"Educated" by Tara Westover: The Power of Education

In the essay "Educated" by Tara Westover, the author delves into her personal journey of self-discovery through education. She highlights the importance of not only having access to education but also taking ownership of one's learning to truly succeed. The author emphasizes how her upbringing in a strict religious household without formal education did not prevent her from pursuing knowledge and eventually obtaining a PhD. Through her experiences, she learned that education is not just about obtaining degrees or diplomas but also about being curious, asking questions, and pursuing knowledge. The concept that one's education is based on what they put into it is a crucial and empowering idea that everyone should embrace. Tara Westover's "Educated" is an inspiring memoir that challenges traditional notions of education and self-reliance.

Before we begin our formal education, we start learning at home. Our primary educators are our family. Generally, they teach us our most basic lessons, such as how to talk, read, count, and write. However, they also teach us crucial moral lessons, like right from wrong, manners, etc. This varies from family to family; some parents teach their children a lot, while others only teach their children a little. For Tara Westover, everything she knew and learned as a child was from her family, since she never attended school as a child. Sadly, her family didn’t teach her much, “In theory, the children were being home-schooled; in reality, there was virtually no academic instruction to speak of. They learned to read from the Bible, the Book of Mormon and the speeches of Joseph Smith and Brigham Young. The only science book in the house was for young children, full of glossy illustrations. The bulk of their time was spent helping their parents at work”. Although Westover learned about herbalism, Mormonism, and scrapping metal, she did not learn much about basic school subjects, like math, science, English, and history. However, despite this disadvantage of not receiving a proper education as a child, Tara Westover was still able to teach herself, get into college, and eventually earn her Ph. D. from Cambridge, not to mention write a memoir that became a New York Times bestseller. As Westover noted in her novel, as well as in her keynote address, she had to work extremely hard to teach herself math, science, and grammar once she decided she wanted to go to college. She spent hours upon hours studying and trying to learn concepts for the ACT, and it paid off, “Tara makes her first big step toward liberation by, remarkably, doing well enough on the ACT to gain admission to Brigham Young University”. Tara received a twenty-eight on the ACT and was accepted to BYU, all without any formal education. She didn’t necessarily need a classroom or teachers to learn; all she needed was a hunger for education and the determination to teach herself. This proves that with hard work, anything is possible.

Once Tara got to college, she kept working hard. She struggled a lot at first because she was so behind academically, as well as socially, “There, she is shocked by the profane habits of her classmates, like the roommate who wears pink plush pajamas with “Juicy” emblazoned on the rear, and in turn shocks her classmates with her ignorance, never more so than when she asks blithely in art history class what the Holocaust was. (Other new discoveries for her: Napoleon, Martin Luther King Jr. , the fact that Europe is not a country)”. She had to adjust much more than most of her peers had to. In her keynote address, Tara Westover discussed how difficult it was having to learn about things that everyone else had learned previously, such as the Holocaust or Civil Right Movement. She described it as being the only person who has never seen the color yellow, while everyone else can see it. Due to the fact that she was so behind, she spent a lot of time and effort into catching up; she studied, did homework, and read as much as she possibly could in order to do well in her classes and maintain her scholarship, which she did.

A student can be given all the tools and opportunities in the world to succeed. However, if the student does not utilize or take advantage of them, then they are halting their own education. On the other hand, a motivated person, like Westover, can learn just as much, if not more, because they are willing to work hard to learn. . The most prestigious or expensive school does not necessarily mean the best education. Although Tara Westover went on to study at top-tier colleges like Cambridge and Harvard, she had very humble beginnings of secretly studying in her basement or at her grandmother’s house. Like it is said in the film Good Will Hunting, “You dropped one hundred fifty grand on an education you could’ve got for a dollar fifty in late charges at the public library”. I feel that this quote is very similar to Tara’s experience. She did not have to spend much money, if any, teaching herself. She did not need expensive textbooks, a classroom, or even teachers to learn. All she really needed was a few books, some patience, and a lot of persistence.

Tara Westover’s Educated explores several themes surrounding family, community, learning, and education. I believe the most critical theme is that you get out of your education what you put into it. Westover shows us that taking an active role in your education always pays off; she didn’t rely on someone teaching her, giving her assignments, etc. as she was growing up. However, she made the decision that she wanted to learn and go to college, and she did it. Despite the difficult circumstances it took to get her there, she worked hard for what she wanted, and was able to achieve her goals of attending college.