From one of my favorite writers, only a bit OT, but certainly no further
afield than the subject has wandered. The writer can be found at
fredoneverything.com

Down With Education

Sort Of



December 29, 2004

Some years back, while laboring in the grim vineyards of police
correspondence for a metropolitan daily, I appeared as a guest lecturer
before a class of undergraduates in criminology at the University of
Maryland. The idea of a major in criminology struck me as peculiar, but
apparently there was one. I was to explain to the students the realities of
police work.

The adventure was a revelation. The kids, a scruffy bunch dressed in student
tatterdemalion, heavy on minorities, were as lacking in polish as in
grammar. Their intelligence seemed low. They had strong, simple prejudices
instead of ideas, and no inclination to examine them. The intellectual level
was that of a rural high school. They appeared to be bored. They had no
business in a university.

Why, I wondered, were we forcing these bedraggled beings to feign a
scholarship which appealed to them not at all, which they at once endured
and degraded-and that at great expense to the public? Why do we make this
burdensome imposition on people who do not want schooling, do not need it,
and do not understand what it is? It is wrongheaded.

I submit that it makes no sense to inflict on the unprepared and incapable a
pretense of a university education for no other reason that to further a
pretense of equality. What real purpose is served? And yet this forcing of
the unneeded on the undesirous runs through all schooling in America.

It makes little more sense to require that the intelligent but uninterested
study what they do not like-usually, the liberal arts. Doing so accomplishes
nothing. An engineer forced to read Blake is merely an annoyed engineer. He
will never touch a book of poetry in his academic afterlife. There is no
reason why he should.

I think that we ought to abandon utterly any requirement that vocational
students waste time on the liberal arts. Schools of engineering,
criminology, and business management are just that, vocational schools,
nothing more. They may be of a high order. Graduating in electrical
engineering from a school of the first rank is not easy. Yet the document
awarded is not a diploma but a trade-school certificate. So is a degree
chemistry or ophthalmology. All are evidence of training, not education. If
a student of chemistry wants to study history, and many might, he should
certainly be enabled to do so. But it should not be required.

Universities usually defend requirements in the liberal arts on many grounds
in which few believe. I suggest that we cease to defend them at all. A
liberal schooling should be a luxury, like a yacht, and should be regarded
as such. The arts are not for many and should be forced on none. They
require much and exact a price. Only the intelligent can profit by them, and
of the intelligent, few want them. Why not make them voluntary?

I now hear of departments of English literature which award degrees to
students who have never read Shakespeare or Chaucer. The students of course
say that such authors are "irrelevant." The literate respond with horror,
leaping to such barricades as may be found in publications on coated paper.

But the students are right. Shakespeare is irrelevant. More accurately,
Shakespeare is irrelevant to anyone who believes that he is irrelevant. You
do not get a federal job by knowing Chaucer, or having heard of Chaucer.
Those forced to study writers, or philosophy, or history they don't want to
study will gain nothing. Those who do want to study them lose much, because
the courses will often be of sufficiently little rigor as not to oppress the
bored.

Yet there are intelligent young of inquiring nature and breadth of mind to
whom liberal studies appeal-students actually attracted to reading Aeschylus
in the original , and Asian history and the Elder Edda, who want to study
Fragonard and Watteau. Let them. By so doing they harm no one. Being
turbulent adolescents under the influence of evil hormones, they will need
direction. Nonetheless if a student chooses such schooling, knowing what he
is choosing, it is his business.

It is not just in the universities that we force the young to study things
that mean nothing to them and will have no influence on their lives. As
soundings of the public monotonously reveal, a minority of the population is
in possession of such arcane information as the century in which the Civil
War occurred, or who fought in World War I, or where Italy might be found on
a map. Things are yet worse: Far more people than we admit can barely read.
Most who can, don't. The United States is not the well-schooled nation that
it seems to believe that it is.

The public schools, say some, have failed to such a degree as to make their
continuance rationally unjustifiable. Yes, they fail, but why? To some
extent it is because they are expected to do what cannot be done-to educate
the uneducable. For reasons of dizzy idealism, we pretend that all students
have the wit to learn. Thus we suffer high-sounding programs like No Child
Left Behind. You cannot ensure that no child will be left behind. You can
try to ensure that no child will get ahead. To this we incline.

As in the universities, the difficulty is that we refuse to separate the
able from the rest, yet insist on attempting to teach to the uninterested
things that they do not want to know. If this effort bore fruit, it might be
justified: A disputable case can be made that the historically literate are
better equipped to vote, etc. But it is easily demonstrated that the
majority do not learn much. Why bother?

