Assignment #2

“This place sucks. I don’t want to be here. Being forced to do all this busy work is unnecessary. No one is even all that excited to learn about it, nor is anyone that excited to teach me about it.” I think it’s safe to say that this is the general way kids these days think, or have thought, of their public education. John Taylor Gatto’s article from Harper’s magazine, How Public Education Cripples Our Kids, and Why articulates what a lot students, teachers, and my self, have felt toward the public education system. Personally, though, I think that the teachers need to be the ones to take responsibility and lead by example.

I agree 100% with Gatto when he says the main cause for this lack of enthusiasm is boredom. A teachers’ job is not only to present information in a manner that is easy for someone to understand, but to also be a leader and to set an example. If the teachers themselves aren’t interested in the information being delivered, then their pupils will likely mirror that attitude. It feels like, at a very early age, the objective of doing the homework and studying for tests is simply to get that good grade so you can move on to the next assignment or test. It’s a subconscious act, but once that test is out of the way, the student has very little interest in retaining that information. Because of this, it is no wonder that teachers indirectly become unenthused.

I have a perfect example of this lack of enthusiasm that took place even in my “college” career, no more than a year ago at the last community college I went to. It was even in a “creative” class of mine that was 2D design. I say “creative” because it is a class where we were not doing traditional analytic “left-brain” tasks, but creative “right-brain” tasks that essentially allowed one to come up with any sort of design as long as it fit the criteria. However, that got boring! And I think largely in part due to the teacher. She was very nice, friendly, and loved to talk but her assignments and the way she explained them were banal, to say the least. Along with 2D design she Drawing 1 and Drawing 2, but for this particular class, I think a combination of the material and the students reaction, or lack thereof to it, made her tell me, “if I only was allowed to teach this 2D design class, I would probably quit teaching.” Awesome! No, not really. She’s the teacher, leading us. She needed to take matters in to her own hands and think of more exciting ways to get the same lessons across. What’s worse is that I took a very similar class at a different community college a year before. We learned the same basic principles of design, positive/negative space, figure-ground, balance, contrast, symmetry, and asymmetry, etc., except the projects we worked on were much more interesting because the teacher was excited about them, which in turn made us students want to do them and want to be there.

The public education system is not exactly motivating for the student. I mean, it works in the sense that if you don’t follow through with it, the likelihood of your success in life, with regards to a career, is pretty bleak. In these cases, the teacher isn’t entirely to blame. There are thousands of very successful people and entrepreneurs that didn’t go through all twelve years of the public education system because they dropped out early or perhaps were home schooled. Some of them being people you learn about while in your first years of public education like Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Mark Twain, to name a few. You learn about these people and their great achievements, but I certainly don’t recall learning that they didn’t go to school. Yes, they were educated, but on their own terms.

Everyone’s different. Therefore, everyone, to some extent, learns differently. Gatto questions if the rigid forced schooling regime of six classes a day, five days a week, nine months a year, for twelve years is really that necessary. I mean, it’s no wonder why so many don’t pursue college, or at least not right after they graduate. No one likes doing things they are forced to do, even if they agree with whatever it is. During high school I decided I wanted to go the community college route and then transfer to a university. I chose this particularly because of the fact that I was going to school on someone else’s schedule for twelve years of my life. Now that I’m in college, I’m more independent than ever and I get to learn about what I want, when I want.

Gatto states that Americans think “in this country to think of "success" as synonymous with, or at least dependent upon, "schooling," but historically that isn't true in either an intellectual or a financial sense. And plenty of people throughout the world today find a way to educate themselves without resorting to a system of compulsory secondary schools that all too often resemble prisons.” I agree with him full on. Take a look at musicians, artists, carpenters, software engineers, etc. some of the best ones were, without a doubt, self-taught. Either by trial and error, asking a peer, watching someone else do the task, or, if in the last decade or so, used the internet and it’s plethora of information to educate themselves on whatever it was that wasn’t boring to them. Look at Youtube alone. Next time you have a problem around the house or need any sort of “how-to” explanation and example, search for it on Youtube. Your chances of finding a video on exactly what you need to know are well in your favor. Otherwise there are web sites like Wikipedia or howstuffworks.com. Because of the advancements with the internet, it seems less and less that the confinements of the public education system is the way knowledge can be gained.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not completely bashing on teachers and public education. I mean, if nothing else, they do help with disciplining your child and teaching them to interact with others their age. However, if this is how it is going to be, and if this is indeed because the government thinks is the “correct” way of going about it, then why the hell is public education in such a financial deficit that is only going further down the drain? If this Prussian/militaristic view of educating is what the government wants, wouldn’t you expect them to support it a little more? After all, these “mindless consumers” that says are the product of public education, are the future of the country.

Hey, public education, what are you doing with your life? I’ll tell you. You’re making it hard for everyone to enjoy you. You’re complicated, and you need to go on a time-out and seriously rethink your priorities. My self and John Taylor Gatto don’t exactly have a plan for what you should change in to, but a good place to start would be to get people excited about what you have to offer. Also, don’t be so strict. You’re not a prison, stop acting like one and stop treating your students like prisoners. Be more open to discussion, teamwork, and thought amongst your students and I think, overall, people will enjoy you more. Thanks.