We don't need no education

Imagine an establishment of education like this: Around 1,000 students in the whole school, but only about 50 per grade.  With every grade represented along with a preschool option there is an age range of students is from 2 to 18.  Souds pretty weird right, maybe like a bad idea, perhaps something that should have been thought through.  There might be some minor conflits of interest in how to set up the school so each student gets the best possible experience when the kids range from toddlers to legal adults.  With no furthur ado I give you my private school in San Sebastian, and they have set up the school I so hastily described as a bad idea.  And now, after several months of attending the institution, I have decided I was right, the school could use some improvements.  Now I can't just lob all the blame onto the designers of the institution.  Running a private school (or any school for that matter) would not be an easy task in my mind.  Anything where kids need to be under control is an extreme hassle and anyone who has every babysat an obstinate child will know.  Smaller children need to be coddled and watched every moment of every day to make sure they don't decide on testing the flavor of glue or pointy metal objects.  As far as the child is concerned these would make excellent treats and if anyone tries to take them away that person deserves to be screamed and cried at until they pick the child up, at which point it is time for the child to vomit.  The same general stage continues for several years, but when verbal skills are aquired the much dreaded whining begins.  At the next stage in developement, from about 9 to 13, kids think they have enough worldly experience to converse with you on any issue, no matter how personal it may be.  The advice they give you is filled with youthful ignorant optimism and only deepens the rest of our cynicism because we know how wrong they are.  At this stage of development kids cannot imagine anything bad happening in the world unless they have experienced it directly, but their bubble of hope will be shattered.  Someday, usually a school day, somewhere, most likely on a bus, the child's hope will be forever shattered by a teenager who already knows how horrible the world is.  The child grows into a pessimist and realizes that authority is really an illusion and parents, much less teachers, have no real control over anything.  When the teenager hears a mere child talking about how great the world is he can't help himself but to destroy the fake world of the peaceful know nothing, it's a vicious, and very short, cycle.  The essential three stages a kid goes through can be reduced to: Anarchist, Carebear, Anarchist. Now if kids need be controled and educated that is a job I could never do, so I admire those who devote themselves to the profession.
I sit in Economía taking a test that I have not studied for.  I don't care and neither does the teacher we both know that grades here for me are just for laughs, which I'm sure she has a lot of reading my answers.  I will find out several days later that I did not even warrent a zero on the test.  While taking this particular exam I find myself continually distracted by noises coming from the window, they are coming from a playground.  The school's property is minimal so all the Fútbol fields, basketball courts, and play areas are situatied right next to the building where education is supposed to take place.  Just outside the window is the 4 and 5 year old playground.  Kids of that age have their own form of communication which is not based on any language, it is based on noise.  In particular how loud you are.  If you are the loudest, you are correct.  It does not matter what type of conversation is being had, there is always a winner when it comes to small children, even if they are just saying hello.  Then another conversation is needed to decide who was, in fact, the winner of the greeting, this results in yet another victory and more decibel intense exchanges.  The simplicity of the oral conversation belies the true power it holds, namely the power to drive any outsider crazy.  I could not imagine if this year actually mattered for me credits wise, I would never be able to concentrate with all the children outside apperently involved in deep conversations about the most important facts and ideas of recent history, I mean if their conversations were about something less important why would they be trying so hard to win them.  Remember the teacher you had who took everything seriously, well I have one here, she bases 10-20% of your grade on neatness.  This is an absurd demand especially since with the kids outside the window I can barely stay sane, let alone color inside the lines.
Parts of the school function as virtually an extended daycare while the older students are trying to prepare for college.  I'm not sure how the students in Segundo de Bachillerato (senior year students) are able to focus on the teacher, much less a piece of paper when Carebears are running the hallway and anarchists have overthrown the tyranny of 'quiet time.'  In addition there is very little choice in course selection because of the small class size.  So instead of getting all elective classes where everyone just slacks off I'm forced to take one of two preselected scheduals where some people are actually trying to learn.  And more often than not their learning gets in the way of my slacking off, they go to the front and inconsideratly explain math question to the class while I'm trying to read my crime novel.  And the school really isn't catering to my daily naps.
But you know, it could be worse. I could have taken an exchange year last year, then it would have counted for credit, and I would have had to do the homework instead of staring at it for a moment before deciding I don't understand.  So the school isn't that bad, provided I never have to learn anything there.