Lesson I - Intelligence, Education, Universal Knowledge and How to Get It

You must never stop learning. The world's greatest men and women were people who educated themselves outside of the university with all the knowledge that the university gives, as [and?] you have the opportunity of doing the same thing the university student does---read and study.

One must never stop reading. Read everything that you can that is of standard knowledge. Don't waste time reading trashy literature. That is to say, don't pay any attention to the ten cents novels, wild west stories and cheap sentimental books, but where there is a good plot and a good story in the form of a novel, read it. It is necessary to read it for the purpose of getting information on human nature. The idea is that personal experience is not enough for a human to get all the useful knowledge of life, because the individual life is too short, so we must feed on the experience of others. The literature we read should include the biography and autobiography of men and women who have accomplished greatness in their particular line. Whenever you can buy these books and own them and whilst you are reading them make pencil or pen notes of the striking sentences and paragraphs that you should like to remember, so that when you have to refer to the book for any thought that you would like to refresh your mind on, you will not have to read over the whole book.

You should also read the best poetry for inspiration. The standard poets have always been the most inspirational creators. From a good line of poetry, you may get the inspiration for the career of a life time. Many a great man and woman was first inspired by some attractive line or verse of poetry.

There are good poets and bad poets just like there are good novels and bad novels. Always select the best poets for your inspirational urge.

Read history incessantly until you master it. This means your own national history, the history of the world---social history, industrial history, and the history of the different sciences; but primarily the history of man. If you do not know what went on before you came here and what is happening at the time you live, but away from you, you will not know the world and will be ignorant of the world and mankind.

You can only make the best out of life by knowing and understanding it. To know, you must fall back on the intelligence of others who came before you and have left their records behi[n]d.

To be able to read intelligently, you must first be able to master the language of your country. To do this, you must be well acquainted with its grammar and the science of it. Every six months you should read over again the science of the language that you speak, so as not to forget its rules. People judge you by your writing and your speech. If you write badly and incorrectly they become prejudiced toward your intelligence, and if you speak badly and incorrectly those who hear you become disgusted and will not pay much attention to you but in their hearts laugh after you. A leader who is to teach men and present any fact of truth to man must first be learned in his subject.

Never write or speak on a subject you know nothing about, for there is always somebody who knows that particular subject to laugh at you or to ask you embarras[s]ing questions that may make others laugh at you. You can know about any subject under the sun by reading about it. If you cannot bu[y] the books outright and own them, go to your public libraries and read them there or borrow them, or join some circulating library in your district or town, so as to get the use of these books. You should do that as you may refer to them for information.

You should read at least four hours a day. The best time to read is in the evening after you have retired from your work and after you have rested and before sleeping hours but do so before morning, so that during your sleeping hours what you have read may become subconscious, that is to say, planted in your memory. Never go to bed without doing some reading[.]

Never keep the constant company of anybody who doesn't know as much as you or [isn't] as educated as you, and from whom you cannot learn something or reciprocate your learning, especially if that person is illiterate or ignorant because constant association with such a person will unconsciously cause you to drift into the peculiar culture or ignorance of that person. Always try to associate with people from whom you can learn something. Contact with cultured persons and with books is the best companionship you can have and keep.

By reading good books you keep the company of the authors of the book or the subjects of the book when otherwise you could not meet them in the social contact of life. NEVER GO DOWN IN INTELLIGENCE to those who are below you, but if possible help to lift them up to you and always try to ascend to those who are above you and be their equal with the hope of being their master.

Continue always in the application of the thing you desire educationally, culturally, or otherwise, and never give up until you reach the objective---and you can reach the objective if other[s] have done so before you, proving by their doing it that it is possible.

In your desire to accomplish greatness, you must first decide in your own mind in what direction you desire to seek that greatness, and when you have so decided in your own mind[,] work unceas[i]ngly toward it. The particular thing that you may want should be before you all the time, and whatsoever it takes to get it or make it possible should be undertaken. Use your faculties and persuasion to achieve all you set your mind on.

Try never to repeat yourself in any one discourse in saying the same thing over and over except [when] you are making new points, because repetition is tiresome and it annoys those who hear the repetition. Therefore, try to possess as much universal knowledge as possible through reading so as to be able to be free of repetition in trying to drive home a point.

