The Educational System Was Designed to Keep Us Uneducated and Docile

It's no secret that the US educational system doesn't do a very good job. Like clockwork, studies show that America's schoolkids lag behind their peers in pretty much every industrialized nation. We hear shocking statistics about the percentage of high-school seniors who can't find the US on an unmarked map of the world or who don't know who Abraham Lincoln was.
Fingers are pointed at various aspects of the schooling system�overcrowded classrooms, lack of funding, teachers who can't pass competency exams in their fields, etc. But these are just secondary problems. Even if they were cleared up, schools would still suck. Why? Because they were designed to.

How can I make such a bold statement? How do I know why America's public school system was designed the way it was (age-segregated, six to eight 50-minute classes in a row announced by Pavlovian bells, emphasis on rote memorization, lorded over by unquestionable authority figures, etc.)? Because the men who designed, funded, and implemented America's formal educational system in the late 1800s and early 1900s wrote about what they were doing.

Almost all of these books, articles, and reports are out of print and hard to obtain. Luckily for us, John Taylor Gatto tracked them down. Gatto was voted the New York City Teacher of the Year three times and the New York State Teacher of the Year in 1991. But he became disillusioned with schools�the way they enforce conformity, the way they kill the natural creativity, inquisitiveness, and love of learning that every little child has at the beginning. So he began to dig into terra incognita, the roots of America's educational system.


Rest of the article:
www.thememoryhole.org...

i agree that the school system, not unlike many other facets of american life, need to be reformed.

i dont just mean send a few dollars that way and call it a referendum, i mean the whole way we look at things should be changed.

This goes for government too.

I can almost feel the changes and adjustments coming. Nothing lasts forever, especially not a way of living.

Amen!!

It's a waste of time...
...Education is an illusion.

I'll back you 110% Cold
Tassadar

Illumination not education to bring the blind sight.

For once cold anger, i actually agree with you.

I was private schooled and home schooled for 3 years before highschool

went to public school, and became a retarded zombie. it was like going back to kindergarten.

I totaly agree, but this isn't just an American thing. In the UK they enforce the same sadistic obedience and conformity rules, including the wearing of ridiculous uniforms. I was reccomended for psychiatric help by the English block after they read a few of my stories, because they considered them "disturbing". They hated me for them for some reason, and pleaded with me not to write anything like them in the exams. But the stories were just normal stories about Aliens, Murder and Supernatural things........they were basically enforcing their own brand of reality on my mind.....

Anyway, I'm sure not EVERY country is like this........Schools must have started off good, after all education is a good idea fundamentally.....

In some ways the article is correct.

The education system IS understaffed, underresourced and decaying.

Also IF the education system is based on rote memorization then it will fail.

However quoting information from the turn of the last century is not rlevent as education has moved on since then.

Traditionally education in america has sought to achieve 2 things. Firstly to create workers for the economy. In the past inner city schools were often aimed at producing blue collar workers and taught basic trades for such an end. The other purpose was to produce people who would carry on to university and then move into positions of power to run the country.

This model is breaking down, but is still predominatly the structures that still exist. Howver in our society EVERYONE needs post school education, there are less and less blue collar jobs around.

Also producing people who can recite the 3 R's is not sufficient for our changing society.

What is needed are people who can learn by themselves, who are able to grasp new ideas, to retrain, who are flexible and fluid in the skills they posess.

To that end you need to change the education system away from basic education to a more experiential system, and I imagine that is difficult to do in such an underresourced and deficient educational system.

People need to take responsibility for their own learning and education, schools increasinly sholder the responsibility for education that parents are abdocating. If you can't learn, or find a way to learn yourself, then that is YOUR responsibility.

I think I've said this before in another post, but another thing about education today is the fact that almost none of the information provides any help when trying to fit YOURSELF in the REAL WORLD we all share socially.

Two subjects that should be on top of the list from day one should be Human Psychology and Philosophy. That way you start out learning about US as in Human Beings, both as a whole and individual. At the same time you learn about experiencing the world around us and how we fit into reality, both as a group and as individuals.

Note: I just loved the comment by Elwood Cubberly comparing the school to a factory and children as nail. Cause as we all know how effective "assembly line" techniques are when working with humans who think and live and learn on different levels. Like the saying goes "The top speed of the line is controlled by it's SLOWEST Link!" Real Nice...

Netchicken, you reminded me of a great point with the "3-R's" comment. Funny how the 3 R's stand for:
(R)eading-w(R)iting-a(R)ithmatic
Which is so lame since they don't even all start with "R's" in the first place...But then again what do they start with????
(W)riting-(A)rithmatic-(R)eading
Ahhhh....Now that sounds more like America...Good ol' WAR.....


