It’s the educational system, isn’t it?

The Romanian education has always been a controversial subject. Since I have knowledge of myself, the majority of the things I have heard about it in the media were focused on its weaknesses: the failures of many high school students at their final exams and the innocent students paying for the frustrations of the unsatisfied and poorly paid teachers. Before leaving to the United States I could also have listed many problems related to this educational system, such as the teachers, and the big amount of information expected to be learned, or too less training for the national team representing Romania at the International Mathematical Olympiad.

However, switching to such a different educational system as it is the American system and being in touch with other ones such as the Brazilian one, I have realized that many of the aspects of the Romanian education that I used to consider disadvantageous were not necessarily detrimental. The truth is that the Romanian school manages to create people who can handle not only situations that appear in the textbooks. The competition that exists at all times makes it clear that, for better or worse, someone will win and other one will lose. Not everything in life is sunshine and rainbows and that’s probably the most important lesson that I’ve learned in Romania, though I have become aware of it only after going abroad.