No one is ever too old to learn. Therefore, you should take advantage of every educational facility. If you should hear of a great man or woman who is to lecture or speak in your town on any given subject and the person is an authority on the subject, always make time to go and hear him. This is what is meant by learning from others. You should learn the two sides to every story, so as to be able to properly debate a question and hold your grounds with the side that you support. If you only know one side of a story, you cannot argue intelligently nor effectively. As for instance, to combat communism, you must know about it, otherwise people will take advantage of you and win a victory over your ignorance.

Anything that you are going to challenge, you must first know about it, so as to be able to defeat it. The moment you are ignorant about anything the person who has the intelligence of that thing will defeat you. Therefore, get knowledge, get it quickly, get it studiously, but get it anyway.

Knowledge is power. When you know a thing and can hold your ground on that thing and win over your opponents on that thing, those who hear you learn to have confidence in you and will trust your ability.

Never, therefore, attempt anything without being able to protect yourself on it, for every time you are defeated it takes away from your prestige and you are not as respected as before.

All the knowledge you want is in the world, and all that you have to do is to go seeking it and never stop until you have found it. You can find knowledge or the information about it in the public libraries, if it is not on your own bookshelf. Try to have a book and own it on every bit of knowledge you want. You may generally get these books at second hand book stores for sometimes one-fifth of the original value.

Always have a well equipped shelf of books. Nearly all information about mankind is to be found in the Encyclopedia Britannica. This is an expensive set of books, but try to get them. Buy a complete edition for yourself, and keep it at your home, and whenever you are in doubt about anything, go to it and you will find it there.

The value of knowledge is to use it. It is not humanly possible that a person can retain all knowledge of the world, but if a person knows how to search for all the knowledge of the world, he will find it when he wants it.

A doctor or a lawyer although he passed his examination in college does not know all the laws and does not know all the techniques of medicine but he has the fundamental knowledge. When he wants a particular kind of knowledge, he goes to the medical books or law books and refers to the particular law or how to use the recipe of medicine. You must, therefore, know where to find your facts and use them as you want them. No one will know where you got them, but you will have the facts and by using the facts correctly they will think you a wonderful person, a great gen[iu]s, and a trusted leader.

In reading it is not necessary or compulsory that you agree with everything you read. You must always use or apply your own reasoning to what you have read based upon what you already know as touching the facts on what you have read. Pass judgement on what you read based upon these facts. When I say facts I mean things that cannot be disputed. You may read thoughts that are old, and opinions that are old and have changed since they were written. You must always search to find out the latest facts on that p[a]rticular subject and only when these facts are consistently maintained in what you read should you agree with them, otherwise you are entitled to your own opinion.

Always have up-to-date knowledge. You can gather this from the latest books and the latest periodicals, journals and newspapers. Read your daily newspaper everyday. Read a standard monthly journal every month, a standard weekly magazine every week, a standard quarterly magazine every quarter and by this you will find the new knowledge of the whole year in addition to the books you read, whose facts have not altered in that year. Don't keep old ideas, bury them as new ones come.

Thank you Yorick Brown for your posting. It was interesting and so very true.

I assume it is by Marcus Garvey? Why did you want to share that with us? Tell us a bit more about why you found this inspiring to you.

Hey guys,

You can visit www.marcusgarvey.com (http://www.marcusgarvey.com) to find out some more information on Marcus Garvey.

The site is owned by Andrew Wilson (a Bahamian) who owns Quality Business Center (QBC) located downtown next to the police station.

"Passive acceptance of the teacher's wisdom is easy to most boys and girls. It involves no effort of independent thought, and seems rational because the teacher knows more than his pupils; it is moreover the way to win the favor of the teacher unless he is a very exceptional man. Yet the habit of passive acceptance is a disastrous one in later life. It causes men to seek a leader, and to accept as a leader whoever is established in that position.

