Smart vs. Useful Academic

Reading the news articles recently, sometimes make me wonder why even though we are armed with good education, we still do not think critically, become savvy, intelligence and flexible...

The promise of smart is to have a way to talk about quality in a sea of quantity. But the problem is that it becomes the competitive of the university, aiming not for the cultivation of intelligence but for individual success in the academic market.

It was the taste of those who talked and thought in similar ways. The danger of smart is that it confirms the moves and mannerisms of a new and perhaps equally closed network.

"Smart," is a designation of mental ability, seems a natural term to distinguish the pursuits of higher education. I would prefer the things that I read to be useful and relevant, and my institution to be fair. However, suggested cooperative values are not rewarded in a field that needs being smart.

Millions are spent every year on sustaining the scholarship program – many of these scholars after finishing their academic tenure are integrated into the various institutions with the hope of ensuring peak individual and organizational performance.

But I think schools teach us to be book-smart, instead of street-smart. Why? Because students have been raise through a 'standard' studying over a very long period of at least 16 years, from Primary School to University, growing up within the confines of a society of generally submissive and subservient people.

The really smart ones are those who survived through countless and persistent difficulties over a prolonged period of time.

The scholar system here in a way our knowledge is defined, regulated and placed a value upon, and thus intellectual is channeled and directed rather than given free flow. When this happens and many disciplines are prized above others, selected types of knowledge are valued more than others, it has become difficult to truly become a “knowledgeable” and “educated” person.

Is the smartness trend tied to "academic groupthink?

How do you see this?