Want to know why things are the way they are in education?

Read John Taylor Gatto’s Underground History of American Education.  Free Online in entirety.

“Prologue

The shocking possibility that dumb people don’t exist in sufficient numbers to warrant the millions of careers devoted to tending them will seem incredible to you. Yet that is my central proposition: the mass dumbness which justifies official schooling first had to be dreamed of; it isn’t real. “

http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/underground/toc1.htm

snip’d from Chapter 8; Plato’s Guardians
But of what lasting value could controlling topical overproduction be—addressing it where and when it threatened to break out—when the ultimate source of overproduction in products and services was the overproduction of minds by American libertarian schooling and the overproduction of characters capable of the feat of production in the first place? As long as such a pump existed to spew limitless numbers of independent, self-reliant, resourceful, and ambitious minds onto the scene, who could predict what risk to capital might strike next? To minds capable of thinking cosmically like Carnegie’s, Rockefeller’s, Rothschild’s, Morgan’s, or Cecil Rhodes’, real scientific control of overproduction must rest ultimately on the power to constrain the production of intellect. Here was a task worthy of immortals. Coal provided capital to finance it.

Nothing posed a more formidable obstacle than the American family. Traditionally, a self-sufficient production unit for which the marketplace played only an incidental role, the American family grew and produced its own food, cooked and served it; made its own soap and clothing. And provided its own transportation, entertainment, health care, and old age assistance. It entered freely into cooperative associations with neighbors, not with corporations. If that way of life had continued successfully—as it has for the modern Amish—it would have spelled curtains for corporate society.

I respect Paul’s message about the need and importance of teaching the arts and music to children and adolescents. And I do lament that the nation’s public school system in just about every part of the country is in a poorly financed state. I agree there is a terrible over emphasis on test taking and the LNCLB legislation is awful in its scope and direction and won’t do anything to improve the learning capacity of students. I hated tests as a kid and adolescent and felt there was not even any proper instruction on how to actually study and prepare for an examination. It was essentially up to you to study at home and memorize what you could and hopefully do well on the test. But the process of learning was not properly instilled in me by my instructors although I did have a few very good teachers in high school. I do remember first reading shakespeare in high school and not connecting with his style of writing at all. I didn’t like it and found it unecessarily difficult to read through. I don’t think Shakespeare impacted me at all. What influenced me more, if anything, was the importance of history, and I’m eternally grateful to my history teacher, Leroy Votto, for instilling in me the importance of studying history as a means to understanding why things are the way they are today. I also learned the importance of questioning authority which, I dare say, is more important than studying the arts. More ballerinas, piccolo players and painters won’t prevent the hideous rise of the likes of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney.

I took painting class as a kid and I also took a ceramics course in highschool. I wasn’t particular good at either but I did appreciate them both at the time. I feel I ultimately am “who I am” as a result more of my sense of injustice and my desire to see things improve knowing they could improve if more people had their eyes open to the travesty that passes for education today.

I am an advocate for home schooling but only if our entire society could go back to a one parent/one worker in the family model, and the number of hours at work were to be reduced to no more than six hours a day at most, and if a work week were limited to no more than four days a week. Schooling in America needs to be radically restructured so that parents can be more involved in what constitutes the curriculum of their kids and not leave it up to a public school administration which really can’t do a very good job of schooling some 20 to 35 kids in a classroom.

The arts play an important role in schooling a child but what this essay suggests is more of a revolution in learning where parents not only spend the time necessary to assist their children in schooling but also are themselves students as well, learning from teachers at various levels reminding them of the need to be humble and to always ask questions and not be complacent.

So much work to be done, so little time and an overall bleak picture of the future without radical change….

There are many good comments and points made in the comments below.  I would like to offer one place to start: laughter.  I am in many elementary and preschool programs, and laughter is noticeably, to me, missing.  School isn’t fun.  Learning isn’t fun.  There is no joy. Lets laugh, enjoy each other and learning.  Lets stop and watch the first snowfall of the year.  Lets celebrate Spring with flowers and watching the birds.  Maybe then we would look forward to learning.

It seems we have a lot of “prescriptions” for how to fix the public education system. We’ve been doing that for 200 years and it hasn’t worked!!