It will be said that the joy of mental adventure must be rare, that there are few who can appreciate it, and that ordinary education can take no account of so aristocratic a good. I do not believe this. The joy of mental adventure is far commoner in the young than in grown men and women. Among children it is very common, and grows naturally out of the period of make-believe and fancy. It is rare in later life because everything is done to kill it during education. Education should not aim at passive awareness of dead facts, but at an activity directed towards the world that our efforts are to create. - Bertrand Russell

Education is humankind’s answer to passing on established knowledge of the world. Unfortunately this process has been streamlined into one that is too efficient at pushing kids through though the system for its own good. Every morning countless young persons go to school simply because it is expected of them. They are grouped into classes, spoon-fed information, tested primarily on their ability to regurgitate the details that have been given to them and then rewarded accordingly. In this setting a large majority of students can perform this basic echoing of their instructor, but do they truly understand the information presented to them? Better yet, are they being taught the ability to challenge, reorganize or even reinvent the ideas that are being pushed onto them?

Personally it took many years for me to establish a real understanding of the process of education. I was indeed one of those students that happened to be very efficient at “regurgitation” of the information passed on in my classes. Academic rewards were always available and I must admit that the experience was enjoyable, but inevitably I found myself in within the ranks of the working class. The pursuit of attaining new information took second place to my job, bills and other adult responsibilities. I even took on an additional role of teaching others the information that I had personally absorbed. The problem was that the educational system had made me too reliant upon pre-packaged information and my skill level remained stagnant. I began to accept things as I saw them, refused to accept ideas that did not match what I already knew and basically fell in line with the rest of society. As luck would have it, one of the societal trends that I followed eventually led (and is still leading me) to a greater awareness of how education can be the greatest tool or (used incorrectly) an even greater hindrance.

I grew dreadlocks; a simple process of allowing one’s hair to grow as nature intended. The almost instantaneous negative judgments upon and rejection of my character by certain educated members of this society shocked me. After a few years of experiencing this behaviour, I shaved my locks for a more conventional "look" and the resulting reactions surprised me even more. Congratulations and praise for “re-entering” society were bestowed upon me by some “educated” persons that I now view as borderline hypocrites for misjudging a segment of African culture that remains true to its own. Their judgments led me to question the very nature of my own education. With all of my knowledge, was I similar to them in resistance to new or different ideas? Have I ever been as guilty as they were of rejecting our own African culture because I happened to move through the hallowed halls of higher learning? This enlightenment led me to research some of the black leaders who have focused on uplifting my troubled race while remaining true to who they were. Marcus Garvey is absolutely one of them.

From my first post one can see that Garvey’s recommended approach to education is very active. Attaining and understanding information relating to one’s environment on a continuous basis is essential to success and the earlier in life that the importance of understanding and active investigation is realized, the better. Exposure to multiple unbiased sources of information is also necessary on all levels. Perhaps once our educational system revamps itself and focuses on consistently creating the caliber of persons that will challenge societal mediocrity and be able to actively stand against current social norms, then this nation will experience true success. Until that time the future of this country seems as if it will be inevitably left in the hands of scores of passive "sheep" that do not have the collective vision or forethought to move The Bahamas to where it needs to be. :cry:

We should all take responsibility for making sure that this does not happen.

Here's a May posting from yorick.org that gives the basic framework of a plan of action to improve this country's educational standards:

Education - Securing the future of our nation [Thought Process] - Yorick - admin@yorick.org @ 13:34:19

Frederick Douglass once said, "Knowledge makes a man unfit to be a slave." Then why, must I ask, aren't those in charge of this nation focusing more intensely on the educational needs of our youth? Slaves are easily controlled by their leaders. Could it be that this is the desired result? Anyway, instead of going the negative route that is so easily followed when this topic comes up, I'll attempt to shed some positive light on this situation.

The basic goals of a leader should include steps that ensure the well-being and prosperity of the community or group that they are the "head" of. The easiest way to do this is through education. It seems however, that enhancing the level of knowledge within a nation does not fall on the priority list of many governments in the world today. What makes this scenario even worse is the reason why most educational matters are not often pushed to forefront of political agendas: greed and personal grasping by politicians at the "pie" of power.

It is not a big surprise that a large percentage of today's social evils are caused by the lack of essential and consistent guidance which easily could have been made available to the masses. For a moment, let's take an imaginary trip to a nation that has decided to make its mark on this world...

