“Be the change you want to see in the world.” (Ghandi): “The only time you should look down on someone is when you help them up.” (Jesse Jackson), “A life lived for others is the only life worth living.” (Albert Einstein). What, for example, do all these people have in common; first, education. Ghandi was educated from a young age in a public school environment; Jesse Jackson attended Sterling High School and was a very accomplished student; Albert Einstein attended the Swiss Federal Polytechnic School in Zurich, specializing as a teacher in physics and mathematics, and graduated with a diploma. All of these people, like many others, believed that they should live their lives for others. Education is a privilege; too many people, especially in this country, consider it a right or even an obligation. In today's American society, most people must earn a college degree in order to pursue a reasonable career; as a result, the vast majority of today's young people are expected to attend college of some kind. The decision today is not whether to go to college, but what kind of college and for how long. This social paradigm causes people to view education as somehow less valuable and therefore ignore the responsibilities involved in achieving the completion of one's education. Contrary to the collaborative social illusion masked before the eyes of today's youth, not all people have the same educational opportunities as us. Do. In reality today only one in four Americans has a college degree; it's only 25%. An even smaller percentage of the world's population has been so lucky. Only 1% of people living on this planet have earned a college degree. When a student earns his or her degree, he or she becomes… halfway… learning to work with his or her fellow instrumentalists to achieve harmony both socially and musically. Each student pushes each other to achieve their best because an ensemble is only as good as each individual sound it produces. As a music teacher I hope to use my training in that field to touch the lives of my students so they can learn to value and use their education for its full purpose. In conclusion, I believe that the responsibilities of an educated person are to value and use their education in the best way they see fit to benefit the world, their lives, and the lives of others around them. We are all born with the potential to achieve great things; it is through education that we gain the tools to pursue our full potential; however, it is still our choice to embrace the opportunity as it presents itself in our lives.