Thoughts on assembly

Just noting my thoughts about the assembly this morning. (Whilst simultaneously procrastinating about my English homework; two birds + one stone?)

I don't know if you were there, but Mrs Marriot was talking about joining extracurricular activities and how great they were for developing your personality in the right way and teaching you things that school cannot. Educating you in a different way. This is fine and, having participated in the judo team for several years, I am a strong believer in the power of teamwork, even in a non-team sport. The team spirit we had when the judo club was at its height members-wise was incredible. Sadly, many people have left and this spirit is only preserved in the few of us that are left. Anyway, back to the point: I agree, sports are great. 

However, Mrs Marriot went from saying that we should all cooperate in sports to develop our character to saying that we should be selfish when it comes to academic work. I was a bit shocked at this drastic leap. Why should we be selfish when it comes to schoolwork and not sports?

Is it because our academic work actually matters in the long run? Was she saying that sports are good fun but don't really matter? What about the professional athlete? Should they be allowed to be selfish in their sport because it is important to them? Does it therefore follow that sports don't actually make any difference to our personalities, as was previously claimed, if we are capable of being selfish in other areas of life? Doesn't altruism permeate all areas of life? Shouldn't it? 

These were the questions that came to me at the time but I think what she really meant was that we shouldn't 'collaborate' with others in our school work. I think she was trying to discourage this idea. Which makes sense, of course, but I don't think this means we should be selfish in our academia. We frequently work together in understanding problems (especially maths!) and explaining concepts to each other. We'll debate to gain a deeper understanding about a topic, work through examples together and give critiques of each other's work to improve. Surely this is a form of collaboration and is good and wonderful and maybe sometimes even altruistic? (Whether that is possible or not is a whole different topic for debate. I'm actually fairly cynical and don't believe much in altruistic acts. They can happen, but true altruism in humans is rare.)

I'm nitpicking, really. But I was confused at first (thinking too much, probably) and I hope nobody else has gone away with the sense that they should never help anybody with schoolwork.