Within academia, essays are the standard form of representation for ideas, concepts, or opinions and a key metric we use to evaluate communication skills, critical thinking, or intellectual competence. From middle school, students are taught to write within the strict confines of the conventions, and from then on, much of their academic life depends on their ability to skilfully compose in the format. As they progress, teachers expect essays of increasing lengths to be handed in, and when the time comes, those applying for university are once again required to share their thoughts in the same, constraining format. Despite academia’s love of essays, however, I’d argue that academia’s heavy dependence on essays is harmful and contradicts the very values that academia seems to so vehemently value.

Hi, I’m Kingston, but I go by some variations of prestopy /ˈpɹɛstoʊpi/ on the internet (prestopy, daprestopy, daprestopie, etc.). You know how curiosity killed the cat? If I had to guess how I would die, it would be like that. As a child, I would spend hours observing the world around me, trying to understand how things work. In fact, for a surprisingly long time when I was around five, I became obsessed with double-acting spring hinge doors (the kind of doors that could open both ways). I would sit there and stare at people passing through them, mentally piecing together the mechanism that would allow such a door to work.

There are many things that you probably shouldn’t do, like, for example, trying to redecorate a road with traffic cones. Now, as a certified Traffic Cone Enthusiast (see https://dub.sh/i1-tce, it’s a real thing, we swear), it takes all my willpower not to go full-on cone conductor. But trust me, for the sake of your freedom and the unfortunate drivers on the road with you, we advise against it. However, if you can’t resist the urge, especially with the traffic around school being a complete nightmare, we understand.