Aqeel Khoso
A university is not a birthplace of poets or of immortal authors, of founders of schools, leaders of colonies, or conquerors of nations. So wrote new man. This sentence very beautifully sets down a limit to what one should expect from a university. A university does not necessarily produce great figures of history –Aristotles, Napoleons or Shakespeares, sometimes university may produce such heroes but it is not just for producing such great figures only that a universities exist. We may even say that a university does not exist just for producing an army of engineers or doctors or economists and so on. Of course, it does give us our doctors and our engineers but its main aim is not merely producing doctors and engineers from year to year. Its aim is rather to give really educated men and women to society. This may seem to be ordinary thing to give educated men and women but it is a great aim. It is no common thing to produce really educated man or women, when a university produce a few really educated man and women, they will change the society. A university education raises the whole intellectual tone of society. A person who has acquired university education in the right sense of the word has developed his intellectual capacity in the right way. His taste is cultivated and purified. His ideas and aspirations are raised to a high level. He becomes broad-minded and tolerant of other people’s views. His behavior and manners are polished. Such a person can not fail to influence society. He will carry the lights of the wisdom with him wherever he goes. His own tastes being refined he will use his influence in refining the tastes of the society in which he lives. His own attitudes and manners being polished , he will be a model for others and will influence their attitudes and manners. A university education prepares a man for successful living. People who are not educated in the right sense of the word have a self-centered attitude. They consider themselves to be the most important people in the world and refuse to look at things from other people’s point of view. Now a man who has received university education in the right sense learns to put himself in another’s place to look things from the point of view others. He learns thus to tolerate others. He also knows how to place his own view-points before others so that others would be convinced. Of the justness of his views. He knows how to influence others and how to come to an understanding with them. A man with a good university education knows how to be at home in any society. He is never snobbish and does not exaggerated notions about himself. If a person does not learn humility , where is the advantage of his being educated? One who is educated in the real sense is always humble. A really educated man knows when to speak and when to remain silent. Just as it is an advantages to be a good conversationalist so also it is a great advantage to be a good listener. It is not enough to be able to talk all the time. One should also learn to others. A good university education must teach these qualities. Similarly, a well-educated man knows when to be gay and when to be serious. It is highly improper to be boisterous when seriousness is expected or to be grim when there is an occasion for light-hearted fun. A man or a woman who has received a good education knows how to adopt himself to various circumstances. A good university education will train these qualities. It will, therefore, be seen that university education has tremendous advantages with go far beyond merely giving a degree. A good university education does not merely touch one side of a man’s personality but it affects his whole personality and moulds his entire attitude to life. Unless a person has benefitted to this extent from a university education, he can not be said to have gained anything from his education at all.
