A Question of Purpose: Education

Throughout this semester’s Civic Issues blog, I have explored how many different aspects of our culture and society affect how we provide and receive education in the United States.  It is complex, flawed, while also great and innovative.  We have come so far in history so that America’s education caters – albeit sometimes at different levels of effectiveness – to both genders and a variety races and nationalities.  But for we college students who have successfully made it to the other side in mandatory public education, I feel inclined to present a question for your mulling over: What really is the purpose of it all?

Is the goal of public education to prepare citizens for a “required” higher education necessary to get a job? Think about it.  More people go to college than ever before, but are we necessarily a smarter population?  Degree inflation runs rampant.  Couple tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars later, and some college grads are back for round two with the parents while waiting tables at the local restaurant.  Of course, there’s nothing wrong with waiting tables ( do it – it’s super fun), but what was the point of going to school? Societal pressure? No, this isn’t an answer.

In contrast, according to Spring’s The Goal of Public Schooling, the opening statement of the U.S. Department of Education’s A Guide to Education and No Child Left Behind, the goal is not for you own good, but the good of the country.  “Satisfying the demand for highly skilled workers is the key to maintaining competitiveness and prosperity in the global economy”.  Not that there’s anything inherently bad about this – but this is for America, people.  In fact, the book also blatantly reads, “Parents are not asked at the schoolhouse door what they want their children to learn and how they want their children to be taught; these decisions are made by a complex political process”.  Rather, public schooling operates on the public interest.  But here I ask you, is this dangerous?  Because primary and most secondary schooling is required, one could infer that educational institutions can serve as driving forces in indoctrinating a young population with specific political and economic ideologies.  After all, Nazism was enforced outside and within the classroom walls, as fascism, German superiority, and undying devotion to the Führer was instilled into minds that had no other choice.  Oh, you say, but that’s Nazi Germany.  And yet, have you ever wondered how an American high school history class in America differs from an American history class taught in Germany – in any other country for that matter?  Where does utilizing history to learn critical thinking skills and gain insight into the human condition cross over into territory of indoctrination?  No, using students as political chess players and economic weapon-wielders should not be the primary goal of education either.

However, some do argue that the purpose of public schooling is in order to instill good values in accordance to good citizenship, all this being required to maintain a functioning republican government.  According to Gastil, deliberation as a means of a successful government can only successfully occur with proper education of citizens.  Is that not the point of this Rhetoric and Civic Life? Which, in a way, we have to take?

And yet many students, including many voices within this very class, instead advocate for a different education; an education for the purpose of our own personal intellectual stimulation.  After all, we’re the ones making the investment; is it so selfish to elevate personal benefit above all else? I challenge you to think about why you’re here in college, and also how you benefitted from the past twelve years of public education.

And also,

what would you change?

2 responses to “A Question of Purpose: Education

  1. The linking of education to the civic and particularly to national interests is tricky, and it’s a strong way to end this excellent blog. In the most optimistic sense, I think a good education teaches students to be critical and vocal members of their polis. That is, they aren’t simply educated to serve the national status quo–they’re educated to be able to think about it and change it if need be. That is, I hope, what has let so many of you critique the very institution that you’re a part of during the course of this class. However, the extent to which this really happens is questionable, particularly in K-12 education. And, of course, there are other national reasons to have an educated citizenry, like developing scientific and military innovation. It’s definitely a difficult balance, and I’m glad that you brought it to our attention!

  2. Firstly Shannon, I just wanted to say how much I enjoyed your CI blogs throughout this semester. I really liked your voice and how you perfectly managed to capture your audience. And on another note, (I didn’t really pick up the point you were making earlier) but history classes are different around the world. Take England, for example. When they teach about the Revolutionary War, they make America seem like the bad guy. When we learn about the Revolutionary War, we make Britain look like the bad guy. But I think I get your point that the “purpose” of this education is to instill within us these ideas that can help our country. Part of the reason they want us to learn about WWII is probably so no one tries to start a WWIII. But at the same time, if no one was ever educated – like completely – then no one would even have the capacity to even start another war. So basically what I am saying is that they give us all these educational tools to do all these things, but force upon us what we can’t do with them. If they’re worried we’ll do something bad with them, why teach them to us in the first place? Sorry, I think I completely got off track of your post.
    Anyways, though, I do think that America should change the way we value education. We should see it more as a privilege than a right. I hate seeing people who come to college just to party all day and all night. Seriously, when they’re paying $30,000 to $60,000 a year, they should have a better sense. Excuse me for sounding harsh, but I think that the truly educated ones have to compensate for the idiots out in the world. I always tell myself that the only reason that I came to college is because I want to go to med school. If I wanted to do something else, I’d probably figure it out on my own instead of coming to school. (Unfortunately, I lack the capacity to learn Organic Chemistry on my own so I stay…) But I have a question for you. Do you think that our situation is so dire that anything will change some time soon? Although I hope so, I sadly don’t think so.

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