The words on a degree certificate of a standard university usually include the proclamation, “…having been found worthy in character and learning…” This presupposes that the degree recipients imbibed not just book knowledge but also moral and ethical principles which are expected to be visible in their attitudes and behaviors throughout life. Sadly, this is not always so. We see littered on our landscape ‘proud’ carriers of these ‘degrees’ who are neither knowledgeable in their specialties (especially after some years) nor possess the ethics, values and mannerisms that are required of them.
Education is defined in one dictionary as ‘The process of imparting knowledge, skill and judgment’. Thus, academic profiles are in themselves nothing. Left on their own, academia and academies are empty jargons and edifices. When academic pursuit is devoid of application in bringing solutions to human problems, then it is void.
We must draw a line between learning and ‘certificated’ education. Learning is progressive, adaptable, humble, pragmatic, realistic and futuristic. Certificate Education is narrow, boastful, arrogant, rude, stagnant and highly combustible. Learning and knowledge take action. Certificated Education is full of inertia and uninspiring. Learning and knowledge leads, sees visualizes and solves issues. Certificated education seeks only recognition and self aggrandizement
When our grammar, postulations conceptual frameworks, theories, strategies and arguments are only in the realm of sensual gratification and psychological day dreaming, then of all men we are most miserable.
I used to hear that “too much knowledge maketh thee mad.” Now I understand. I would even add that ‘too much certificated education makes one uneducated, less knowledgeable and hopelessly out of tune with reality.’
There is something odd that is embedded in the DNA of certificated education. It makes one handicapped in the exercise of common sense and natural intelligence. Learning and knowledge leaves the laboratory and gets into the mix of the fiery furnace of real life experience. It is not afraid to pit the skills acquired against an evolving world. It can’t but win because it is real and practical. On the contrary, certificate education is cowardly, insipid, lazy and makes a huge bombastic cacophonous noise.
I have also observed that certificated education makes one unable to lead people to a place of permanent beneficence. ‘At the first instance of trouble’ recipients escape into theosophies, outlandish language, and grandiose talk just to mask their inability to solve practical problems.
True learning opens up the mind to the golden rays of divine illumination. Therein lies enlightenment. Recipients are liberated spiritually and mentally to be all that God wants them to be. They become people of purpose. Light comes and darkness flees. Then the learning and knowledge of the sciences, arts, humanities, social sciences and theology will be of benefit to man and God. Because the source is divine, it must flow out. It must be selfless, reaching out to teach, nurture, grow, share, hug and impact.
Certificated education on the other hand is selfish, bland, colorless and of no use to man. It is fearful, fretful, unsure, insecure, unsteady and cannot lighten any burdens.
Certificated education is sensuous, carnal, ultra-competitive and fault-finding. It gives its adherents a false sense of importance and inflames their ego. They are very poor leaders. No wonder they cannot inspire anybody and nobody will follow them. The DNA of certificated education is so narrow that it frowns on real vision. It vaunts itself and always asserts itself. Why? because of its ingrained hollowness, shallowness and emptiness.
True learning and acquisition of knowledge is free, unhindered and unencumbered by lower elementals. It is an open mind which beams with smiles at the sight of progress and rejoices in other people’s elevation. It is a life-long journey. Certificated education is consigned to the classroom and stops to learn at graduation.
How do we know the difference between learning and certificated education? It is in real-life situations. In the choices we make, in our moral comportment, in our altruism and serendipity, in our love, care and reaching out, in our abhorring evil and speaking up for righteousness, in our showing example and our refusal to surrender our values and ethos. It is also seen in our forgiveness.
School should be an experience, nurturing and grooming the total man. He leaves the school equipped with most that is needed to contribute to the society. Certificated education only memorizes what others have said or done. He leaves the school with only a ‘certificate’, no ennobling value or moral rectitude. He will be a parasite.
In time past, a certificate was like the Rod of Moses to he used to part the “Red Sea” of unemployment. Alas the real Rod of Moses was more than a certificate. It was power and life. It led the people across the sea. It brought forth water from a rock. True education should be so; bringing light wherever darkness reigns.
Olisa Egwuatu
Editor- in- Chief
Olisa Egwuatu,a writer, Sports manager, Consultant and Youth Coach lives in Lagos.He is a Founding Trustee and CEO of Howzat Foundation for Cricket based in Lagos.
An alumnus of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka.