A wise course, and therefore one impossible of realization, might be to
recognize that schooling is inherently hierarchical and not susceptible to
populist leveling. A beginning would be to make all study voluntary beyond,
say, the sixth or eighth grade. By then all would have learned to read who
were ever going to learn. Below the university level, private schools unregu
lated by government are the only way to let people study the subjects they
choose at the level of rigor that they want. Freedom from federal intrusion
is crucial. Nothing else can prevent resentful minorities from imposing
invertebrate standards on all.

Fat chance.

I didn't write this - but I like what he sez...

L8R

Skip

--
Morgan 461 #2
SV Flying Pig
http://tinyurl.com/384p2

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you
didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail
away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore.
Dream. Discover." - Mark Twain

On Sun, 26 Dec 2004 17:05:23 UTC, Keith Hughes
wrote:

YES!
Finally, a sensible entry into this 'debate' .

I AM a teacher - and in the 'east' - the kids that do well TEND to be
the ones who have parents that give a damn. About them and about
their education. The kids that don't get that TEND to not do as well
as they could.

Chris

On Sun, 26 Dec 2004 22:12:02 UTC, "Alan Gomes" wrote:

Now, even if there were a "rebate" for home schooling, that money would be
used to eduate the children in question, though outside of the public
system. This would still provide the alleged societal benefit you are
touting above. Unless, of course, the real issue isn't whether children
receive an education but whether it is the government doing it?

Yes, but we all benefit from OTHER people's children getting an
education too...

Chris-

On Mon, 27 Dec 2004 18:17:40 UTC, "Alan Gomes" wrote:

Ok, Keith. You win. I'm convinced. The public school system produces such a
massive societal benefit that no amount of taxation to support it is
excessive. Without it we'd have a society of kids who could not read or
write and who are in general functionally illiterate, who could not do
simple math, and who had no knowledge of world history or even of the great
books of western civilization.

Oh, wait! That's what we presently have *with* the public school system.
Quick! Someone raise my property taxes so we can throw some more money at
it!

A pathetic strawman setup - that's not what he said, as you well know,
but you don't know how to address what he did say.

Just to summarise/simplify it for you and the other 'public bad,
private good' folks, he did say:
the system has flaws;
it won't be fixed by opting out with your money;
it is the result of people (parents in this case) opting out with
their other resources, like participation.


Well, it's been fun playing. Gotta get back to life beyond usenet. So go
ahead and have the last word and I'll see you around sometime--maybe on the
water. (A feeble attempt at getting back to something sailing related
here....)

--Alan

Chris
--

On Sun, 26 Dec 2004 17:24:32 UTC, "Steve" wrote:

I have met (US and other) families in the Philippines and the Pacific
Islands who have home schooled out of necessity (lack of comprehensive
western education). We considered it while living in the Philippines for 8
years with 3 school age children but opted for an international school
(another story).

Do tell... :)
Chris

--

On 29 Dec 2004 19:31:02 +0700, "Chris Lasdauskas"
wrote:

On Sat, 25 Dec 2004 04:28:38 UTC, "Tuuk" wrote:


No, not at all, I am talking the east such as the Asian countries, the ones
that are economically exploding. Of couse there are poor countries
everywhere, and middle east and the islamic or muslims teach the wrong
things. That is why they attacked on 911. Those schools focus so much on the
koran, teaching to hate non muslims, hating non islam and they do not spend
enough time on the maths and sciences etc. When they become 20 years old and
ready to compete in the workplace, they fail and see others so wealthy then
the jealousy, rage, anger, and they rebel against the apex.

I know you are generalising, but let's look at a fact or two, shall we
...
At least one of the 911 hijacker pilots was apparently very well
educated at an expensive Lebanese private school which has a mixed
intake of various Christian and Muslim denominations, they promote
racial and religious harmony - not hate - and he came from a rich,
protective, family where he was the only son. So I don't think you can
specifically say ' That is why they attacked on 911'.

But to better answer the caller's question, yes with proper resources,
motivation and training a student could learn more in that environment. What
they might miss would be the public speaking opportunities, team work,
friendships, but at their age, they could easily go one on one with the
computer and yes learn more than at a public school.

A large number of studies have found that the major factor in the
average success (ie some fail dismally, some excel) of home educated
students is the fact that their parents care about their education and
show it. The same child, with the same parent showing the same amount
of interest might very well do better in a public school. On the other
hand public schools have their average dragged down by all the kids
whose parents don't give a damn and only send their kids because they
are made to.

