Education is an investment

It's less than four days to the new year now, are you excited about it? There's something about entering a new year, it comes with a feeling of being able to accomplish anything and we are usually full of energy.

A funny occurrence happened in my city yesterday; it suddenly rained! It's weird but I am not surprised, coz the weather over here can be really crazy sometimes. We are supposed to be in the middle of the dry season now, specifically harmattan but instead, we are having the complete opposite: rain.

While it was raining yesterday, I suddenly remembered the conversation I had with my dad concerning my education. He was asking when I will be done with the whole thing, so I explained I will be in my final year next year, so it will probably all be over in 2023.

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I knew why he was asking; he is tired of paying different fees and levies 😆 well, he is not alone on that, I am also tired of the whole thing and can't wait to graduate. Will life be easier by then? I don't think so, I will end up with lots of responsibilities, seeing as I am even the first child.

My parents have invested in my future by making sure I have a sound education. So, how is education an investment? According to the Cambridge dictionary;

investment is the act of putting money, effort, time, etc. into something to make a profit or get an advantage, or the money, effort, time, etc. used to do this.

Education is an investment in the sense that you put in money, time, and effort into it for the sake of getting an advantage in the future. That advantage is mostly money-related; you get educated so you can apply such knowledge in the world and make a profit from it.

Most parents send their kids to school in the hope of investing in their future, so they will have someone to take care of them in old age and at the same time help their kids to secure their future. But unfortunately, I have witnessed some persons in my university that I have concluded are wasting their parent's money and efforts.

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What I mean by this is that they never take their education seriously. Some persons might argue that it doesn't matter, as long as they are having good grades then it's ok. But most of the time, such good grades come by cutting corners, either by paying off lecturers (in cash or in kind) or by cheating during examinations.

At the end of the day, what do we have? We end up with graduates who don't know what they are doing. They have been cutting corners their whole life in the university, then they will bring such attitude into the career world.

The ones that are lucky enough to get good jobs usually do so by the same cutting corners, it's all based on who you know. People like that will eventually end up at the top after years of cutting corners (as usual) and in the end, we have people that aren't qualified leading the ones that are qualified (a certain president comes to mind).

What about the unfortunate ones? They venture into the world of crime. Most of them actually start from the university, which is usually why they are not interested in school anymore because they are making lots of money from their criminal enterprise.

The males go into cyber fraud while the females go into prostitution, but it's all good because they are still making money that can be used to take care of their parents, right? Wrong!

Picture this; after graduating from school, the young man is now fully into fraud, he has even built a house and bought cars and his parents are hailing him coz he is bringing money into the family and all their needs are well taken care of. The parents know what their son is into but they ignore it, coz why not? There's money everywhere.

Then suddenly, he slips up and the hands of the law get a hold of him. All his money and assets are seized and he is thrown into prison for years. Would you say that was a good investment on the part of the parents? Probably not.

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What of the lady? She has grown even longer legs after graduating from school and is now a full-time prostitute. After a while, she even turns it into a business and has girls under her who she collects a percentage from after every "job".

She regularly sends money home and her parents are happy because their daughter is "working". Sometimes it's even worse coz her parents will probably not know what she's into, she might have a small business as a front to mask her true occupation.

Then suddenly she falls very sick, but it's not like the sickness she used to have in the past, which she just ignores and feels it's because of the nature of her "job". She finally goes for a test and discovers she has AIDS, not even HIV, it's now AIDS. Her whole world shatters, and she knows her time is up.

After a couple of months, she finally dies because of AIDS, and at that point, her parents have finally known the truth about her and all her escapades (or sexcapedes 😉), would you say they invested in the right thing? It's just like buying a coin that gets rug-pulled after a while.

In both cases, the parents ended up losing all their investment because they invested in wayward children. Although they benefitted from their kid's wayward life, it was short-lived. The whole idea of investing in their education is to ensure their future is secured, in the long long run.

The problem I have with people like the ones in my story is that, if you know you don't want to go to school, why not tell your parents instead of wasting their money and time. But sometimes, the parents wouldn't listen and still force their kids to go to school (I actually know someone like that) but would you blame them? They are just trying to look out for their kids and do what they think is best for them.

Education to me is totally an investment and we all know investments can go both ways; either good or bad. It all depends on how you handle your education, that's what will determine how your parent's investment is going to end.

Thanks for reading 💖💖💖

Tuesday December 28, 2021