Commentary: Students are ultimately responsible for their own performance

The media (along with the rest of us) are forever talking about the quality of education and how it can be improved.

Certainly a very important question. In fact, it may not be too far off the mark to suggest that everything depends on education. So how does it work?

To understand popular thinking, consider a pool table. The cue stick hits billiard ball No. 1, No. 1 hits billiard ball No. 2 and then No. 2 goes in the pocket.

The cue stick is public funding. Billiard ball one is the teacher. Billiard ball two is the student. The pocket is the diploma.

Simple, right? Except it doesn’t work that way.

We have the British physicist Sir Isaac Newton to thank for that causal imagery. But there’s no big statue of Newton in Silicon Valley. And there’s no Newton chair in the neuroscience program at UC Irvine.

That’s because computers and people aren’t billiard balls. As with software, being human means making choices. A whole new ball game.

Yes, funding is important. Yes, quality of teacher training is important. Yes, books, materials and computer resources are important.

But they are not crucial. What is crucial is student decision-making.

Students decide whether to listen to the teacher. Students decide whether to do homework. Students decide whether to create a harmonious school environment in which everyone is free to learn. It is the students who grasp the connection between a good education and a good job, a good life.

Students are ultimately responsible for their performance.

Dr. STEVE DAVIDSON is a clinical psychologist in Newport Beach.