Noor Teebi

According to Paulo Friere in the “Pedagogy of the Oppressed,” the banking system of education is a system in which students are simply provided with information by the teacher and are expected to memorize the information without really processing it. Friere says that education simply becomes a process of depositing information, where students are the depositories and teachers are the depositors. The problem with the system, according to Friere is that it stunts the creativity of the students. It takes away children’s opportunity to critically think and to actually learn. I feel that this is a tactic of the government to limit the imagination and the critical thinking of students. We’re so absorbed in the time consuming assignments that we are given, memorizing and reading, that we don’t have the chance to ponder and analyze real world material. By mechanically feeding students with information, much of which is not applicable or beneficial to real life, students’ ability to properly process information and think on their own is suppressed. Even here at UCLA, we are usually taught in a way that demeans our thinking. We sit in a huge lecture hall, listening to a professor who “teaches” us information, from one view or angle, often not sharing their own subjective background, therefore altering how the course is taught. Moreover, by adhering to the banking system, the opinions and ideas of the teacher are forced upon the student and presented as unchallengeable facts. Also, in this system, students are given the role of ignorant individuals, who are unable to contribute to the learning system. This role that they play lowers the student’s expectations of themselves and decreases their ability to be involved in mind challenging activities. By addressing the banking system of education, students and teachers who were unaware of the trap they had fallen into are given the opportunity to fight against the oppressive regime they are victims of., This system is not conducive to productive goring society, but rather it prevents students from thinking, forcing them to see past what they are taught, so they do not see and rebel against the oppressive society that they live in.