Assumption divide 1 - The purpose of education is for personal attainment vs societal enculturation. The whole argument usually boils down to this. Are we learning to help ourselves or learning to help others. Particular nuances get sticky but I lean heavily towards the former. A neat RAND policy document from 1982 was quite illuminating about the government's desire to program citizenship behaviors into American children.
Assumption divide 2 - Education can be measured by test scores. This was surprisingly common, especially amongst policy makers and educators and those who felt the second way on the last assumption. Another way to look at it is - education's effectiveness is in the eye of the beholder. Why should a future plumber pay thousands of dollars to learn about symbolism in early 20th century literature? How will this help him or her pay the bills or be a successful parent or enjoy life?
Assumption divide 3 - There is a universal best way to educate. This parallels a hang up I have with evolutionary eugenicists (digression averted). Maybe rote memorization of multiplication tables is better for some children. With a national Board of Education a one size fits all approach is inevitable and those kids will be left out. The idea of a universal best has been disproved most prominently with spaghetti sauce. Check out Malcolm Gladwell's speech to TED if you wanna learn more.
Assumption divide 4 - More education is better. This ties in with the 2nd assumption. But obviously there is a point where the marginal benefit of education is less than the marginal cost. Only an individual can dynamically respond when this happens.
Assumption divide 5 - Government knows best vs Parents know best. This one speaks for itself and is highly controversial
Assumption divide 6 - More resources should be provided to low achievers vs more resources to those with greater potential. Kurt Vonnegut's 'Harrison Bergeron' dealt with this dilemma
Assumption divide 7 - More facilities and individualized programs are better. The DC study seems to disprove this sadly.
I know this isn't everything but at least it is a start.
So what do you guys think??? What am I missing? What is left to ponder? How can we use this information to make a difference? Should we make a difference? Does the current situation appeal to you based on how you lean regarding the aforementioned assumptions??
Did you just call the national board of education Hitler? Or maybe I'm confused about what you mean by evolutionary eugenics. Hopefully everyone has a problem with that. Anyway, I've never given much thought to the education thing so it looks like your list is pretty complete to me.
ReplyDeleteI don't care too much about the subject--it seems to me like one of those things I don't pay much attention to until I have kids of my own someday--but Assumption divide 6 is particularly interesting. It's a shame that more funding isn't put towards "gifted" programs and so on. I know I absolutely benefited from such programs when I was in Anchorage, and sorely missed them when I moved to Montana and they didn't have anything like that. One of my earlier memories is doing some sort of test thing for the Rabbit Creek Elementary School gifted program...we were in this little storage room and I think it was some sort of spatial or visual relationships kind of puzzle.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I do absolutely think funding to lift kids on the bottom is important, especially because these kids obviously aren't getting as much support from home as other students, but I think it's just as important to have programs to help exceptional children excel and achieve the best of their abilities.
The question then comes, however...where do you make that cutoff, that distinction between which kids get into the "gifted" program, and which ones don't? Do you do different gifted programs for different subjects--for example, a math/science gifted group, a social sciences group, and an English/language group?
Gary, I'll be sure to ponder on the potential correlation and write a bad-a post.
ReplyDeleteGood point on the issue of determining who is 'gifted' Drew. Maybe, assuming the restrictions of a public education, it could be a self select option, where anyone wanting rigorous learning could opt in - and then risk the consequences of not cutting mustard. Kinda like AP english when I opted out.
Drew!? That was me, Matt!
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