The school system is meant for the education of students, but in practice is only made convenient for the educators. In the present day, curriculum has actively made the push for standardization of subject matter, testing students all across the country on the same things and using the comparisons between each student to hold ‘rankings’. However, the usage of this system has simultaneously created unnecessary pressures on students to perform well instead of focusing on learning, as well as lead teachers to alter their teaching style around these tests, which also leads to less retention of information. With this current standardization of education, our school system does not place the focus on the education of the students, who feel underprepared going into the working world after they graduate. In order to place the importance of learning back into our school system, we need to break off of standardized testing and focus on our students once again.

While generalized information still should hold value in our education system, students emerging as young adults still are not receiving what the critical skills they require in order to gain an advantage in the workforce. While still succeeding in teaching hard skills, which are skills that focus on practicality and concrete processes, school systems fail in coaching students on social and problem-solving skills. These mentioned ‘soft skills’ provide much more use for young adults in the work market as opposed to hard skills. Systems that provide more of an emphasis on soft-skills will prepare kids better for jobs and create a richer population of new workers that will have more opportunities and drives for better careers.