From: pajerek@telstar.kodak.com (Don Pajerek)
Subject: Re: Why can't the liberals just admit that public education has failed?
Reply-To: pajerek@telstar.kodak.com (Don Pajerek)
Organization: Digital Equipment Corp. - Telstar
Distribution: usa
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 16:40:47 GMT

In article <SLAGLE.93Jan26005255@sgi417.msd.lmsc.lockheed.com> slagle@lmsc.lockheed.com writes:
>In article <1993Jan14.181049.21423@kadsma.kodak.com>, pajerek@telstar.kodak.com (Don Pajerek) writes:
>
>> In article <SLAGLE.93Jan13134049@sgi417.msd.lmsc.lockheed.com> slagle@lmsc.lockheed.com writes:
>
>>>In other words, according to Shanker and most of the educationist
>>>crowd, the purpose of the public schools is not to teach skills
>>>and ideas, it is to socialize kids properly.  Different goals,
>>>different results.
>
>> Give me a break.
>
>Sure.  Why not?
>

[stuff deleted]

>I understand why the teacher unions and the educationists are 
>threatened by school choice proposals, but I still don't see
>why you are so threatened by it that you would stoop to this
>sort of snotty misreading of my comments.  Care to offer a
>little reason and enlightenment instead of sarcasm?  If so I'll
>be glad to consider it.  But if all you've got is more of the
>same, then I'd prefer you keep it to yourself.
>

My sarcasm is in response to overstatements on your part, such as
the quote included above. Note the phrase, 'the purpose of schools
is not to teach skills and ideas...'. A non-sarcastic response to
this is hardly possible. I also have a problem with your general
intent to demonize teachers and 'educationists' (is this a new word?).
The effort to classify entire groups as 'the enemy' is not very
productive, unless one is at war, and I certainly hope we aren't
in this case.

Having read much of the discussion on vouchers and private schools
here on t.p.m (lots of net bandwidth there) and elsewhere, it
seems to me that we have to go far beyond simply introducing choice
into a system that will otherwise remain largely unmodified. Given
the changes in the economy that are happening now, and which will
continue over the coming decades, we really need to rethink the
entire function and purpose of education.

When the economy was dominated by large, monolithic corporations
(and their appendages), we needed the kind of authoritarian,
group-oriented educational system that most of us are familiar
with. Now, however, the large corporations are breaking up, and
economic activity will be organized in a considerably different
way in the future (see books such as 'The Virtual Corporation').
Individuals will more and more tend to participate *as individuals*
in a global, networked, ad-hoc economy that is no longer organized
along geographic lines (by 'as individual', I mean that people will
be be independent economic agents, not merely employees).

The point for education is, the types of skills and behavior patterns
which were appropriate for the industrial economy of the middle
20th century are probably inappropriate for the future. We need to
identify the skills and patterns that *are* appropriate, and go
from there. As I have proposed (semi-seriously) in earlier postings,
why should we preserve any sort of public (i.e., government)
involvement in education at all? Why not privatize the whole thing?
The government could possibly stay involved as a granter of tax
credits to those who use their income to finance education, but
that would be about it.

>=Mark

Don Pajerek

Standard disclaimers apply.
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