Peter Marin, a great educator and mentor of the young of the ‘60s in Calif and the founder of Pacific HS said it best…“The schools are the state’s and they do the state’s work.”

You can’t get any clearer than that.

Tapu Tuailemafua (#62178) should be praised for making such a Platonic suggestion (and I mean that with absolutely no tinge of irony or sarcasm)!  The most important lesson from Plato’s “Theaetetus” concerns the tight coupling of the concepts of knowledge, learning, and being.  Description also figures in that tight coupling, which makes sense, since your understanding is often best demonstrated by your ability to give a descriptive account of what you understand.  As a case in point, look how good the White House is at describing things!

Why art? 

That’s the question I hear when parents discuss school - and the implied premise is “art detracts from things that improve test scores.”

That may be true - art won’t necessarily increase test scores.  It will give them some experiences which may make them more humane, and in a world already overfull of hostility, a little humanity and willingness to take a good hard look at things rather than reacting violently is a good thing.

A wonderful and timely meditation on the waste land that is modern “education”. No wonder children and young people (and what’s with this popular parlance “kids”, these are not young goats), no wonder they are acting out, and up, and being inattentive in class - they are bored out of their marvelous, inventive young minds.
Of course “diagnosing” the results of our own failure to engage our children as somehow the children’s own problem - something hilariously called “hyperactive attention-deficit disorder” gives carte blanche to the appalling pharmaceutical industry to blitz children’s tender young synapses and neurones with the chemical cosh of Ritalin et al.
Ye gods.
And has anyone else noticed that basic geography is not taught in public schools any more ... not, I believe, since the 1950s if Gore Vidal is to be believed. Certainly, in my experience,  American teenagers are staggeringly ignorant of their OWN country, let alone the Great Globe Itself.
Oh, what is to be done ?

Home-schooling isn’t just for right-wing Christians…

The public school system is doing, very successfully, what it is designed to do. It is turning out shoppers whose critical faculties have been short circuited.

I agree with your premise. However, we must understand that high school has become just one more gauntlet to traverse before going on to “real life”. I cannot tell you how dismayed I am by the prevalence of “Co-op” classes in our school. Children who should be in class, learning the history, literature and mechanics of our world and society, are instead sent out to learn the lesson of the almighty dollar. We require our children to complete 4 years of high school and yet we allow them to skip out on a substantial portion of the school day to earn money for the very things that distract them from the learning experience. I don’t believe that a cell phone, ipod, computer, car, jewelry, etc. are more important that teaching our kids to be informed, productive citizens. Unfortunately, that is exactly what they learn when they are taught that passing a test is more important than the process for learning the material.

If you want a real education towards freedom in thinking and joy and confidence in life for your children, send them to a Waldorf School. Over a third of the curriculum is art, which is interwoven with virtually every other part of the curriculum. One of the first things that the Nazis did when they took power was to close all the Waldorf schools. If you want to build for a human future, build it in partnership with the wisdom of Waldorf Schools.

I am certain that if everyone read Shakespeare and Sophocles, listened to the b minor Mass, and went to the museum once a month, they’d be far happier people.  Of course, this means they’d have to be successful in shutting out the rest of the miserable effing world while they tried to escape into the own little world of joy.  I don’t think so, Paul.  You’re either dreaming or being elitist.  The world just doesn’t work that way.  Teaching kids the technology to keep a world economy and war machine humming is far too important to let ballet and oils get in the way.

The education you are writing about is gone, at least from our public schools. Perhaps if we shouted from the rooftops…“Kids you are being cheated! There are colors you will never know, worlds you will never see,  worse you won‘t even imagine!... AND in your lonely boring existence toward the end of your life … you will not know the comfort only a fine education may give…

I feel sorry for you and disappointed in me.

Surely there is something we, I can do…

Tommy

This is SO true! Many of us have forgotten to ask, “What kind of human do we want/value?”. Many others don’t care or have never thought about it, and so we get what we get from our schools. After devoting most of my adult life to public education, I have to admit that much of the alienation and dysfunction in our society lies directly at the school doorstep. We have not taught our youth to think critically; they do not know history and do not have the skills necessary to be fully-functioning citizens in the modern world. What else IS there? I am not optimistic about our future! If those of us who espouse the values promoted above don’t DO something, we deserve the result. NCLB is up for reauthorization. If we don’t make our voice heard on this horrible fiasco, we have missed one great opportunity to make change.