[Edited on 17-7-2003 by mOjOm]

riiiight mojom, more kids come out of school unable to find a job because they did the 'easy' subjects like Human Psychology and Philosophy.

Yep sure we need that, like a hole in the head.

Don't we have enough Arts students who can only find jobs in MacDonalds?

Look, with the way jobs are changing you are trying to educate kids for jobs that are not even created yet, that have no names.

To do that you need to give them basic generic skills and the ability to learn and teach themselves. Producing "nails" is no good in a society which uses glues.

If people are complaining about having a poor education then my answer is "What was your part in your own education?" You can't pump people through on production lines any more like the 1950's.

Netchicken, first off anyone who thinks Psych and Philosophy are the "easy" subjects as you said obviously shows you don't understand either of them. Then at the same time to foolishly bash "ART" as if it's some kind of pointless waste of time lets me know that you probably never made it beyond finger painting, stick figures and playdough.

Learning how the human mind functions, along with techniques that enable you to think and learn better are abilities that can help throughout your whole life, especially when it can enable you to learn more effeciently. Therefore aiding you in understanding all other subjects like math and science and language. Not to mention the ability to interact with people and society in more constructive ways. Not to mention how to correct your own weak points when realized resulting in a more productive, able minded and self sufficient human being.

I'm not saying ditch off the skills and education needed for "job skills" by any means...What I'm saying is why not educate people in ways that help them learn and retain information better instead of just trying to pack more info in when they mentally do not understand what it is they are trying to learn.

You said it in your post on the last line:

If people are complaining about having a poor education then my answer is "What was your part in your own education?" You can't pump people through on production lines any more like the 1950's.

That is exactally what I'm saying...Just because someone can commit some formulas or some dates or events into memory doesn't mean a thing if they don't know how to apply the information or how to use it in a creative way. But if they know how to lean new things and understand them and how they apply to their lives, they will be productive no matter what they choose, and will be confident in themselves to seek out and accept new challenges.

I think its less the education system, more of todays youth and parenting skills. I dropped out of school my junior year for my son. Three years later, I'm starting college and taking honors classes due to my high ACT scores. No Studying, No reading books, No nothing.

Why? I put half assed effort into school (maybe not math but thats my fault now isnt it?) I had a mom who taught me what educational effort would get you. Not many son's can say "My mom is an Areospace Engineer and worked for NASA". That's a high mark for me to live up to, But it gives me reason to try hard.

Children make poor grades and have poor attendence due to 1) The world has changed, face it. Kids would rather go hang out and get stoned then learn, duh?
2) With so many forms of entertainment out there, Who's gonna want to learn and do homework when they can frag the rest of their flunking buddies in counter strike. (Personal Experience
3) Teen + sex = > = School + Future

You cant expect a person straight out of high school to be able to get a job fast, and a high paying job at that. The world has advanced and most jobs these days require training in certain fields, Something they cant just *squeeze* in High School education.

""To do that you need to give them basic generic skills and the ability to learn and teach themselves. Producing "nails" is no good in a society which uses glues""

This is all about personal effort...

Education isnt an illusion. Its something that takes alot of effort, Something that modern youth arnt willing to put forth.

If I can go to college at age 19, divorced, and with a son. On a GED. There's no reason I can think of, that Joe Bob or Jane Hoe cant succeed.

[Edited on 17-7-2003 by ThermoNuke]

I agree and disagree, ColdAnger, got article, but although you may become better educated with home schooling, I have seen them lose there connection with the common man.

Remember, the only way to be intelligent is to understand stupidity first hand.

Originally posted by FoxStriker
I agree and disagree, ColdAnger, got article, but although you may become better educated with home schooling, I have seen them lose there connection with the common man.

Remember, the only way to be intelligent is to understand stupidity first hand.

Well i must afree with FS, people that learned in certain way cannot communicate/connect to others that have another way to see, talk or disscuss things.
Remember also that the education system gives to childs the ability to use their brains, memory, intelligence and wisdom. And if the system is bad always, the person coming out is a complete ignorant.
And he doesn�t have any source of information to help him get back some wisdom...

And netchicken is right, if the educations system is crappy, the people will hate it, so they don�t show interest in learn, they start to convert to shallow persons, without any question about life, just consume work and die...
People now is less kind than 50 years ago, and we are suposed to evolve with the time?
I don�t know but education system is VERY important, because they create the next generation and it�s knowledge...