Comparison of Real-life School to Oasis Public School from Ready Player One

In the book, Ready Player One, the public school in the OASIS is an ideal version of real-life schooling for every reader. Most readers, including me, think that if someone can attend the school like the public school in the OASIS, he or she will be very pleased. Simply because it is difficult to find a school like a school in the OASIS, which does not have bully, violence, apathy, indifferent, and any other negative stuff. Compared to the school I experienced in reality, there are many similarities and differences between OASIS public school and real-life school, which basically reflect in teachers, classroom overcrowding, student apathy, and school violence.

Unlike their real-world counterparts, most of the OASIS public school teachers seemed to genuinely enjoy their jobs, probably because they do not have to spend half their time acting as baby sitters and disciplinarians. So they can wisely and efficiently use their time to teach students a lot of useful technology. Compared with it, most teachers in real life could not be a “real” teacher. Although he or she obviously loves to teach, he or she always seems to “fight” with some mischievous student in the classrooms. For this reason, he or she loses a lot of time to teach the students. And there are some students who are definitely not interested in studying. Teachers have to be patient to explain the principle until those students understand it. Everyone can see how much it frustrated the teachers when the kids say “I do not understand! It does not make sense!” and it is also frustrating for the kids who are there to learn. But there is one thing different. The real-life school teaches students how to communicate, how to be a part of society, how to respect others, how to be themselves, and how to build up their own rules of conduct.

The school of the OASIS deals with class overcrowding by dedicating an entire planet to school. The planet called Ludus which consists of as many schools that needed to sustain a large number of students. So the classroom overcrowding is fixed by there being as many schools as there needs to fit a large amount of schools. However, the real-life school struggles with overcrowding. In most schools, in reality, it is very normal that there are over 20 students in a class with one teacher. So it is hard for the teacher to take care of all the students in the class. In addition, when the students move to the next class, if someone looks at the entire school, he or she will find it is like a huge train station, noisy and crowded. In the process of moving, vividly, people are crowded like canned sardines. What is further, when the students line up in the washroom, the line is very long. It is no exaggeration to say that people in the queue can be discharged from the washroom to the doorway next door. Obviously, a short five minutes between classes is not enough for students to go to the washroom.

Student apathy is handled in the school of the OASIS. The school of the OASIS provides students with the ability to travel on a class trip like adventures, which Wade loves very much and he takes advantage of it. Because he has little in-game money to travel. This issue also depends on the class and the teacher. For example, in Wade’s Latin class, he finds that it is difficult to focus on the class, so he ends up reading Anorak’s Almanac, James Halliday’s autobiography to pass the time. In this situation, other teachers tend to bring their classes on virtual class trips, so that students can be entertained when they learn about it. Similar to the school of the OASIS, the school of real is also handled student apathy by letting students truly to experience things such as visiting different places in an instant. For example, in the school year, the school board will organize some field trips in order to reduce students’ apathy and want them to be active. Besides, holding a host of welcome ceremonies and other group events are also what the school will do every single year, such as, the international students’ meeting which is an assembly helping all international students integrate into school life.

The other issue is dealt with by the school of OASIS is school violence. They solve it by being able to mute people you don't wanna talk to. In the book, Parzival mutes a group of bullies from his Algebra 2 class who was giving him a tough time. This gives students, who are bullied, a safer feeling being in school. Students can still use words to mess with each other, but this is simply fixed by muting the other players. In the Oasis, PVP (player versus player) is turned off on the school world of Ludus, so that no fights can occur on school grounds. And it solves violence by completely preventing it. The solutions in the school of the OASIS also work in a real school. They have their own principles that every student ought to obey those regulations. It effectively prevents the occurrence of school violence. What is more, if school violence really occurs, students who participated will be asked about the specific process of it. If their mistakes are confirmed, the school will call their parents to come to school, and inform them of the final punishment. By blocking out students it helps cut down on school violence. When students feel uncomfortable in their previous class, they can apply to transfer to another class after giving reasonable and accurate reasons.

Generally speaking, the virtual school of OASIS is a perfect school which is definitely the sort of school every nerdy kid would love to attend. There is almost no such thing as classroom overcrowding since an entire planet is dedicated to having as many as needed large schools, which every classroom is a holodeck and no one ever nails you with a spitball in the back of the head. Muting can help with getting rid of distractions for students, as well as student violence. The virtual school is a bully-free learning environment where only your brain goes to class, while your body stays at home. So school violence is solved by completely preventing it. Student apathy is fixed by letting students truly to experience things such as visiting different places in an instant and having students go on field trips to faraway places instantly. Thus for students who don’t have a lot of money, it allows them to travel for free. However, the downside for a child who attended a school like that would be the total lack of true human interaction and socialization. Because this kind of school does not teach kids how to interact with others, how to contribute to the society, and how to be a human with right world ideology, values, and outlook on life. Consequently, even though the circumstance in the real-life school is mostly similar to the school of OASIS, attending public school in real life is much different from attending in the OASIS.