Cap'n Bex: 70. Hug a tree.

30 day challenge:
How important do you think education is?
WELL.
Rather, I'd say!
I'm soon to leave mainstream education (school, college, art college?, uni) after being in it for, what... 18 years!?! Probably a bit less, as I don't think I started reception until part way through or something... but still. 18ish years! That being the majority of my life!
Here goes a brief history of my school life, with photos of myself throughout it! Just because my external harddrive is currently attached to my laptop.

I didn't enjoy the majority of school - in the first few years I got frustrated with learning, as some people were doing it faster & better than me.

(Above photo, year 1 (5-6 years old). I'm far left, middle row).
In the few years above that, I started getting more & more bullied, I never really had a good friend until mid year 3, where I became best friends with Becca Jones / Joneseo / RTD3 / Tweedle Dee. We bonded over the Victorians. See picture below. I'm the blonde.

More bullying, more getting confused over maths, more just wanting to draw & paint & such. More struggling to make more than 1 proper friend (in year 4 Rose joined Becca & I).
I guess the first time I ever really thought of education more than "urgh, school?" was when we were all starting to think of what secondary school to go to.
My mum offered me the chance to go take the entrance exam to Reigate Grammer school - that place has pretty big termly fees. I turned the offer down... I didn't think I'd pass the entrance exam, at age 10/11. The second time thinking about education, was probably around the same age - still year 6, when I couldn't do algebra. My thoughts were "urrrgh! So difficult! Oh well, I'll be able to do it when I'm older". That thought sort of became my life mantra, much to my mums disgust... I think it's part true, though. You WILL know SOME things when you're older... fair enough I sort of learnt algebra in secondary school, but I've since forgotten most of it apart from the basics. But who cares? So far I haven't needed it at all. Ahh... leaving primary school. I felt so grown up. Here, have a photo of me with my new friend(s) Martha (left) and Imy (middle). Yes. I really did used to have a duck smile... I think it was cured by my goth times of not smiling so much. This was on the last day of school.

Secondary school... Warwick school. Shit hole full of chavs... was going to go to Reigate school (not the grammer, the other one) but when we were just leaving some shitter threw a strone at my mums car, so she didn't want me to go there. So I went to Warwick, with my new friend Imy.
Again, slightly tough time making friends - I kept myself to myself sometimes, just had people I'd "hang round" with. Imy tended to go off with other people. I got bullied more & more, chavs. Doing work was more for just getting it done (if it seemed important enough / if I knew the teacher would otherwise embarrass me / detention me / worse). Art was still the one good lesson, though gradually graphics became better and better, and cooking wasn't so bad either.
Boys (and girls... but that was kept on the quiet. Why give a chav more ammo...) were more interesting to study, I used to draw the backs of their heads whenever I sat behind one I liked.
My decision to become a "grunger" "goth" etc possibly didn't help me with the chav attacks, however it was good. Instead of working, I'd doodle in the backs of excersise books / soon learnt to carry a small note book, as teachers would tell you off for messing up books. I'd have totally buggered up pencil cases (see below picture of me with bright pink fluff on my head, holding a Zippy pencil case).

The bag was messed up too, patches & such, but with more care.
Slowly I became more popular, with the "weird" crowd anyway. We hung out outside in the quad, on the benches around the big stone chess board floor bit. The freaks, the geeks, and the losers. Great fun! It sometimes really was! But there was still the horror of bullying, and hating classes... so grades slipped (though I was still in near top classes for everything - maths kept going up and down a class though...). I took up drum lessons, tried to get them so they were always over a class I didn't like.
I became better friends with a good little crowd at Reigate school, saw them at weekends and small gatherings when possible. They were, admittedly, more my "style", though the 2 groups seemed to merge a bit in the end via my parties & college. Below is myself & my 3 best females of the time (L>R, me, Jenny, Tanzee, Jennie) (don't ask) (it was fun).

Below is a photo from right near the end of secondary school, myself (the most awkward looking one - 2nd from right) and my other female friends there. Yes, we did have boys too... this was just our girl gang.

And then... from age 16... FREEDOM! I managed to get my 5 A-C GCSE grades to get into college (just).

Off to college I went! This was good for various reasons:
-It was a 10 minute walk down the road for me, rather than a 15 minute cycle ride, then a 15 minute walk.
-I didn't have to wear a uniform.
-The majority of chavs weren't clever enough to get into college.
-Any bullies left, generally left me alone now... lots more "weirdos" went to college, they came from loads of other schools about the area.
-I could get on more with the things I ENJOYED.
I failed my English GCSE, of course my mum was greatly annoyed about this... but that was ok, I got to take another year of English at college, and re-did the GCSE at the end of that year. The other classes I took were Geography (it was never THAT bad... and the field trips looked good... and I had to pick a 3rd subject). Photography - taking photos? Must be easy! And arty! Yay! And of course... Fine Art. I just wanted to do art.
College started off ok, I made lots of friends, joined up with old friends I'd had from a different school, I was still quiet though. Annoyingly so, it seemed, as when I fell behind in Photography, I didn't ask for help... I just started not turning up to classes. And then I barely turned up to English... and Geography...... and Art. Of course I still had fun, though. Lots of fun, sometimes... I think perhaps I lost being so friendly with some of my friends though because I got a chap, and a girl.
Scarily, they tried to kick me out before start of the second year - I had to beg for my place back, but to do that I had to have excellent attendance. Thankfully, I had better attendance but less friends and now took to wandering about on my own all breaktimes & lunch, trying to find someone to talk to who wasn't already stuck to their boyfriend, or in their little click of other friends.
The thing which kept me full of possible friends, was quite likely the fact that whenever my parents went away for more than 2 nights I'd throw big house parties, and they were super fun. Sometimes a little messy, but always good, and always easy enough to clear up from afterwards. The second year of college also resulted in me getting a tad depressed, partly because I'd had a miserable break up with my then boyfriend and girlfriend (a tricky business, I don't think I need to go into it, really!!).

