From: hrubin@pop.stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
Subject: What can we have for an educational system?
Organization: Purdue University Statistics Department
Date: Sun, 8 Nov 1992 18:20:00 GMT

In article <83160@ut-emx.uucp> andy@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Andrew Hackard) writes:
>hrubin@pop.stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin) writes:

>>The system is broke.  There is no way that we can get enough competent
>>teachers NOW.  These teachers can only dumb down thinking children.  
>>That is why there is no hope of getting an adequate public school system.

>It ill behooves me to comment on the first half of this, since I'm going
>to be a teacher next year (ideally, a competent one, though I'm loathe 
>to make that claim myself).  However, I'm curious, Mr. Rubin: what
>alternative school system do you propose?

>(This wasn't meant as a flame; I'm honestly not sure what you have in
>mind.)

It is barely possible to have a fair public educational system.  But such
a system must not operate on the basis of adjusting the education of some
children to that of others.  Such a system must not operate on the basis
of merely teaching "what the children can learn well," with little idea of
curricular organization.  But it must also consider that there are many
ways of acquiring understanding; I see no possibility even of avoiding a
lot of experimentation, as we do not really know how to teach other than
rote memorization and "plug-and-chug" computation.  It must not assume,
as the much better system of old did, that progress in different areas
proceeded at comparable rates.  It must consider understanding, and if
I may be so bold as to state the purpose of education, as opposed to 
training,

	Education is preparation for the totally unforeseen situation.

We must stress not the regurgitation of answers and mechanics, but the
understanding of the concepts, and children, even from the beginning, 
must be asked to apply the learning in one area to others.  It we attempt
to teach concepts as formal definitions only, it will not make much of a
difference.  We must avoid the idea that only the easy material should be
taught; it does not make understanding any easier later.

But there is a major problem in a public system, and that is that different
people have vastly different ideas of what and how children should be taught.
There is no reason why your neighbors should be allowed to decide how your
children should be taught.  There should be input from the scholars, but the
final decision must be in the hands of the parents.  This would have been 
very difficult to do in the past, but is much easier now.

And we must have teachers who understand the subjects they are teaching.
This means that the first grade arithmetic teacher must understand the
structure of the number system and the use of symbols.  The first grade
teacher of reading must have a good grasp of grammar.  An elementary
school teacher of science must understand the fundamentals of physics,
chemistry, and biology.  A teacher of history should be aware of world
history, and the interrelations between the various political, geographical,
economic, and cultural forces throughout the ages.
-- 
Herman Rubin, Dept. of Statistics, Purdue Univ., West Lafayette IN47907-1399
Phone: (317)494-6054
hrubin@pop.stat.purdue.edu (Internet, bitnet)  
{purdue,pur-ee}!pop.stat!hrubin(UUCP)