Can mere graduation be considered as education?

Education is rather a heavy word. It involves learning, acquiring knowledge and application of the learnt skills. However, most people tend to use it the wrong way. For instance, if a person who has been to college or university or even school for that matter, performs a deed which one might expect an illiterate to do, he/she would get a response like "I thought you were educated enough not to do this!"

Well, there seems to be some error here... Does this mean anyone who has ever been to an institution and has graduated, is entitled to be called educated? Let us validate this a little more.

Here are the reasons why a mere graduation will not account for education:

Graduation: "I belong to all" - These days anybody can claim that he/ she is a graduate. How? There are many institutions in the world which are actually not into education, but into making money. They consider anybody's applications and declare them graduates. So we don't quite know if these graduates really did acquire knowledge or can apply their skills in real time.

The imposer: "I am you" - Although the institutions impose strict rules, there are loopholes for those who are willing to commit the crime. A person may get a degree under someone else's name for any sort of a benefit (like money, for instance).

We can clearly witness the above mentioned activity in the movie "3 Idiots", which highlights this issue. A rich man wants to see his son holding an Engineering degree at any cost; hence, he sends the son of his servant to study engineering and earn the degree instead of his own son. If this is true, then we'll never know if the doctor who is going to operate us really did clear his/her practicals in anatomy.

Degree certificate: "I work for money" - Many were caught, and yet there are so many of them still doing well in this business of creating a fake degree certificate. Not many companies call the institutions to validate the employee, especially if there is a bulk recruitment. Anyone can pay these culprits to get a fake certificate and be called Mr.X, MA, MBBS, MS, Ph D... etc.

Examinations: "I am your immediate goal" - Face it, most of us just want to pass the exam while some others aim at being the toppers. But in either case, the immediate goal is clearing the exam and there is no emphasis given to "acquiring knowledge". And the basic definition of education is gaining knowledge about something.

There are many people who are graduates, who followed the mantra of short term focus laid on exams. We are left to wonder if they really did educate themselves.

The scores: "I don't really belong to you" - There are so many people out there who have copied during the exam, who have got the scores because they were lucky etc. They never really "learn" anything, but they are graduates. Are they still educated?

Can mere graduation be considered as education? No, education is a vast ocean. We cannot imagine wrapping this up with just a few questions to think about whether or not a graduation should be considered as education. For starters, graduation states a course completion, and as far as education is considered, it is infinite. There is no end to it.

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