[substitute]

Yeah whatever, I agree that people should be tested and certified for certain professions such as medical, and there are some things that are obviously easier to learn in an institutional context.

However, the current educational system here seems to be somewhat rigid in its all or nothing approach: you either come and learn everything with us and take our exam at the end, which, if you pass, gets you a certificate that means everyone respects you and believes you have these skills. Or alternatively, you can not bother with us at all, learn everything off your own back through private study, and have no opportunity to have your knowledge recognized or respected, which means you'll have less opportunity to use it.

The trouble is that because there is this mentality that only formally recognized skills 'count', those who have the skills but without the certificates are unable to obtain the chance to prove they have them. And also, many of those who have the certificates, but might not actually be very good (could've passed by the skin of their teeth? rote learning but no actual deeper understanding of the subject? etc) get the opportunities that really some self-taught guy who's shit hot, deserves more.

If there were more flexibility in the formal system, so that you could take exams without taking classes, if you feel you have the knowledge self-taught or learned through some informal means (tutored by a friend, relative, whatever), so that when you've already spent say, ten years learning mechanics, you only have to spend a day or so doing exams to have that skill and knowledge recognized, rather than spend 3 years on a course "learning" things you already know, just to get the recognition, thereby wasting the time you could've spent learning advanced levels.

In my lifetime my formal certification has always been playing catch-up with my actual knowledge and skills.

But I do find it a kinda ulimate irony, a sorta illustration of the self-defeat of the system, when I get people unquestioningly giving me a translation job over someone else, by the fact I can put Dr in front of my name rather than Mr. They don't bother checking that my doctorate is in history. So I'll get a job translating a piece in a language I know pretty well, but the guy I pipped to the post has it as his native tongue - just no letters after his name. And the same thing's happened to me in reverse before I had the PhD - someone whose French is obviously academically learned beating me to a client because they have the certificate, whilst I was 'only' French!! lol