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An Open Letter to Students on the Danger of Seeing School as a Trial to Survive

Cal Newport · 27 Aug 2010 · calnewport.com ↗

3 korrents from this piece

Cal Newport did not write this page.

Every claim below was made in this piece, quoted word for word and numbered in the order the piece makes them, so you can read it there rather than take our word for it. The sentence above each quote is our reading of the claim, not their wording. Each quote was checked against a stored copy of the page at build time; where the two differ, the quote is the fact.

  1. Our reading

    Treating school as a trial to be survived leaves a person unable to say what the postponed life was ever supposed to be.

    Their wordsIn other words, when you go through life thinking “if I can make it through this, things will be better later,” you eventually forget what “better” means.
    Interesting

  2. Our reading

    A student is judged in the end by how good they are at the one thing they do best, not by the sum of their activities.

    Their wordsThese students recognize that they’ll ultimately be judged not by the sum of their contributions to diverse activities, but instead by the magnitude of their ability in the one thing they do best.
    Interesting

  3. Our reading

    Doing less and doing it better is worth pursuing as an end in itself, because a life with both freedom and focus is a life well lived.

    Their wordsThese students practice the above rules not as a means but as an end: A life with both freedom and focus is a life well-lived.
    Interesting