Nobody will care about your grades, either, but you never know. I graduated with a 3.03 grade point average, barely a B average, and for a while, that was a big handicap. Imagine explaining in Wall Street interviews why you had a 3.03, to financial institutions that typically only hired people with a 3.9 or higher. I must have been a smooth talker.

But here’s the real tragedy—I just didn’t learn as much as I should have. I got a C in my freshman English class. I got C’s in chemistry. Check that—I got an F in Chemistry 2, re-took it, and got a C+. I got B’s in physics—I’m not sure how, because I don’t remember a thing. I did get an A in American History; I would have received an A+ if it weren’t for one day when I fell so sound asleep in class that I fell out of the chair onto the floor. The professor actually tried to catch me. That hurt my class participation score. I slept in all my classes, except the few that I liked, like my creative writing class.

One math class that I was excited about taking was Linear Regression. I loved statistics. There were eleven chapters in the book. The instructor, a commander, only managed to get through Chapter 2 by two-thirds of the way through the course. He kept deriving the same formulas over and over again. Fuck you, I thought to myself, I don’t need to be awake for this, and would fall asleep on the desk, drooling all over the place. One day the commander got sick of my shit and asked me what cutter I would be stationed on after graduation. The Coast Guard Cutter Active, I said. “Boy,” he said, “do I feel sorry for your commanding officer. You will never amount to anything.” I don’t know if you’ve ever been told that you won’t amount to anything, but that can be a pretty powerful motivator. I’d like a word with that guy now, if he’s still around.

There are consequences to not learning. First of all, I’m not very good at Jeopardy. I’m better than my wife, but I should be a lot better than that. A lot of the questions pertain to stuff that I should have learned in school, but didn’t. It’s embarrassing. Or when I’m reading something and there’s a reference to something in history or literature that just goes over my head. It’s called being uneducated. I’m just not that well-read.

Part of this is because of sex. I had the highest SAT scores in my high school, but far from the highest grades. The two guys who finished one-two in my class were practically asexual. They were celibate. I was a serial monogamist, probably having twelve to fifteen girlfriends over the course of my time in high school, plus a few random encounters as well. It is difficult to describe the extent to which my sex drive dominated my thoughts. When I was in class, I could think of nothing else. It was a major distraction. And if I didn’t have that distraction, my life could have turned out very differently. Instead of going to the Coast Guard Academy, I might have gone to, say, MIT. That said, my sex drive was even more out-of-control when I got my MBA. But somehow, I determined to redeem myself later in life.

It's funny, because people in this country spend a lot time and resources trying to get as many people to go to college as possible, but we don’t really think about what they’re doing while they’re there. I’d estimate that for your typical state school, with all the partying and screwing around and the distractions, less than 10% of those students are realizing their potential. Less than 10% of those students comprehend the importance of education. College is wasted on the young. Part of this responsibility lies with the educators. In the classes I teach, I first tell the students that my job is to make them financially literate, informed citizens. That tends to get people’s attention. If you can frame it as: why this class is important and you will need this knowledge later in life, you have a shot at getting your message across. Parents have a role, too, but parents just want their kids to get good grades, rather than learn. You can get good grades without learning, by just following the rules, regurgitating information and doing the minimum.

When I was getting my MBA, my job was to learn. I was taking classes, but I was also getting a lot of enrichment outside those classes. I would show up to campus two hours early, head to the library, and read books on option pricing. I read everything I could get my hands on. And it was a good thing, because I was asked interview questions about the stuff I read in my free time. When you’re in school, you’re there to learn, and nothing else.

I am going to school right now. I am getting a Masters in Fine Arts in Writing. And here’s the interesting thing—it’s a good thing I am getting my second master’s degree, because without it, I really would be uneducated, owing to my poor study habits in college. I remember practically everything I learned in business school, probably because I worked my ass off. And I am learning a ton in my MFA program. When you’re in your late 40s, you’re doing it for the knowledge—you’re not doing it for the credentials. You’re trying to become more well-rounded. Though I have never had a desire to get a PhD—a PhD is too narrowly focused, and there’s politics involved, and you’re basically at the mercy of some dickhead advisor who has the power to take it all away from you. I know of a few people who have gotten screwed in such fashion. And I’m not much up for writing a dissertation. I like prose, I don’t like research papers, especially with 100 pages of citations.

The two most valuable classes I have taken in my MFA program were art classes—one Art History class, and one Art Criticism class. I’ve never taken an art history class in my life, and I wasn’t much looking forward to it. Both professors took themselves a bit too seriously. But the classes were wonderful. For the first time in my life, I can go into an art museum and know what I’m looking at—and talk about it intelligently. It’s a pretty important life skill. Great art has layers and layers of meaning, and a single painting can inspire thousands of words of analysis. My one objection is that there seem to be more art critics than there are actual artists, and the critics have a huge amount power over the artists. I was so inspired by the classes that I was motivated to take up painting after I finish my MFA program. My wife bought me canvases and paintbrushes for Christmas.

Most universities have lifelong learning programs at little cost for senior citizens in the area. And beyond the lifelong learning programs, pretty much anyone can walk in off the street and audit a college class. I highly recommend that seniors do this. It keeps you sharp, it keeps you social, and you keep learning stuff all the way until the day you die. The alternative is staying home with Fox News turned up to 11.

You don’t see me sleeping in class nowadays. I am bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. What the fuck does that mean, anyway?

Go fuck yourself,

Jared

Music recommendation: One of the joys of being a DJ is finding really obscure, but great music and playing it live in a club. Aegean Sunset by Double Kay absolutely rocked at my party at Doux back in the Spring. And it has—get this—just over 100 plays on YouTube.

The producer has been burning me up in SoundCloud messages since he learned that I posted his track. He’s sending me a bunch of originals and bootlegs. It’s probably the only time that track has ever been played live. And it’s a banger. I still have no idea how I found it.

P.S. We’re Gonna Get Those Bastards will always be free. Please forward to whoever you like.