Chris

Your last paragraph was well said. As a retired public school teacher
(8th grade math), I can attest to the truth of that last sentence!

John H

On the 'PocoLoco' out of Deale, MD,
on the beautiful Chesapeake Bay!

"Divide each difficulty into as many parts as is feasible and necessary to resolve it."
Rene Descartes

"Chris Lasdauskas" wrote in message
news:mPcurcJnILSl-pn2-WRHg7dJwntVU@localhost...
On Sun, 26 Dec 2004 17:24:32 UTC, "Steve" wrote:

I have met (US and other) families in the Philippines and the Pacific
Islands who have home schooled out of necessity (lack of comprehensive
western education). We considered it while living in the Philippines for
8
years with 3 school age children but opted for an international school
(another story).

Do tell... :)
Chris


Chris, if your referring to my last comment in this thread, here goes::

We enrolled 2 of our 3 sons in one of the international schools. The name
was Magellan's (unsure of spelling) International School. This would have
been in 1979, during Marshal Law, under Marcos..

The school bus picked up our children in the BF Homes sub-div. outside of
Makita. The first thing I noticed was an armed guard on the bus and was
somewhat surprised but not impressed.

Given sometime to consider the political situation, I realized that by
enrolling my children in an international school, with the children of
international public official and wealthy business people.. The guard was to
prevent possible hijacking of the bus and kidnapping of these children..
With only a single guard, I felt at most he might only start a gun battle
(with his one or two bullets) or at least, surrender the children to the
hijackers.

Although there were never any kidnapping attempts at this school I heard of
attempts at other schools where the children of wealthy family attended.

We moved out of Manila, to the rural province and enrolled them in a
Catholic school. Not the best quality education but a lot safer. When our
oldest son reached the age of 12 we moved him back to the states for
traditional schooling and the following year we all moved back.

Overall, the Philippines is a nice place and the people are wonderful but
life is too short and children need to be exposed to "both the East and
West", but not under the barrel of a gun.

How did my children do after a mixture of education and culture?? All were
high achievers in their high school years with various honors and awards.
One graduated from UCSD with a dual degrees (if that is the proper term),
another from San Fran. State followed by a Masters from Samuel Merritt and
the third from UC Berkley and a MMA from Syracuse U..

My experience and opinion, FWIW.

Steve
s/v Good Intentions

On Fri, 31 Dec 2004 17:03:41 UTC, "Steve" wrote:


but opted for an international school
(another story).

Do tell... :)
Chris


Chris, if your referring to my last comment in this thread, here goes::

We enrolled 2 of our 3 sons in one of the international schools. The name
was Magellan's (unsure of spelling) International School. This would have
been in 1979, during Marshal Law, under Marcos..

The school bus picked up our children in the BF Homes sub-div. outside of
Makita. The first thing I noticed was an armed guard on the bus and was
somewhat surprised but not impressed.

Who would be?

I teach in Jakarta, as you may be aware there have been some bombings
here over the last few years, including a grenade thrown in to the
Australian International School compound. Folowing this several of the
larger schools set up full security fences and paid the armed forces
to provide protection. Several of the parents moved their children
from those schools to ours because they didn't want their kids
educated surrounded by machine guns (and I mean machine guns, in
sand-bagged nests, not just automatic rifles). That aside, all schools
here have security guards to protect the kids from the perceived
threat of abduction - which does happen, but not as often as people
think. Any kid at a private school, not just international schools, is
a target as the parents are udoubtedly much richer than the general
populace. To give you an idea the 'minimum wage' in Jakarta is about
US$ 75 per month or US$900 per year (and many people earn way less
than that), this is supposed to support a husband wife and several
kids. Kids in our secondary school cost around 10 x that per year in
school fees (and that would be a pretty typical fee for the other
better 'internationally-foccused' private schools too, while the big
international schools are about US$ 13-15,000 per year), so the
kidnappers deduce that kids at these schools come from wealthy
families and they are an attractive target - one ransom could be 10 or
more years work....

My experience and opinion, FWIW.

Thanks, it was interesting and I'm glad your kids turned out well, and
hopefully happy!

Steve
s/v Good Intentions


Chris




--

Frank wrote:
....snip...
Rather than recommend a curriculum, I'm gonna recommend that you look
into unschooling. Check unschooling.com and/or just google the term.
....snip...

Self-followup:

If the unschooling.com website is too radical for you, or even if
you're uninterested in the concept, you might wanna try a little book
called _The Teenage Liberation Handbook_.

Good luck,

Frank