I will not let a curriculum written in nostalgia erase my future

By Rebecca Thomas, inspired by Suli Breaks and Te Ngāhere students 

Yuval Noah Harari

So you want me to get an education…

Why?

Let me tell you what society tells me:

It opens doors.

Builds futures.

Makes you “employable.”

“Be grateful for what you’re given.”

But I’m given a lunch that dropped from six bucks to three,

and still tastes like yesterday’s apology.

I’m told it’s better than nothing.

But “nothing” never came wrapped in foil trays.

Education is the key.

But who holds the lock?

Who holds the lunch tray?

Who holds the power and the contracts?

Seymour says be grateful.

Grateful for burnt kai.

Grateful for worksheets and textbooks with no purpose.

Grateful for "digital learning" that teaches me nothing but patience.

I will not let a budget decide my worth.

They say the curriculum opens pathways.

But my pathways are YouTube autoplay and DMs at midnight.

My literacy is more than print.

It’s TikToks. Memes.

It’s rage-quits and late-night scrolling.

It’s the group chat that knows I’m not okay

before the school counsellor ever will.

You say school prepares me for life —but what life?

The one in your textbook,

or the one in my pocket?

Nine-year-olds told me they game with strangers,

use voice changers.

Twelve-year-olds dodge filters,

game during class,

and learn more from YouTube

than from “Google Classroom.”

And you want me to write essays?

You say ChatGPT is cheating.

But it’s the only voice that explains things

without rolling its eyes or marking me down.

Maybe I’m not cheating.

Maybe I’m surviving a system 

that hasn’t updated since dial-up.

Adults say they understand digital life.

But do they?

You say we’re distracted.

We say we’re adapting.

You say the internet is dangerous.

We say it’s home.

We live in a world of persuasive captions,

AI content machines, and dopamine-drenched algorithms

that know us better than teachers do.

And yet you still teach “structure”

as if it’s the thing that’s going to save us.

You say English teaches us to write properly.

But we’re already writing:

In memes, reels, short bursts of meaning.

In resistance.

One of us said:“Kids have good ideas too.”

So why don’t we ever get asked?

Ask us.

Don’t guess.

Don’t ghostwrite our futures with your nostalgia.

You removed Te Tiriti from the curriculum

—but you didn’t remove it from our bones.

We carry it in our mihi, 

in our group work, 

in our relationships.

We are living, learning, breathing whakapapa.

Even when the curriculum pretends we’re not.

Teachers are out here learning te reo on their own time.

Tuakana-teina happens in group projects without it being named.

Te ao Māori isn’t an “object of study.”

It’s how we survive.

And we’re already being assessed

by metrics no test will ever test.

We are learning to code-switch, read the room,

survive on likes, and balance the algorithm against our own mental health.

So don’t ask me for a five-paragraph essay

when you haven’t taught me how to read the world I actually live in.

English is where we question voice and power.

Where we tell stories.

So why are we still teaching it as if the story ended with Shakespeare?

We are crafting arguments in Instagram stories.

Writing poetry on walls.

Speaking truth in emojis,

and silence, and edits.

We are not lazy.

We are not disengaged.

We are not just kids.

We are the voice you didn’t listen to.

And no —I will not let a whitewashed curriculum written in nostalgia erase my future.

I will not let a lunch budget define my health.

I will not let racist writers define my learning.

I will not let silence be my only voice.

I am not a grade. I am not a data point. I am not a blank page.

I am rangatahi. I am resilience.

I am real.

And I will not let anyone decide my future for me.