Difference between revisions of "School sucks"

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So why does School suck? Because public education (and the bureaucrats who run it) suck the joy out of it, and beat it with a conformity stick until anything that once resembled individuality looks like roadkill on the edge of a highway. Which is why homeschoolers are generally happier and outperform the indoctrinated drones that go to the liberal re-education camp. Here's a few things I'd try to make school better.


When I complain about public education, or tell stories about My Education, some people often use a fallacious technique of demanding I offer how I would improve it. Even if I couldn't, it wouldn't change that the current system is broken (not functioning near optimum). But in the spirit of trying, here's a few things that might help.

Problems

Every subject in school has a problem. Schools try to suck the life and fun out of learning, and then they wonder why most kids donít value school or education, or treat it like work. Bureaucrats have tried to boil the process down into things that make their lives easier. It is ìtoo hardî to allow teachers to teach, and to do assessment, so they do what is politically correct and easier for them.

Reading. I was listening to a story (on NPR) the other day where some famous writers (Newberry Medal Winning ones) were talking about problems in our schools today; and their biggest problem was that schools were killing kids interest in reading. The teachers would assign book reports, that required the kids to analyze books by writing a book report on each chapter; and try to anticipate the next chapter, and so on. It wasnít about getting something out of the book or stimulating thought, or the pleasure of the story. It was about bland analyzing the style or motivations of the authors. They made reading about so much work, that kids hated it. The other writer was asked by a teacher, ìHow should I teach this bookî. Huh? Let the kids read it, and then tell you what they got from it; you donít need to analyze it to death. I doubt the teacher got it. Why should s/he, s/he was probably been taught to teach, and if s/he didnít like that method, sh/eíd have gone off and done something else. But adults are learning to enjoy reading not because of their educations, but in spite of them.

The problem is that teachers need to make assignments and create normalized grades for reading that are easier for them to grade. They can teach the easy way or the hard way. The hard way is to actually spend time with each student to figure out (on a case by case basis) their motivation and comprehension in reading by oral and written means; and let kids read and work on subjects that interest them. Teachers donít have time for that and that isnít ìstandardizedî enough. Better to create lots of cookie cutter assignments that try to test various ìlearning objectivesî, and teach students in lock step (like an assembly line) so that teachers donít have to do their jobs, right?

Verbal communication and Writing is even worse. It takes a lot to actually assess someoneís ability to communicate. How well do ideas and concept come across? Can they argue cogently? Do they have critical reason skills? Nah, all that is too hard, and is the point of teaching. Better to focus on the pedantics and minutiae. Did they make stupid spelling or grammar mistakes? Did they stutter during a verbal presentation, or make mistakes in form, instead of measuring their ability to communicate in function. And critical reasoning is basically ignored until college; and often is just a side class then. Does anyone else think somethingís missing there?

History is this brilliant melange of ambiguity. There are all these interesting people who did interesting things, for many different reasons. And all these varied interpretations of what happened, and why. Good people that did rotten things, and vise versa. Roosevelt (FDR) was this interesting control-freak tyrant that played people off of one another, he had socialist tendencies, and did things that we would consider criminal today. Benjamin Franklin may have created the post office, just so he could swap porn with his friends easier. Many of our founding fathers had profit motives for their actions. Lincoln and Kennedy were horribly unpopular and not particularly effective (in some ways); until after they were shot. Many of our presidents were whoring around and had the morals of alley cats, and violated the spirit of our laws if not the letter. Hellen Keller was a socialist extremist. Henry Ford was probably closer to a fascist. But the school board canít allow that to be taught; that might interest kids. What could be more interesting than love, sex, war, murder, menís motivations and summing up their actions or what actually happened? Why the way our schools teach history of course. (note: that was extreme sarcasm).

School teaches kids to memorize dates and names and places; but not to understand what happened or why. There is no ambiguity in high school history. Even when the ìapprovedî history books are wrong, you canít show contrary evidence or discuss it; teachers must follow state approved lesson plans and books. Trust me on that one; I tried. And kids graduate not understanding a lick about what really happened or why. You canít teach that people might be good in one aspect of their lives, and lousy humans in others; why thatís life. We need to make the administrators lives easier, by filtering out all the grayís and contradictions, so we can allow our school books to be designed by committee and delivered based on what is politically correct (or at least tolerable) and only teach black and white absolutes that can be agreed on in some meeting.

Math is this wonderfully fun thing; you can solve all sorts of practical problems. How do you balance your checkbook, figure out investments, deal with loans and compound interest? How about sale prices, and so on? What about building a house or a bridge? How about calculating goods needed to complete various projects, or manufacture something? What about engineering and practical physics? Kids have interest in behaving like adults, and doing adult jobs. If you teach them how to do that stuff, they have interest. The best math class I had was an ìapplied mathî class; and the whole thing was considered a dumbbell math or an elective credit because it was how to apply math concepts to life instead of the ìpureî theory. How dare you teach out of the pure form (the abstract)? When you suck all the practical applications out of problems, and teach them rote memorization of theorems, or algorithms without how and why they are used, then it becomes glorious tedium. Guess how math is usually taught?