“No Child Left Behind” was crafted by a small group of white, male, protestants, who have never taught in a classroom and regard the 19th Century as the golden age of education.

Here in Seattle, I started a computer based learning center to make up for what the schools aren’t doing. It’s is a disgrace to disservice the children in this way. According to the Borgen Project, the US has a $522 billion military budget. My question is, why is there a debate over whether we can afford to give our kids a meaningful education when we spend so much on war?

Our government should be investing in education and in ending poverty. It’s striking that what the UN can do to end so much suffering in the world with the Millennium Development Goals can be funded with our military budget. What does that say about the political leaders in our country who claim there isn’t enough in the budget for anything beneficial?

The article points to a symptom of a much bigger problem: public schools’ emphasis on appearance over substance. Well run schools would try to do a good job of teaching and let statistical indicators be what they may. On the contrary, too many schools, perhaps the majority, prioritize statistics over performance.

Another area where widespread mismanagement is painfully apparent is safety. Bullying reports on the web suggest that schools focus on keeping the official count and severity of incidents down. The way to do it? Encourage a culture by which kids do not report violence or harassment, and when an incident becomes apparent, try to categorize it as a brutal game or blame the victim for provoking it.

Amen brother. As a former art teacher I am ashamed at what passes for education in Ohio (my home state) and across the nation. Testing has become the norm and learning, particularly creative thinking and problem-solving, are relegated to the back burner.

In Ohio our state legislature passed laws requiring testing only after the big testing agencies had written tests for Ohio (and lobbied for them as well).

As I watch my children go through the system, one who is extremely intelligent, but bored and the other, also intelligent but dyslexic (if it weren’t for our insistance that the schools do their job he would have fallen through the cracks long ago) I am reminded of the question my wife posed to me years ago, “What was so bad about our education 30-years-ago that we have to put our children through testing hell we do today?”

And who, one might well wonder, will acquaint the country’s chronically short-changed young with those finer things Mr. Cummins laments the lack of here?  The U.S. public school system was set-up specifically to provide a work-force “educated” enough to meet the requirements of the industrial revolution’s early twentieth century transition from craftmanship to mass-production….but not enough to make workers a serious threat to the interests of their capitalist “employers.”  It is also carefully designed and operated to co-opt those who might challenge “ownership” by letting them in for a miniscule “piece of the action.”

Now several generations into this regime, with most of those who teach as ill-formed (in their development as human beings) as their students, it appears that the emphasis on consumerism and competitiveness in today’s curricula continues to serve the needs of the predator classes…..and better than ever, even.  So the-powers-that-wannabe are not about to “fix” what from their elite perspective is hardly broke at all, but humming along rather nicely….thank you very much.

When people were conned into thinking of the ways they have for preparing their children to carry-on the life of the nation as an “expense,” it was really all over except for the “weeping and wailing and gnashing…...” Mr. Cummins exemplifies here.  Anyway, the corporate privateers are all ready to take-over the schooling phase of the thoroughly commercialized “social programming” that now begins at birth.  Of course they will not be inclined to include anything with no immediate benefit to “the bottom line.”  (Anyhow, there’s a ton of money to be made warehousing the “rejects,” from the “consumer unit” production line, in private prisons.)

“Individuals” are mere artifacts of the process for domesticating humans that is called, for marketing purposes, “civilization.”  Once stripped of their natural organic living arrangement, these under-people are easy prey for the ancient and highly-organized forces systematically exploiting them.  The only way out of this spiraling death-trap, for the tame two-legged livestock stuck in it today, is back into the organic living arrangement that is our natural condition.  It is one of the tragic ironies of the present situation that their tormentors are fully aware of that salient fact, while the great herds and flocks of humans they “manage” remain, by devious design and constant distraction, woefully ignorant of it.