A leader tells their subordinates that they are going to build a great nation...together. This leader goes on to tell them that this plan will not take place overnight, but once implemented will ensure success by our people not only within the regions of this country, but all over the entire world. It is noted that the plan will be expensive and mandates a lot of hard work, but it should be considered an investment that will reap more benefits than ever imagined. Here is the basic layout of the plan:

* starting at the kindergarten level of all schools (both private and public), all kindergarten teachers will be given intense, strict standards and educational courses to prepare themselves for the start of this educational evolution. The time frame for their role in this training is estimated to take a total of two years (due to having to manage their regular school hours in addition to their training schedule). The kindergarten teachers will be compensated accordingly for the rise in their skill level and the extra hours that they will have to work during the year to meet these requirements. The resulting increase in compensation will be made mandatory at all scholastic institutions.

* a year into the standardization of the kindergarten teachers, the first grade teachers (both private and public) will begin their two year journey into the upgrading of that educational level. They will also be compensated accordingly for the increase in skills and extra time requirements.

* during the third year, several distinct things will happen: 1. the kindergarten teachers will begin to put their enhanced skills into action; 2. the standard of education within the kindergarten level is increased dramatically and; 3. the second grade teachers (private and public) will begin their two year journey into educational standardization.

* the fourth year will mirror the third year. The differences are that the first grade teachers will begin using the new standard in their classrooms and the third grade teachers (private and public) will begin their intense training path. Note carefully that the kindergarten students that have been taught by "standardized" kindergarten teachers will now be taught this year by "standardized" first grade teachers.

* this cycle will continue all the way up past grade 12 (senior high) to the professors in the college level. Meanwhile, new teachers that are entering the educational field will also have to meet the increasingly stringent requirements. When it comes to educational matters there will be NO room for mediocrity. Teachers will all be prepared in a holistic way of teaching their students with the proper equipment to do so. They will learn the skills needed to effectively manage and assess the needs of young eager minds that will have begun to be precisely molded from the kindergarten level. Concentration on the entire student is key (socially, physically, intellectually, career-wise (culturally as well), emotionally, and spiritually). Teachers will also be heavily evaluated on a yearly basis to ensure that standards continue to increase rapidly. There will also be "update" workshops during the summer months for new and updated material to be incorporated into the teachers' curriculum.

The bottom line of this very primitive framework is that once these students pass the college level and go out into the community, they will be well-prepared for this world because the educational system will have properly prepared them for most aspects of it. It WILL be expensive and take years to get everything in place to even start the kindergarten level, but once it has begun, the nation that will rise up 15 to 20 years from its implementation will have a clear advantage over other nations that have not prepared their people to such a level.

Just imagine an entire nation of knowledgeable people! An impossible task? Not at all. Less crime, more community building, better lives, better jobs, better economy, more creative ideas to make society even better. What a wonderful nation that would be!
__________________________________________________________________
"Education is our passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to the people who prepare for it today". --- Malcolm X

these are true words but they are not 'true' here in The Bahamas. For you see if you are intelligent & have good English skills in this country you will be labled as gay.
:what:

these are true words but they are not 'true' here in The Bahamas. For you see if you are intelligent & have good English skills in this country you will be labled as gay.
:what:
If that is true, it just goes to show how silly we are!!

these are true words but they are not 'true' here in The Bahamas. For you see if you are intelligent & have good English skills in this country you will be labled as gay.
:what:

That’s a first for me to hear. But then again if you are intelligent & have good English skills you know what it is to be different.

People we must end this being different its hard so hard to do but we must. Keep thinking the other person is just as human as you. They have feelings of love they have people that love them. They have mothers, fathers brothers, sisters friends and lovers. They hurt when injustice is done to them just as you would.
Everyone is important to our Bahamas the garbage man and the Dr. Both affect our health. Take a few moments and think where would we be if we had no garbage men. We would not have any tourist industry. What would the hotels do with the tons of garbage they produce every year. The Bahamas would be a very unhealthy place to live.
Have you ever thanked a garbage men for doing a good job? Have you ever offered them a cup of coffee or tea in the morning or cold water on a hot summer day. Let your Dr. pull up in front of your house.

Stop the difference when its time to change the constitution lets make every one equal.

There has to be a first time for everythin, keep up and practice!!

That’s a first for me to hear. But then again if you are intelligent & have good English skills you know what it is to be different.

