I came across an interesting article the other day that revealed a misconception I had about public education in the United States. The Huffington Post article cites a study done by the University of Southern California (USC) which found that the United States is the “clear leader in spending-per-student.” At first, I was baffled by the fact that the U.S. still has a weaker public education system than many other prominent nation with such high amounts of money being spent per student. However, it makes sense if you consider that the quality of the education we receive in the U.S. does not meet the standards of many other nations throughout the world.
We have been discussing ways of improving the quality of education in the U.S. throughout this semester, and one of the main reform efforts we have discussed is the de-standardization of public education. I would like to take this a step further and assert that we must not only free ourselves from stringent standardized guidelines, but we must also implement ways of broadening the minds of students so as to truly break away from the regurgitation mentality. Therefore, as many education reformers have suggested, I support the implementation of philosophy in public schools, namely middle or high schools.
The prospect of injecting philosophy into the curriculums of public schools below the level of higher education is extremely controversial, and I certainly realize this. Critics definitely have some valuable concerns, yet some are factually inaccurate. For one, opponents state that philosophy is too academic and esoteric in nature to be valued by the every-day person. This is the farthest from the truth, and the argument against this assertion follows that of the value of history (“How can we learn from our mistakes without studying the mistakes of the past?”). Philosophy is simply the “love of wisdom,” and similarly, how can we understand where we are today and where we are going in the future without first realizing the thinking that brought about societies institutions and ways of conventional thinking.
Another argument lies in the assertion that philosophy in public schools could cause children to question their religion. Maybe this is just me, but I find this argument to be so fundamentally flawed that it doesn’t really serve as a valid argument at all. Religion has been tested for thousands of years, yet it continues to endure despite individual questioning. More importantly, though, religious indoctrination without the ability to ask questions is not okay, in my opinion. Granted, I understand that parents have raised their children a certain way, and they certainly have a right to do so; however, philosophy and religion are not mutually exclusive. In fact, there are numerous philosophers who practice a diverse array of religions from. There exists this conception that those who study philosophy lose their faith and become atheists. Philosophy helps people to explore all possible realms of thought with an open mind so as to promote a more universal perspective, but that does not mean that they do not retain their own faith. Oftentimes, the study of philosophy strengthens an individual’s faith in their religion because he or she is able to understand other ways of thought and morality and choose what they agree with. This is a lot more meaningful than religious indoctrination, in my opinion.
Lastly, there always remains the idea that philosophy may be valuable to study, yet it is not as essential as the rest of the academic subjects. Therefore, it is left out of curriculums in high schools because there is simply not “enough room” for it. However, I would argue that philosophy is potentially even more valuable than some subjects in school because it introduces an entirely new concept into public education – free thought. Currently, almost all academic subjects before higher education are knowledge-based. Although some would argue that english or literature classes are more interpretive than empirical, from my own experience, this is only partially true. In my AP literature class, our grades were often based upon regurgitation of given themes of short stories or detailing events from a novel, which, I would argue, borders on memorization and regurgitation. Even so, philosophy would allow students to think for themselves and critically consider various perspectives on life, death, and other more tangible applications to society. To me, it is more important for students to develop critical thinking skills, logic, and a more broadened perspective so as to promote both themselves as individuals and the improvement of society.
Here is the article I discussed at the start of this post. Give it a read!
“It Lies Within: The Key to Education Reform”
That’s all for now! Stay fly and goodbye!
-Dan
I really agree with all the points you make and think that philosophy would be a great addition to any school’s curriculum. Personally, I’m actually a little alarmed that there is such strong backlash for some of the reasons you have already outlined in your post. Most of the objections to teaching philosophy in schools seem to center around an opposition to free-thought (especially the one about erasing pre-existing religious indoctrination). I hope that one day we can live in a world where philosophy is more broadly accepted as a valuable source of education for our nation’s students!
I personally have never considered teaching philopsophy in public schools. I agree that it will do a good job of opening students perspectives and their view of their world, however I think it should be implemented mainly in upper high school. In middle school and high school I do not think students will have the cognitive ability to really consider philosophy or benefit from it because developmentally these parts of their brains are not yet fully developed. It is an interesting idea and one that should maybe be considered more as we look at reforming education, and I will be interested to see how this argument progresses in the years to come!
You make some great points in this post Dan. Personally I don’t see the problem with teaching philosophy in public schools. If it is to controversial from some schools, then maybe provide a philosophy class as an elective for interested students rather than a required course. I think a lot of students could benefit from taking a philosophy class in high school. Like you mention there is less memorization and regurgitation than there is in typical math, science, history and English courses. Having more classes that are more open ended and allow students to think about new and interesting things they hadn’t thought of previously can only be beneficial! Nice Post!