Us free wild natural human beings, “ickche wichasha” in the Lakota language, having declined to accompany our captive sisters and brothers into their misery, could help them to recover the natural life that is still their birthright, and for which they are still suited.  But their tormentors have done and are doing everything they can think of to keep their human cattle convinced the one place they must never turn is to us.  Most of the unfortunates are sure we don’t even exist anymore….maybe never did except in “myth.”

This old heathen savage is here to say right out that is a load of bullshit….and swallowing the recommended daily dose of it will just keep-on killing you inch-by-inch….except in-time-of-war (and when in these latter days is it not?), when death comes at mach-speed and in wholesale lots.

HokaHey!

As a former student (of yours) as well as one who worked in the arts for many years, I come close to agreeing with your premise.  The arts should ideally have a role in our educational system.  But not necessarily, I believe, for the reasons you suggest.  In narrowing the focus of our educational system to standardized testing, we create a truly dull and unthinking populace.  What is missing I suggest, more than the arts per se, is the teaching of critical thinking and problem solving, skills necessary to succeed in an increasingly changing world. The arts can play a role in this for many of the reasons you describe.  But as for instilling “humanity,” well the Nazis, to pick an extreme example, were great art connoisseurs.  They had values too.

Personally I believe we teaching students to become peasants again in new type of fuedal society. In that kind of society, knowing too much is far worse than knowing too little.

Education nowadays still do not “get it”
The learning students recieve far removes from the actual reality in life. In fact leaning for being is not there and learning to pass exams is the norm. Whats the point of students regurgitating thier learning in order to pass an exam? because the system needs a huge chnage and reshuffle! Like Cummins, We must “learn ” again
We must learn for BEING it has lasting effects on students and a s such learning in this way always have lasting effects on people and their respective lives. Some people believe when one really learns, it has fundamental changes to ones life. Therefore there is a need to critique the way education is taught in the world as the product of the present system do not think laterally and therefore lack the holistic way of thinking due to this kind of approach

Of all the things I learned and did in school - barely any of these memories today’s children will ever experience.

Recess - interaction and learning “sharing”.
A “break” that renewed the day and made the “tests” bearable.  There is no “time” made for this today.

Plays and performances - singing, oration and speech contests *grr - pages and pages of memorizing!*

Art class - how many talented kids today don’t even REALIZE their potential because they don’t have the opportunity to stimulate it.

Music class—I LEARNED this was NOT my fortay!
But they let me experience the clarinet, Coronet,Trumpet, Drums and finally I was designated the “sticks” as my contribution.

We have NO “social” skills - no manners and no realization that others are just as important in this world as “SELF”.  It’s all about Me Mine and I.

There is no imagination - technology and lack of time have erased the capacity to “pretend” and utilize the inventive nature that we are born with.  When you tell kids today to “go out and play” - they usually are back inside within 1/2 hour relating boredom or the need of something to satiate their lack of imagination. 

Economic prejudices - go to your high school parking lots.  My young lady entered an “academy” that was out of “district”.  She was otricized because of her lack of $$$ and alienated because of - what her house looked like, where it was, what car she drove, what designer clothes she didn’t have…
AND economically those in districts of the “wealthy” often DO have programs for the artist, the actor and the athlete - the schools in lower economic districts fight for ANY funding for elective art programs. 

Forget the college also - the Liberal Arts colleges are for the most part beyond the reach of the average american student.

I agree with the article. I think education should have a more worldly compass. Learning about art and the current state of the world would help America’s children become global citizens. The next generation should be able to step up to the task of committing to peace. Stopping hunger and saving the environment. Idealistic as it may seem, these are global issues that aren’t being addressed now.

The obsession with testing, budget cuts and inadequate funding of public education, is designed to keep poor people poor and rich people rich.

Now, why would I think that? I must be some horrible Liberal, right? Well, let’s take a look…

First, we must admit that many people think that teachers should not make any money and have the notion that we cannot improve schools by only spending money—these are the basic “principles” of Republican/Christian/Right-Wing core values.

“Testing” is explained to us that by making school’s access to money dependent on how many students pass these standardized tests, schools will someone find the will to get students to pass these tests in greater numbers.

First, everyone should know that that all students have equal learning abilities—this is not directly proportional to “intelligence” but also has to do with physical, mental, and economic factors, as well as some students are just slackers (I was) and some very intelligent students will still have difficulties (your Edisons if you will). Many “C” students go on to have rather important jobs like CEOs of large corporations. And many students will go on to pursue careers where being an “A” student just does not mean all that much like in, say, Hollywood.