Political Science and Sociology. Again, very interesting stuff. That is if you arenít trying to pound propaganda into kids and stay politically correct. Make some kids debate and defend both sides of an issue and actually think. Look at the good Hitler was doing (from his countries point of view) to get such support in the first place. What about the worlds anti-Semitism at the time that tolerated such things, and is what Hitler was feeding on? (And the U.S.ís ignoring of the problem and sending Jewish kids and families back to Europe to be exterminated?) Look at why Stalin created the iron curtain. And so on. Not that I think the ends can justify the means in any of those cases; but the point is you need to discuss, think and explore in order to really learn. But we prevent that, because that might be unpopular or controversial. So suck the life out of it, and bore kids instead; that will foster learning.

Religion and Philosophy; talk about seriously interesting subjects. Iíd love to take a college level religion class, and put it in grade school (or at least Jr. High). Here are the different religions of the world, what they stand for, and what they believe and their histories. Here are various philosophies and when they happened and what some of their greatest advocates did. Here is what people split over, and why! Bring in different garb and explain relics and rites and rituals, and talk about their temples. Gads, we canít teach that! That might educate kids! Someone once said we shouldnít have an organized state religion, and so obviously that means that we canít discuss religion in school?!?! What bullshit. Separation of church and state became more of a problem when we federalized the school system; but still you can teach what religions are, you just have to make sure you arenít teaching preaching one religion. Instead we dodge one of the most significant issues in peopleís lives for the sake of administrators. But kids are taught they are supposed to be tolerant of all that stuff they donít understand. So ignorant tolerance is the learning objective there.

The best classes I had, were the least structured and most liberal artsy, and least valued by academia. (They arenít official strands). Wood and metal shop, Homemaking, Art, auto shop, P.E., computer programming electives, psychology, those are the classes that probably taught me the most about life and just getting project done (on my own). I truly believe the reason is because the teachers were allowed more to teach, and there was less micromanagement by the board of education because that stuff was ìbelowî them (or under their radar). I also sadly believe that soon, theyíll feel the need to structure those to death as well; and Iíve already seen them starting a negative trend there too.

What about social skills? Teaching kids management classes, or communication skills (at it applies to interacting with others and conflict avoidance), the art of negotiations, and so on? All the stuff we need to learn in the workplace, at home or in the therapistís office? What about relationship interactions and how to deal with a spouse, kid or parent? Most of the coping skills that will make people understand how to succeed in life; those are the job of dysfunctional parents or slow painful self-discovery? I love how school shirks any responsibility that might positively impact society.

Even Sex Ed is taught only in the mechanical, ìin, out, repeat if necessary; but donít do it or youíll get a nasty case of rotten crotchî. Or the politically correct, ìwait until marriage; but hereís a condomî. The true things the kids want to discuss, relationships and social interactions, we canít talk about because it would make administrators lives hell; so let the kids talk about it themselves; that way their views can be skewed towards the perspective of teens; and it will take them years (or decades) to learn on their own. Then lets act surprised when teens feel that adults are out of touch and donít listen. Hello? Is anyone out there?

Conclusion

All these problems have solutions. Unfortunately the solutions require change (which administrators and teachers hate), or they require going through controversy, instead of avoiding it (which they hate even more). But whose running our schools and what is education for? Is it to make administrators lives easier, or to treat kids like proto-adults and help them grow into productive, responsible, contributing beings?

What are the solutions? Thatís easy; just keep firing administrators and teachers until they start doing their jobs, or their replacement do it. Their job is to educate the kids. Yes, it is hard and yes, kids are trying. That doesnít mean you make kids fit your mold, and throw out the rest. Their job is to adapt to kids and educate them anyway, even when it is hard. And the responsibility to force that change is ours (societies). We pay the bills, and they are supposed to be doing our bidding; I just donít think they are doing it well.

Bad teachers stick around forever. Good teachers burn out, after beating their heads against the wall long enough. And you canít possibly offer merit-raises or bonuses based on what students think of them? No one wants to fight the NEA, or even publicly admit that their interests are not always the students. Let alone go after the bigger bureaucracies like the school boards. Why canít we treat kids like they are intelligent human beings that might have a clue and know a good teacher from a bad one? In hindsight, every one of the teachers I liked and thought was good when going through school, I still think were good teachers. The teachers I thought were bad, were the worse teachers. Iím supposed to act like kids today are dumber and more out of touch than I was? Why shouldnít they have some control in their education?

Kids are not stupid; and they understand how bad their education is, and that school has become about babysitting and welfare for teachers or administrators, or places where tyrants to play their control-freak or political games that wouldnít be tolerated anywhere else. So kids are trying to learn and adjust on their own, without the aid of much guidance and useful information from their schools, teachers or parents. They arenít doing a great job; but often people blame the kids instead of the system that is screwing them up.

Kids have to break away and become independent, and some of that comes from mocking authority and rebelling. But that doesnít mean that authority should do everything in its power to make itself a good target and to give the kids more to mock. Kids have enough stress without society trying to magnify it with stupid mandates. And Schools have become an example to kids of bureaucracy and stupidity and make-work, and just about everything they resent about society and authority. So when are we supposed adults going to fix it? Or are we going to sit around spewing platitudes and hypocritical soliloquies like ìyou can do anything, but I wonít stand up for your educationî, or ìyouíve got to try to make a difference; while I sit on my ass doing nothing about the incompetence in your schoolî. When is it going to be time to teach kids by deeds instead of just words? We need a revolution in education because frankly, I donít think it is working very well the way it is.

Written 2002.10.08