A Critique Of US Public Schools
It is "back to school" time in America! Emily Spence writes from Massachusetts with the determined purpose of stirring controversy among critics of popular education. The Flyer's email distribution list includes many educators and several prominent "libertarians" that are at odds over the public education system. Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul has called for the abolition of the U. S. Department of Education. Throw Ms. Spence's analysis into the mix and you have a very interesting debate! She writes [excerpt]: "All told, John Gatto, Jonathan Kozol and other critics, repeatedly and disparagingly, point out that public education (in the US and elsewhere across the globe) is guaranteed to keep economic classes in their relative placement and trapped in a basic inability to apply higher level cognitive skill sets to written and heard accounts. Thus, many individuals absolutely have to rely on commentators (i.e., authority figures for the most part) to form their understandings of events. Alternately put, students, in many school districts, are not taught to think independently, nor question the opinions provided by the status quo. How convenient for those in powerful leadership positions! How easy, then, it becomes to keep corrupt systems in operation as many people cannot even conceive of alternatives let alone figure out ways to put them in place!" Read more of her two part series here.
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