I ended up walking to the church yard at lunch & such, to talk some half arsed photos for Photography, & to prevent myself from going home (the result of which would be not going back to college after).
Have you noticed yet that none of this is really about education? More so just about me being IN education. The thought never really occured to me that some people of my age weren't, they just got jobs. I don't think I wanted to do that though - and contuining education was the easy option... I got my first job just after my 18th birthday, because my mum told me to.
Below is the start of one of the afore mentioned parties... Martha & I. Yes.

Mid second college year my art tutor mentioned that I was good enough to get into Epsom art college, the two colleges had some sort of agreement going on. So when lots of other people were thinking more about going to uni, I went to art college...

Epsom art college! Hurrah!
Now, THIS was good! I'm glad I had this year, I wasn't ready to go off to uni like some other folks. I got to concentrate JUST on art - with the occasional essay here and there, but not really, and made a super duper great circle of friends. I eventually went into the Graphics class at Epsom, with my "crew" Racheyboiii ("God"), Emilarrrgh ("Pink Power Ranger"), Ninoid ("Captain Jack"), and Sophie ("Pamela") (I was Barbie). We had so much fun, even if I "had" to listen to slightly mainstream music in God's car... heh heh heh.

But then... I had to start thinking about uni! That was leaving home! The real world?! I really enjoyed graphics, but I had a more free style... but not so free as Fine Art. It got suggested to me that I tried for an Illustration course. So I did.
It didn't occur to me that I should look at what reputations each place had, my thoughts were more so about was the area they were in pretty, and was it far enough away from home. I didn't choose Brighton, as it was too close to home... instead I chose:
Route A:
1. Falmouth (went to interview)
2. Bournemouth (went to interview)
3. Derby (this was my back up plan.....) (went to interview)
Route B:
1. Edinburgh (didn't need to go to interview, because...)
2. Portsmouth (see below...)
I GOT INTO FALMOUTH! Only once I had applied, and got accepted for INTERVIEW did I find out that it was the illustration course with the best reputation in Britain. I took big mucho pride in that, when I was accepted :P
So... off to uni I trotted.

Hellooooo university.
Had automatic friends with Silje (I spoke to her all summer via MSN & Facebook) and then also with Vera. I didn't really "hang out" with that many other folks, it's always sort of been just us 3. Just how it is, really. Norwegian sandwich with a British filling (sorry, it's not vegetarian). Here is the sandwich in first year, with icecream. I'm the topping, though... with brown hair.

First year was a bit crap, I didn't know what direction to go in, my work turned out shoddily, and I worried that I was on the wrong course for a fair long while and thought that perhaps I should go onto Graphics. Thankfully I didn't fail, at all, only referral I got at the end of the year was in life drawing due to attendance. But thats fine, I got the work done super speedy.
Third year happened, I noticed a good improvement in my work, though kept myself even more to myself & my Norwegian bread slices except for my joining of a sea shanty group.
Essays happened... yes... but I never took them too seriously. I find essays tricky. And why? Well, at the end of 2nd year I found out I was dyslexic! Which is great, as it explains a few things (and of course gets me free stuff ^^).
So is this really education? Yes, of course it is! Is it education in THE ARTS! A VERY important part of the world, thank you... without it, we'd live in a far uglier place (thankfully it'll never be totally ugly, so long as we have nature).
Third year, thats now. I've had to do one essay - my dissertation. That was difficult, but I did it. I HOPE it has not failed... it may quite likely have got a bad mark though. But you know what? I don't really mind. So long as my portfolio comes out well, and I continue in life doing what I want to do, I don't mind. I've got through university, and thats more than many people in the UK can say... and then SOOOO many people in the world don't even have the chance to get that far in education! They don't have the funds nor anything else! So, I'm happy that I've had it - still got it!

I don't reckon I'll ever go on to do anything like a masters degree, thats my current opinion anyway. It sounds like it entails much essay writing - something I am not strong on. Let me write a fictional story, sure, but not a factual essay which requires shedloads of research.
I hope that one day I can earn decent money for my art, but I shan't hope too high just yet... we'll see how things go.
I'll sort of miss being in education, I suppose I've become accustomed to the structure of it all - especially now that it's all to do with something I ENJOY...

So... do I think education is important?
YES! Indeed! You have to go through years of shit to get to what you want to do, but I think that perhaps it is for the best - when we're 6 years old we really don't know that we want to go into art for the rest of our lives... and you really do learn some valuable skills in the rest of your lessons (even though you forget the majority of stuff you learn, perhaps it is the best most important bits which stick. This includes knowing that there is a religious group out there called the Amish, not the ARMish.
Not everyone is priveleged enough to be able to afford to go to school, let alone do anything else they would like to do rather than HAVE to do.

Anyway, thats the end of that part of the 30 day thing... next bit will appear at some point...

Heres some images by other folk...