Everyone goes to school — even if you drop out of high school you went through at least 10 years of federally-mandated schooling, and if you are a student at Mississippi State University, you have probably been in school for much longer.  This is obvious to us and rarely causes a second glance, but really, why do we go to school, and why for so long?  Regularly we hear the topic of education fly around as political ammunition, giving candidates something to argue about, but really what are these politicians saying, and is their notion of education changing from what it used to be?
   The executive branch of the United States federal government makes statements about education on its website, whitehouse.gov, referring to K-12 education as a tool for economic superiority that should maximize the potential for every American.
   “In today’s global economy, a high-quality education is no longer just a pathway to opportunity — it is a prerequisite to success. Because economic progress and educational achievement are inextricably linked, educating every American student to graduate from high school prepared for college and for a career is a national imperative,” says the education page of whitehouse.gov. “To create an economy built to last, we need to provide every child with a complete and competitive education that will enable them to succeed in a global economy based on knowledge and innovation.”
     Usually the rhetoric employed by candidates on the campaign trail also refers to education as a tool for boosting the workforce, improving quality of life or increasing the national gross domestic product.  Is that really education’s purpose?  Such a narrow and utilitarian view of education would most likely shock the ancient Greeks, who so heavily influenced what we would recognize as education.  Yes, Aristotle’s educating Alexander the Great met with truly spectacular results, but Aristotle himself had little influence on Alexander’s military expertise.
    We should use education to spread knowledge and eradicate ignorance of history, culture and scientific and mathematical discoveries, but the greater purpose of education is to teach students how to think on their own and function independently in society.  The kind of education provided by the ancient Greeks emphasized examining oneself and one’s goals through Socratic dialogue and learning how to evaluate one’s goals.  
    Joseph Trullinger, visiting assistant professor of philosophy and religion at Mississippi State University, expressed we should use education to train ourselves to evaluate our goals and make us responsible for them in a logical fashion, but that in modern times, we often concern ourselves more with simply learning how to achieve our goals.
     “The important role education performs is teaching people to reflect on their goals, and on what goals they should have,” Trullinger said.  
    Consequently, rather than identifying a goal and learning how to achieve it, our goal in education should be to help us identify whether or not these goals are inherently good.  
    Trullinger continued by saying education equips a nation for democracy where different groups can find a consensus in logic, rather than through sharing identical implanted goals and ideologies.
     “Democracy is predicated upon the idea that despite coming from different backgrounds, people can logically find common ground,” Trullinger said.
   This does not mean every single person has to learn exactly the same or everyone needs to have a common core to function in the job market or in political dialogue.  Rather, a common education, one that prepares each member of society to continue to learn and function on his or her own without the assistance and forced guidance of a teacher, allows for everyone to come to a rational consensus — one enriched by the diversity of backgrounds in the dialogue.
    Education should continue to train people for their chosen goals, but in the K-12 years, it may be best for democracy and personal development across the board if we try to use education as it was originally intended.  We should be able to identify good life goals and defend them and then use our resulting diverse life paths to further the nation in rational, democratic dialogue that looks at issues from all perspectives and seeks true progress.