(IQ Test: Could a “C” student get to be President of the United States?)

It would be entirely okay for society as a whole—as it has been for over 200 years—to have students “pass” high school with grading system.

Mandatory tests sounds like we suddenly make a system in which every student must get an “A” to pass. Which is what is does. But not all students can get an “A” nor do they need to.

Second, one of the basic selling points of education reforms such as No Child Left Behind is to close the “Achievement Gap” which most people acknowledge exists. Which can be simply put as poor schools do not do as well as rich schools. Better schools means better students. Clearly this is that case.

So, providing less money to schools that have less students passing standardized tests KEEPS THOSE SCHOOLS POOR.

And, providing more money to schools that have more students passing standardized tests KEEPS THOSE SCHOOLS RICH.

The push for Standardized Testing in American is a blatant attempt at the Economic Genocide of poor schools and poor students by the rich white people running this country, backed fully by the Republican/Christian/Right-Wing populous.

i love to learn. i do not like to compete, or be compared or made to conform.
we need schools that are free, timeless and there when the student is ready.
sure, the time when a child is a sponge should be taken advantage of, but after the age of ten or so, we need to be feral animals and learn through the rock and roll method, or the early new orleans jazz method=learn what fascinates you.
Math is fascinating. logic is, too. history is when it’s your story, not that of rulers.
the stars are fascinating.
so instead of being shoe horned into getting this degree by 21, and this one by 24, and taking the damn status quo oath not to question JFK, 911 and the like, just hire teachers to teach the basic fundamentals of things, 24/7 to anyone who can catch on, and then we’ll think for ourselves, and do as we see fit with our personal learning.

More basically;what is the point of education? Especially education in a democracy. What history lessons do we want our kids to learn about, say, how facism and fear regularly affect populations, how powerful people manipulate public conciousness? If I simply spent the whole year teaching the history of pottery the class would learn SOMETHING, but would it be in any way useful in maintaining our democracy against the predictable dangers? And PS; are we using USEFUL criteria to select who teachs?

I think that each time this—very legitimate—issue arises, the columnist or expert should specify that he/she is referring to inner-city schools. Suburban schools, especially in the west, offer choices in IB, AP, great dance, history, fantastic music and visual art programs. If a person is looking for answers, they are found in local tax systems, respect for teachers and the teaching profession and programs that fit the development of the whole person.  All of this has been squandered in the last ten years by conservative approaches to punishing schools and teachers, i.e., standardized testing.

In a word: AMEN!

I remember once reading a Web page of an address by sociology professor Neil Ramsey, who entertained the hypothesis that the purpose of a liberal education was to clear the mind of “fear, superstition, and pettiness.”  If this is the case, then we have only to look to the White House to see why the process is being undermined.  9/11 has given the administration an excuse to elevate fear to the primary currency in what now passes for discourse;  and what is “faith-based reasoning” if not a postmodern euphemism for “superstition?”  As for pettiness, it seems to be the usual framework in which the President voices disagreement, as his recent remarks about the current congressional fact-finding visit to Syria have demonstrated all too well.

I apologize if it seems as if I am falling in a rut.  Yesterday I explored the reasons why Olmert wants the current efforts towards peace in the Middle East to fail.  Today I am arguing that the current administration wants this country’s educational process to fail.  What other acts of intentional malice are we likely to encounter?

I agree whole-heartedly with Paul Cummins, but fear the situation is much worse.  Our educational system is not only undermining the talents of tomorrow but is deliberately using “education” as a tool to keep young people ignorant and controlled.  Dissenters in most schools are seen as “bad seeds” and unpatriotic.  If students don’t “get with the program” they are attacked verbally and ostricized by the “adults” in charge.

From early on they are coerced to accept total control of their reasoning as an appropriate, necessary and even esteemed form of behavior.

