Education is often one of the most complicated investments people make in their lifetime. As such, accurate information is essential, yet often difficult to acquire thus only increasing the risk of educational malinvestment.
There is a cornucopia of free information regarding every possible educational issue known to man, but remember the old adage, “You get what you pay for…” and time isn’t free when spending countless hours slogging through crowdsourced information about education in the numerous social media parent forums , blogs, random Googling, as well as the eager gaggle of parents in the bleachers during sports games or the carpool queue, work colleagues and don’t forget, books.
On the other hand, paying for timely educational advice can also be fraught with the risk of either paying too little for ineffective information or paying too much for inaccurate information delivered by credentialed experts with complex vocabularies. Asking the wrong questions, from the wrong perspective, less to know and more to alleviate anxiety or to confirm and well-worn bias can lead to even fewer answers and more questions than before hiring the educational top gun.
Before seeking answers to educational questions with the goal of finding value in the vast educational marketplace, first properly define the question by seeking consensus amongst all stakeholders to the educational outcome. Then, in search of an answer, seek amongst a variety of options in the informational spectrum ranging from free to expensive with the goal of finding the right answer not the cheapest or most expensive answer, but the right answer to the right question.
Mistakes come in all varieties with concomitant costs on the road to success, as learning itself is a lifelong endeavor. Though when mistakes that could be avoided with appropriate information, adds to the cost of the educational product—itself rising at a rate far outpacing consumer price inflation—educational malinvestment can be a bitter pill to swallow.
With outside counsel, like Creative Marbles, families gain a moderator for difficult conversations, as our children’s prosperity is an issue fraught with emotion and expectation. Furthermore, given complicated family dynamics, teenagers who seek to assert their own agency, can often be candid with adults who aren’t their parents in order to gain confidence in their aptitude and life’s purpose.
Seeking a balance between no cost and accurate, timely information plus an experienced guide to point out opportunities, as well as the pitfalls to avoid, parents and students can navigate the critical, yet nuanced transition from childhood to adulthood. Then, families can achieve their primary objective: create a foundation for prosperity, grounded in the peace of mind which only comes with living true to oneself.
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Educators who first taught and learned from the young in the modern high school classroom, now with 20 years of consulting experience, bring an understanding of the complexity of the modern teenager and the travails of parenting soon-to-be adults regarding their education to bear when advising families throughout the United States and around the globe. See us at Creative Marbles Consultancy