People we must end this being different its hard so hard to do but we must. Keep thinking the other person is just as human as you. They have feelings of love they have people that love them. They have mothers, fathers brothers, sisters friends and lovers. They hurt when injustice is done to them just as you would.
Everyone is important to our Bahamas the garbage man and the Dr. Both affect our health. Take a few moments and think where would we be if we had no garbage men. We would not have any tourist industry. What would the hotels do with the tons of garbage they produce every year. The Bahamas would be a very unhealthy place to live.
Have you ever thanked a garbage men for doing a good job? Have you ever offered them a cup of coffee or tea in the morning or cold water on a hot summer day. Let your Dr. pull up in front of your house.

Stop the difference when its time to change the constitution lets make every one equal.

these are true words but they are not 'true' here in The Bahamas. For you see if you are intelligent & have good English skills in this country you will be labled as gay.
:what:

strange, this has never happend to me and i have been known to all of my friends to have an impressive array of knowledge and very rarely use slang but i have never been accused of being gay. When i was younger i always asked if i was from America but that was about it :)

Here's a May posting from yorick.org that gives the basic framework of a plan of action to improve this country's educational standards:
Education - Securing the future of our nation [Thought Process] - Yorick - admin@yorick.org @ 13:34:19
Frederick Douglass once said, "Knowledge makes a man unfit to be a slave." Then why, must I ask, aren't those in charge of this nation focusing more intensely on the educational needs of our youth? Slaves are easily controlled by their leaders. Could it be that this is the desired result? Anyway, instead of going the negative route that is so easily followed when this topic comes up, I'll attempt to shed some positive light on this situation.
The basic goals of a leader should include steps that ensure the well-being and prosperity of the community or group that they are the "head" of. The easiest way to do this is through education. It seems however, that enhancing the level of knowledge within a nation does not fall on the priority list of many governments in the world today. What makes this scenario even worse is the reason why most educational matters are not often pushed to forefront of political agendas: greed and personal grasping by politicians at the "pie" of power.
It is not a big surprise that a large percentage of today's social evils are caused by the lack of essential and consistent guidance which easily could have been made available to the masses. For a moment, let's take an imaginary trip to a nation that has decided to make its mark on this world...
A leader tells their subordinates that they are going to build a great nation...together. This leader goes on to tell them that this plan will not take place overnight, but once implemented will ensure success by our people not only within the regions of this country, but all over the entire world. It is noted that the plan will be expensive and mandates a lot of hard work, but it should be considered an investment that will reap more benefits than ever imagined. Here is the basic layout of the plan:
* starting at the kindergarten level of all schools (both private and public), all kindergarten teachers will be given intense, strict standards and educational courses to prepare themselves for the start of this educational evolution. The time frame for their role in this training is estimated to take a total of two years (due to having to manage their regular school hours in addition to their training schedule). The kindergarten teachers will be compensated accordingly for the rise in their skill level and the extra hours that they will have to work during the year to meet these requirements. The resulting increase in compensation will be made mandatory at all scholastic institutions.
* a year into the standardization of the kindergarten teachers, the first grade teachers (both private and public) will begin their two year journey into the upgrading of that educational level. They will also be compensated accordingly for the increase in skills and extra time requirements.
* during the third year, several distinct things will happen: 1. the kindergarten teachers will begin to put their enhanced skills into action; 2. the standard of education within the kindergarten level is increased dramatically and; 3. the second grade teachers (private and public) will begin their two year journey into educational standardization.
* the fourth year will mirror the third year. The differences are that the first grade teachers will begin using the new standard in their classrooms and the third grade teachers (private and public) will begin their intense training path. Note carefully that the kindergarten students that have been taught by "standardized" kindergarten teachers will now be taught this year by "standardized" first grade teachers.
* this cycle will continue all the way up past grade 12 (senior high) to the professors in the college level. Meanwhile, new teachers that are entering the educational field will also have to meet the increasingly stringent requirements. When it comes to educational matters there will be NO room for mediocrity. Teachers will all be prepared in a holistic way of teaching their students with the proper equipment to do so. They will learn the skills needed to effectively manage and assess the needs of young eager minds that will have begun to be precisely molded from the kindergarten level. Concentration on the entire student is key (socially, physically, intellectually, career-wise (culturally as well), emotionally, and spiritually). Teachers will also be heavily evaluated on a yearly basis to ensure that standards continue to increase rapidly. There will also be "update" workshops during the summer months for new and updated material to be incorporated into the teachers' curriculum.
The bottom line of this very primitive framework is that once these students pass the college level and go out into the community, they will be well-prepared for this world because the educational system will have properly prepared them for most aspects of it. It WILL be expensive and take years to get everything in place to even start the kindergarten level, but once it has begun, the nation that will rise up 15 to 20 years from its implementation will have a clear advantage over other nations that have not prepared their people to such a level.
Just imagine an entire nation of knowledgeable people! An impossible task? Not at all. Less crime, more community building, better lives, better jobs, better economy, more creative ideas to make society even better. What a wonderful nation that would be!
__________________________________________________________________
"Education is our passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to the people who prepare for it today". --- Malcolm X

