They spent the first three years of school getting you to pretend stuff and then the rest of it marking you down if you did the same thing.
Interpretation
The quote critiques the contradictory nature of educational systems that encourage creativity but penalize deviation from norms.
Margaret Atwood's quote highlights the irony in education, where students are initially encouraged to use their imagination and creativity during early schooling but are later graded and evaluated on their ability to conform to preset standards and expectations. This reflects a broader commentary on how educational institutions may stifle originality in favor of compliance, suggesting that the system may not foster genuine learning or individual expression.
In practice
In a speech about educational reform, one could reference this quote to highlight the need for nurturing creativity in students.
If I am good enough and quiet enough, perhaps after all they will let me go; but it’s not easy being quiet and good, it’s like hanging on to the edge of a bridge when you’ve already fallen over; you don’t seem to be moving, just dangling there, and yet it is taking all your strength.
I would like to believe this is a story I’m telling. I need to believe it. I must believe it. Those who can believe that such stories are only stories have a better chance. If it’s a story I’m telling, then I have control over the ending. Then there will be an ending, to the story, and real life will come after it. I can pick up where I left off.
What else can I do? Once you've gone this far you aren't fit for anything else. Something happens to your mind. You're overqualified, overspecialized, and everybody knows it. Nobody in any other game would be crazy enough to hire me. I wouldn't even make a good ditch-digger, I'd start tearing apart the sewer-system, trying to pick-axe and unearth all those chthonic symbols - pipes, valves, cloacal conduits... No, no. I'll have to be a slave in the paper-mines for all time.
We love each other, that’s true whatever it means, but we aren’t good at it; for some it’s a talent, for others only an addiction.
I've learned quite a lot, over the years, by avoiding what I was supposed to be learning.
Knowing too much about other people puts you in their power, they have a claim on you, you are forced to understand their reasons for doing things and then you are weakened.
A book is always an emergence above everyday life. A book is expressed life and thus is an addition to life.
So many organizations have a mentoring arm, but they don't really do it. Their idea of mentoring a kid is giving them general advice. But what they need to do is read with children.
Unprovided with original learning, unformed in the habits of thinking, unskilled in the arts of composition, I resolved to write a book.
I have seen schools across the country working long and hard to embed a commitment to the unlimited development of every student into their cultures. The result, in terms of motivated learners and test scores, often is spectacular.
It is one thing to open the schools to all children regardless of race. It is another to train the teachers, to build the classrooms, and to attempt to eliminate the effects of past educational deficiencies. It is still another to find ways to feed the incentive to learn and keep children in school.
In a high-IQ job pool, soft skills like discipline, drive and empathy mark those who emerge as outstanding.
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