An advocate of parochial federalism continues his/her presentation[1] …
Expectations of Schools (cont.)
The last posting
introduced the last of Shubert’s commonplaces, the milieu, and focused on the “expectations
of schools” as the first factor by which to tease out this commonplace. And initially, one outstanding realm of this
factor is the shared disappointment the American public has had over how well their
schools have met, in their eyes, a basic function – to prepare their kids to
take their places within the economic system, mostly through employment.
The perceived inability
of schools has been the center of much concern, although somewhat softened
currently because of the pandemic and the recent experience many have had with
home instruction. Yet, even with that, the
level of dissatisfaction is still palpable.
This blogger can personally report and agree with Christopher Hurn[2]
that this concern has led to many different reform movements within the
education community.
Hurn could point out, as far back as 1993, that
“[s]chools were asked to individualize instruction, introduce new relevant
curricula, provide more options and electives for students and become
more sensitive to the special needs of minority and disadvantaged
students.”[3] While some studies demonstrate some
improvements in school performance,[4]
more common reports reflect the findings of the Pew Research Center.
Pew found, at best, US educational achievements
lodged somewhere in the middle of all global educational systems. That report shared findings in student performance
in mostly STEM subjects. According to 2015
testing, US students ranked 24th in science, 39th in
mathematics, and 24th in reading.[5] Given the implementation of those “reform”
efforts, one cannot detect great changes – other than the effects of the
pandemic – in the nation’s schools over the past decade or so.
As a virulent issue, deficiencies in those
schools have lost a lot of steam as of late.
It has been overwhelmed by inflation, political extremism, crime,
immigration, climate change, racism, foreign conflicts, COVID, mass shootings, etc. But it is not totally off the concern screen.[6] And all along, this concern has had a very
practical bent – what are the preparations and consequently the opportunities one’s
kids will have in the job market of tomorrow?
Among those professionals who look after these developments,
there has long been the concern that American educational efforts have overly
relied on recall-based curricula. Instead,
the expectation of career/job preparedness seems to place on school instruction
the impartation of learning and problem-solving skills. Of primary concern is how to motivate
students to engage in their lessons more meaningfully and interactively.
Grading, from way back, has been the prominent
form of reward and punishment for students behaving in desired ways, and tests
seem to be overly based on recall questions.
Generally, this leads to lessons having students as passive observers
and listeners to teacher monologues in which what is expected is uttering
“right answers.”
That is, the aim is perceived as reproducing
what is known instead of utilizing what is known or strongly believed. Most classroom processes are geared to getting
students to reiterate what they have been told – what can be described as a form
of conforming behaviors. And there is
ample evidence that the whole effort is mostly a waste of time.[7] That is, the rate of recall after even short periods
of time is significantly low.
In short, these factors suggest change and,
ironically and according to parochial/traditional federalist view, that change
should look to tradition or what academics call academic rationalism. This is an approach to education that advocates
a type of curriculum suggested by this dialectic view, parochial federalism. Those advocates pick up on the prevailing complaints
and offer a set of pedagogic solutions.
Recently, Jessica Richardi[8]
has stirred up new interest in a reform movement from the 1980s that touts
academic rationalist ideas, that of Mortimer Adler and his Paideia
curriculum. For example, one aspect of
Adler’s views was his concern about equality.
She, Richardi, emphasizing that curriculum’s concern for equality,
concludes,
It is a fact that racial and class
inequalities permeate the American education system, and well established that
curricular tracking and ability grouping can and do perpetuate those
inequalities. In and of itself, the Paideia Program’s democratic stance against
tracking warrants a collective look in its direction. What’s more, Paideia
represents a step toward fulfillment of the promise of democracy articulated by
[John] Dewey and reiterated by Adler: A true democracy demands excellence and equality
of education for all children. Regardless of background or perceived ability,
students deserve to be held to the same rigorous standards, to achieve at the
highest level of their capacity, and to reap the benefits of a quality K–12
education for the remainder of their lives.[9]
Beyond this concern for equality, what did Adler advocate?