so what about the kids of today? how do we help them...are they a generation lost?

I have read most of the body of work of Marcus Garvey.

Everything that he says about the black man taking his rightful place in society is true.

However, he wrote in the early part of the twentieth century, and there is one aspect of his writing that is dated. He is a proponent of going back to Africa and re-creating modern black society there as a base.

The reason that I say that his writing is dated, is that he never foresaw globalisation, the loss and blending of culture and instantaneous communication like the internet, obviating geographical space and distance.

I believe that Black society must rise up and compete as an integrated unit in the global village. In other words, we stand and make a go of it here. When Garvey wrote his words, the Bahamas was a colonial backwater. Now that we have our destiny in our own hands, it is our job to make this the best possible center of excellence, and not the mediocre backwater that it is. And this is where Garvey's teaching's can help.

Do you notice his advice? If you go up a layer of abstraction from the points that he makes, he is advocating a return to first principles. And this answers the question of how to help the lost generation today.

First principles include a basic grounding in Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic. First principles include extreme fluency and literacy in English. That means a huge focus on phonics, spelling, vocabulary. ANd then comes the mathematics bit -- the only notation that describes the universe without language.

There are a few ideas floating around in Yorick's writing that are intriguing. There has to be a change in teaching methods, a focus on self-discovery and not learning by rote, but learning by doing. And there has to be a disciplined, serious approach. I've read that in several schools, they have separated the girls from the boys, and the marks went up dramatically.

I think whatever approach is adopted, the one thing that is self evident is that the present education system is sorely lacking, and doing a huge disservice to Bahamians.

hear, hear ... (applause)!

what particularly perturbs me about the bahamian school-based education today is that it overlooks so many writers and thinkers such as marcus garvey, malcolm x, stokely carmichael, derek walcott as primary influences. when i was in school, we learned about western civilization from a macmillan caribbean text, which at least took into consideration many different points of view.

when i first attended school in the u.s., i noted that their textbooks were remarkably different in their focus, and as a result original thinkers such as carmichael, leroi jones/abaka, ntozhake shange, malcolm x were largely marginalized as terrorists or at best, black militants, and therefore 'less than' important. if the ministry of education in nassau is cutting costs by importing secondhand american textbooks, it is doing the bahamian citizen not a single favour.

did some one say marcus garvey? on education? hmm yorick whats your point dude most pretenders here dont know a thing about marcus garvey, so like i say again whats your point, other than trying to be more aware than you are? If your intent was to deal with the issue of education then the thread armed police in schools is an excellent one to do so.:)

hear, hear ... (applause)!
what particularly perturbs me about the bahamian school-based education today is that it overlooks so many writers and thinkers such as marcus garvey, malcolm x, stokely carmichael, derek walcott as primary influences. when i was in school, we learned about western civilization from a macmillan caribbean text, which at least took into consideration many different points of view.
when i first attended school in the u.s., i noted that their textbooks were remarkably different in their focus, and as a result original thinkers such as carmichael, leroi jones/abaka, ntozhake shange, malcolm x were largely marginalized as terrorists or at best, black militants, and therefore 'less than' important. if the ministry of education in nassau is cutting costs by importing secondhand american textbooks, it is doing the bahamian citizen not a single favour.


I would recommend that you read the Isis Papers, and your eyes will be open.:angel: