What is the real purpose for education in a post industrial society? Schools have played the role as “scapegoat” for the larger culture. Politicians use the educational system to both cast blame and to redirect attention away from their not being focused on their own jobs. Corporate leaders point the fingers at schools as the problem for why they don’t have an available supply of disposable humans to make more profits.
Instead of shrinking back and yielding to political misconduct; meaning the way we are using education to create what politicians want or want to get rid of; educators need to become advocates and activists for learning. We need to break the cycle created by Elwood Cubberly – in which he, as an industrialist, fought for the kind of school that created factory workers, not members of a democratic society. He wanted a way to filter out what he considered scrap humans and make sure his industrialist friends had disposable humans for their workforce needs…
Politicians say they want public education and have never fully funded education. They have supported layers of federal, state and local bureaucracies that siphon dollars away from the actual buildings and classrooms.
Our students need us to equip them with skills that provide them the foundation of being a productive member of society, not just “test passing, paper-waving, hoop jumpers.” We need graduates who can critically think; problem solve; practice continuous learning; engage in civil discourse; work collectively with others and contribute to their individual good as well as to the greater good. Currently we are not graduating problem solvers, we are telling kids that learning only what will be tested is all there is to life.
The NCLB law was not created to powerfully provide a well-educated society. It was created to destroy public education. The whole testing focus is a sham and a game.
- Do we need accountability and standards that focus on proficiency in the basics? Yes.
- Do we need to break the corruption in education? Yes.
- Do we need to graduate students that can meet their world with real skills? Yes, absolutely!!!
And we need communities to get back in the game and DEMAND that the state and Feds FULLY FUND SCHOOLS. We have nothing if we can’t give our children what they need to take on the world we will be leaving them.
What is the real mission of public education in a free and democratic society? It’s time the adults answered the questions for ALL children, not just the children of privilege and money. What do you think??
LeeAnn
