Why Schools Can't Succeed, Part II - Siddown, Shaddap

Siddown, Shaddap

While conservatives and liberals differ sharply on their views on how what an education is, it's ironic that criticizing the "Sit in your chair and learn" model of education draws virtually the same conclusion from both sides of the spectrum; "What, are you crazy?"

To the liberal, the institution of public education is intended to be the great equalizer (although the liberal leadership belies that vision; the ranks of students at Breck, Blake and Saint Paul Academy are full of the children of DFL mavens and liberal activists). It's everyone's duty to society to sit in that chair and learn!

To the conservative, the act of making your brat sit in that chair and learn the Three R's, Dammit!" is seen as an essential character building exercise - sort of like hazing.

Both sides tend to agree - there's a base of knowledge about our society that a kid needs to have to be a productive adult. Exactly what's in that base is open to endless, vituperative debate, like the current rhubarb over the state's social studies standards.

But - one way or another - the goal of both sides is to shovel the kids through 12 years of a planned program to make sure that everyone "knows" the same stuff. Some kids do - depending on where you are, a majority of kids who started in first grade might walk across the stage twelve years later and get their diploma - and like the Zuni shamen we discussed yesterday, we'll assume that the schools are the reason why the learning took place.

I'm less and less convinced of that every day. The more I see the way education works - and, more accurately, "doesn't work" with kids who might not be on the traditional college track, and especially with kids who don't respond to the punishments and enticements of the traditional "Sit down, shut up and learn!" school of education - the more depressed I get.

In any segment of society, on any subject, the "achievement" scores of any group of people, when plotted out on a graph, will resemble a bell curve. If the subject is History, my score will probably come in "above average" against the general population (and in the 99.9th percentile when measured against liberal bloggers). If the subject is auto mechanics, I'd score an "C" against the general population, a "D" among rural males, and a solid "F-" among auto mechanics. It's not a big subject for me.

Now, picture this scenario:

1. The government of the State of Minnesota, aghast at the lousy decor of Minnesota homes and lawns, has decided that all Minnesotans must become functionally literate and knowledgeable in the art and science of interior decoration.
2. To facilitate this, the State decides that its citizens must attend four years of interior design school.
3. By the way, this is such a huge priority, the state has decided it's too important to be left to your own discretion; if you don't attend, your kids will be put in foster care.
4. You will spend six hours a day for four years learning an approved curriculum of interior design, cooking, decoration and aesthetics.
5. You will be graded against the federal "No American Left Tacky" standard. Students that don't perform as required by the standards will be shunted into "remedial interior design" programs, even "special education", to bring them up to speed. Schools that dont' get their students up to speed on basic interior design concepts will be sanctioned.
6. Performance will be gauged by a series of structured tests, to ensure that at the end of each year, you're progressing on your way to becoming a good interior designer.

How do you think you'd do?

• If you love interior design - probably pretty well!
• If you come from a family that's motivated to succeed at interior design - especially if they're so motivated that they pull you out of a public interior design school and put you in a private one - probably pretty well, too.
• If you manage to teach yourself the fine art of taking tests, you'll do fine, whether you know design or not. You'll graduate a highly-literate test taker, perhaps even with a graduate degree!
• If you like it well enough, but learn all you need to help you teach yourself what is REALLY important to you in the first year, and get bored out of your skull afterwards, your teachers will spend the next three years saying "you're bright, but we need to figure out how to make you perform up to your potential!", where potential equals "Ability to give the answers you are supposed to give".
• If you're more wired to learn how to fix cars or split atoms or write stories, you'll probably get used to being considered a "failure", and count the hours until your four years are over.

Fanciful? Really?

What separates that scenario from our school system today?

And why do we have that system? More tomorrow.

(Part I here)

Posted by Mitch at March 3, 2004 06:48 AM