The American Education System- We Came, We Taught, We Failed…But How We Can Still Succeed
Patrick Edmonds
Coutesy of Thee ErinThe system of public education in America has failed. Take note of what I’ve written and be clear on what I’m saying. To argue that public schools themselves have failed is too short-sighted and reflects no critical thought, something essential if we are to have any hope of saving this most valuable of institutions.
The failure of this system is not a sudden occurrence, but rather a systematic, prolonged decay. These same sentiments of hopelessness for the future of public education could have just as easily been expressed ten, or with a bit more foresight, even a hundred years ago. It should be noted that there are those who have seen this inevitable collapse decades ago and have written passionately to forewarn us all. Most notably is John Taylor Gatto, a former conspirator in this system.
After a thirty year career in NYC’s public schools, and being named the city’s Teacher of the Year three times, Gatto finally retired in 1991, announcing it in an essay entitled “I Quit, I Think” (published in The Wall Street Journal), and pursued a career as an educational activist. Gatto has written numerous books and essays deriding the public education system as a collectivist trap bent on repressing any meaningful autonomous thought and intent on dumbing down all students to the most base and consumerist of levels. When you read Gatto’s thoughts and contemplate his numerous anecdotes of daily examples of systematic failure, it is easy to place great stock in his conjectures for they are logical and persuasive. Worst of all, they are fairly accurate, meaning much of our ideal perspectives of a truly meritorious democratic system of education are flawed, if not flat out delusional.
However, where I see the greatest flaw in Gatto’s understandable pessimism is in the limited stock attributed to the teacher. Gatto’s arguments are primarily institutional in nature, and therefore he sees the culpability and victimization of all those involved, including teachers. Essentially, it is Gatto’s presumption that the flaws of the educational institution are so entrenched that the individual is incapable of overcoming them. And although I concur, to a point, I still see merit in the individuals of true conscience trying in the face of such realities. Gatto himself, being once an accomplished classroom leader/teacher, could surely attest to the individual teacher’s influence and capacity to incite legitimate thought in his or her students through literature, history, science, art, music, mathematics, etc. I believe the conscientious individual can do much to overcome the conscious-less institution, or as Thoreau claimed, “It is truly enough said that a corporation has no conscience; but a corporation of conscientious men is a corporation with a conscience.”
So why not? Why can’t schools succeed if they are filled with teachers of purpose and conscience, which I believe most are? Well, the reason is due to Gatto’s cynical perspectives of an institutional quagmire being more accurate than not…and it has only gotten worse. The burden has gotten too heavy for teachers to carry, and the ones of Gatto’s caliber will not be able to sustain it for thirty or forty years any more. Therefore, the schools will fall upon themselves. Unless, the schools themselves are changed, radically and frequently until the right system and the best system for the individual state or county or township or school or child is developed. The paradigm must shift and now is the time for such an occurrence, when the system is buckling and ready to collapse for good. So over the next few weeks I will propose one man’s thoughts on how to rectify this failed system and transform it into something new, dynamic, and hopefully, successful.
Step 1: Early Childhood Education- The Sooner the Better
Step 2: Year-Round Schooling- Why Kids Should Stay in School
Step 3: A European Model- Why Not Here?
Step 4: Pay Your Way- The Broken System of Real Estate Tax and Schools
Reader Comments (3)
Lay it on me, man. You got me interested.
The problem is that we have never really been sure what high school kids need to know. They can not be as smart as adults. Until there is an apprentice system or high school becomes a place to explore their interests, we will lose many of the urban and rural students. Public education is our most worthy attribute. I strongly believe it is our only chance to remain a democractic nation.
I appreciate your challenge and will comment all the way.
I find it interesting that, in a world where technical innovation and thinking outside the box is becoming critical, we are instead training future robots. With little or no exposure to abstract, creative thinking, our children have largely become devoid of the capacity to mine and develop it.
I agree completely with Gatto's pessimistic sentiment: that the individual teacher is incapable of overcoming such a flawed system. I have been personally stigmatized and victimized for years in trying to exert my own artistic influence into what I consider to be nothing more than a mind-numbing factory spitting out an inferior American product that they're making much better overseas.
The art of teaching has given way to the science of teaching. Unless or until both methods are encouraged to coexist within our classrooms, we will continue to lose their minds and our souls.