He, for example, expressed that students generally
have not been challenged sufficiently in the typical American classroom. He further contended that children will
naturally meet higher expectations if those expectations are reasonable and
attractive. In addition, students will meet
the challenges if instruction captures their interest.[10] And
that happens when their minds are engaged by teachers able to provide different
types of instruction than what prevails today.
During his time, the common complaint was that
American classrooms were lacking in intellectual stimulation which led to a general
setting of boredom and general incivility. As for the boredom claim, one finds things
have not changed. Here, Harvard’s
journal, Ed., reports,
A 2013
Gallup poll of 500,000 students in grades five through 12 found that nearly
eight in 10 elementary students were “engaged” with school, that is, attentive,
inquisitive, and generally optimistic. By high school, the number dropped to
four in 10. A 2015 follow-up study found that less than a third of 11th-graders
felt engaged. When Gallup asked teens in 2004 to select the top three words
that describe how they feel in school from a list of 14 adjectives, “bored” was
chosen most often by half the students. “Tired” was second, at 42 percent. Only
2 percent said they were never bored. The evidence suggests that, on a daily
basis, the vast majority of teenagers seriously contemplate banging their
heads against their desks.[11]
And with that “uplifting” note, this posting will end with this view of
Adler’s contribution. The blog has a bit
more to share of that contribution in the next posting.
[1] This presentation begins with the posting, “A Parochial Subject Matter” (March 11, 2022). The reader is reminded that the claims made
in this posting do not necessarily reflect the beliefs or knowledge of this
blogger. Instead, the posting is a
representation of what an advocate of parochial federalism might
present. This is done to present a
dialectic position of that construct.
[2]
Christopher J. Hurn, The Limits and
Possibilities of Schooling: An
Introduction to the Sociology of Education (New York, NY: Harper and Row, 1993).
[3] Ibid., 1, emphasis in the original.
[4]
“International Comparisons of Achievements,” IES/National Center for Education
Statistics (n.d., but reports on stats from 2016), accessed June 12, 2022, https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=1#:~:text=centerpoint%20(500).-,The%20U.S.%20average%20score%20was%20higher%20than%20the%20average%20scores,higher%20than%20the%20United%20States.
[5] Drew DeSilver, “U.S. Students’ Academic Achievement
Still Lags that of Their Peers in Many Other Countries,” Pew Research Center
(February 15, 2017), accessed June 12, 2022, https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/02/15/u-s-students-internationally-math-science/ .
[6] Geoffrey Skelley and Holly Fung, “We Asked 2,000
Americans about Their Biggest Concern,” Five Thirty Eight (May 17, 2022),
accessed June 12, 2022, https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/we-asked-2000-americans-about-their-biggest-concern-the-resounding-answer-inflation/ .
[7] See interesting study in which students are retested
a year after their final exams for a course of study. It documents the rate of loss students
experience in the memorized “knowledge.”
Daniel T. Willingham, “Ask the Cognitive Scientist: Do Students Remember What They Learn in
School,” American Educator (Fall 2015), accessed June 12, 2022, https://www.aft.org/ae/fall2015/willingham .
[8]
Jessica Richardi, “The Paideia Program Is Worth another Look,” Journal of
Educational Research and Practice, 11, 1 (2021), accessed on June 12, 2022, https://scholarworks.waldenu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1650&context=jerap
.
[9] Ibid.
[10] Mortimer J. Adler, The Paideia Proposal: An Educational Manifesto (New York, NY: Collier Books, 1982).
[11] Zachary Jason, “Bored Out of Their Minds,” Ed.
Magazine (Winter 2017), accessed June 12, 2022, https://www.gse.harvard.edu/news/ed/17/01/bored-out-their-minds , emphasis added.
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