I know of liason officers in the public schools who take early elementary-school aged children and ask “does your mommy or daddy smoke their cigarettes this way (like a cig.) or this way (like a joint). (BIG BROTHER IS WRITTEN ALL OVER THAT TACTIC)

My experience is that this is happening most often in rural and “small town” schools.  From what I’m able to ascertain these children really “believe” controlling and authoritarian dictates are a better and “right” way to do things.  When asked WHY they think this, most can’t verbalize it, but “KNOW” it’s a “BETTER” thing.

It’s ALARMING and upsetting to hear the youngest of them endorse this type of agenda.  It is my belief that they are purposefully and blatantly NOT being taught “ACCEPTANCE OF OTHERS”.

Education needs to encompase our historical literature, teachers need to read to their students. We once had teachers who would read a chapter of an appropriate book everyday. This in grade school whet the appetite for reading on our own.

Physical education appropriate for each student should be included in the day and if more money is being spent to field a team, than is spent on activity for all the students, than perhaps that money would be better spent seeing to the physical welfare of each child rather than the ego trips of parents and coaches.

We need hands on art classes, music, civics & government and plenty of trips to museums, galleries and historical sites. We need to stop demeaning our history, but at the same time give instruction about the different histories and societies of the world, Geography any one. It should be possible to teach students to respect each other, without degrading our culture or focusing only on the negatives (I didn’t say ignore our failings).

We need to see more of Mark Twain in the class room. He is probably the best writer to address the developemental history and problems of our transistion from a rural to urban society. He did more than anyone to focus on the shared humanity in America and I find it astonishing the number of times we see various pressure groups trying to block his writings from our students.

Thank you, Paul, for this article.  I couldn’t agree with you more.  So often, from my observation, what we call “education” has become a soulless enterprise for the educational travesty of preparing young citizens for “global competition.”  Overall, as we well know, we’re not doing much of a job even at this! 

I’d like to propose a concept and a spirit or attitude that I’m calling “coopetition,” which contains the virtues of both competition and cooperation.  It’s worth thinking through.

Weren’t we warned long ago that “1984” and “Brave New World” would turn out so dreary and fundamentally stupid (though clever and shrewd)?  Arts education is anything but frivolous for our well-being!

I agree with Paul Cummins’ assessment of the woeful state of our public education system, and would like to add to his list of the now absent benefits of real arts education. It has been documented that active participation in all of the arts enhances brain development for non-arts related subjects such as math, engineering, and all subjects involving memory and critical thinking. Teaching to the test eliminates the development of independent thought as well. This may be the ultimate goal of the current administration’s education policies. The public education system in this country was originally designed to create an employable and obedient working class, rather than truly educated independent thinkers. It seems the ruling class would like to return our education system to its roots.

Bravo.  Recently I’ve been making a nuisance of myself with my elected representatives, trying to point out the severe drawbacks of studying for tests and using our children to compete for funding.  Here in New York, entire lessons plans are now written with the standardized tests in mind.

Last year I wrote Representative Tim Bishop lamenting the difference between my daughter’s English Language Assessment (ELA) test results (she scored in the upper 80% of New York students) and the reality of her english language skills (all of her teachers agree that she’s reading two to three years below her actual grade level).  The letter I received back for Rep. Bishop read, “Dear Sir.  Thank You for your concerns about school bullying.”  School bullying.  That shows me that he (or his staff) didn’t read the letter and that Rep. Bishop is more concerned with his agenda instead of the concerns of those he claims to represent.  My letters to both NY Senators went unanswered.  The NY State Board of Education replied that my concerns are unfounded and their curriculum is backed by a committee of professional educators.  Every teacher I’ve spoken to personally feels as I do, that the children are being cheated, but can’t speak out for fear of losing their jobs.

Because of my daughter’s ELA results, she is not eligible for state funded tuition.  I am now paying a tutor to teach my daughter how to read all over again because my tax dollars have been spent to teach children word recognition instead of phonics (which the tutor uses). 

I’ve given up on hoping my children learn anything about the arts at school and have taken that part of their education on, as well.  I’m confident the creation of mindless, cubicle riding, consuming automatons is already in good hands, though.

This presents a good case for home schooling your children or sending them to a private school. In the end, it’s the parents, not the government who should decide what their children should or shouldn’t learn. I took both art and music appreciation/history in school and hated them both. The one curriculum fits all approach won’t do it.