Students at Prairie View are often incredibly vocal when it comes to complaining about the quality of education many of us receive. Many students often ponder if Prairie View is providing us with the education we are paying for, or if all of our hours in class and stress over homework add up to nothing more than a series of four year babysitting busy work. Is our dear Alma Mater truly preparing people to enter the professional world and deal with the rigors of “real life” on our own terms?
The answer may not be as simple as we think. Let us be honest: Prairie View may not be the most respected (or well known) institution in the country, but does that mean that we cannot be educated here?
The fact is no matter where you are, be it Prairie View or Harvard or UT or Texas A&M, the quality of your education is directly related to how much you want to put into your education. We may complain about Prairie View not giving us more opportunities to meet with actual professionals (or future employers), but many job fairs, major conferences, and professional seminars are poorly attended (and how many poorly attended Hump Days have you seen?) It would seem that events like a Z-Ro concert or probate tends to draw a lot more attention from students than a town hall meeting or a career fair.
The real difference between a great student and an average student is a matter of conscientiousness and drive. The school one attends has little to do with how well one will do in the real world, but most of it comes from the student. How often, for example, have we found ourselves seeking out classes with teachers who will give us an “easy A” instead of teachers who will challenge us to educate ourselves? Should we really be more concerned with how easy class work will be? And if that is our most important priority, what right do we have to complain when we feel that Prairie View has failed to educate us?
To benefit from the knowledge that our best faculty can give us, we cannot be afraid of teachers who will challenge us to enlighten ourselves.
If anything, Prairie View is a “mothering” institution. One look at your campus e-mail inbox would tell you that administrators are frequently thinking of ways to help students achieve excellence in their academic and professional lives. Certainly, this kind of care would be much harder to find at a larger school like UT, where students may be regarded more as numbers than as individuals. So Prairie View really does provide us with the tools to make ourselves into “productive people.” Some of the tools may be hidden in the back of the shed, but they are all there nonetheless.
If we are concerned about the quality of our education, we must actively engage ourselves in aspects of campus life that do not necessarily include a live DJ or a two-drink minimum.
In the end, we all have to realize that this university belongs to the students. What we yield from this institution is all dependent upon how hard we work. Concerned about your future job prospects? Career Services has a lot of information and helpful resources. Worried about your application to graduate or professional schools? Speak with advisors or with the Prairie View graduate program coordinators. Sick of having to deal with the incompetence of some faculty? Donate money to the university after you become an alumni. No matter how you slice it, we reap what we sow in our education.