Mandatory/Public Education

[Minty]

Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Section 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Thirteenth Amendment of the Constitution.

The whole concept of compulsory 'education' (I use the term loosely in regards to public schooling) is wrong and tyrannical. Not only should no child be forced to attend any institution day in, day out for 12+ years of the greatest years of their life, but what is being offered is not even the best of what could be offered. Yes, you learn the basics of mathematics and English, but children can learn that stuff anywhere- at home or at a voluntary institution offered by the free market to cater for the demand of education made clear by the fact that government schooling is there in the first place.
Riddle me this: if government provides such a necessary service with schooling, why do they need to make it compulsory? I mean, food is even more necessary than education and imagine if the government took over food production and forced everyone to eat their 3 square meals a day, regardless of weight, stature, age and fitness; it would be the disaster in parallel to what schooling is now.
I wonder what the "free-thinking" community reckons about that which is blatantly in opposition to free thought, intellectualism and freedom.
Looking forward to hearing your replies.

P.S. I'm from Britain, but I don't think that slavery is only wrong in the U.S.

 

[obsidianavenger]

Re: Mandatory Education

because schooling is important (seriously important, undeniable in today's world) and kids don't always know whats best for them. judging from some of the horrible cases i've heard of (why do most of them seem to be religiously motivated?) parents often don't either. the basic justification is that children need an education if they are to succeed in life, and the state needs an educated populace (both to continue to run smoothly and to attract companies to seek labor there) so the state takes it over.

would you be against it if there was no law on it, but parents still forced their kids to go? i think thats fair, as kids haven't come into their full mental faculties yet and thus haven't obtained their full rights. the argument against this, however, is that a child shouldn't suffer because their parent(s) are too dumb/busy/indifferent to send them to school. not having an education is an *enormous* disadvantage these days. by not pressing the issue a parent could doom their kid to a lifetime of underachievement and poverty. i mean seriously, a high school diploma is almost useless these days when it comes to getting a job. because so much of the current economy is knowledge based.

now, you can argue about what ought to be taught, or how schools ought to be run, or indeed, whether the gov't should have anything to do with it, but you cannot argue with the fact that schooling is necessary if you want a good job later on. and kids just don't have the kind of foresight to make that kind of decision.

 

[Minty]

Re: Mandatory Education

If there's anyone out there like me, take a look at this site: http://www.school-survival.net/
For the sceptics, read John Taylor Gatto (a retired teacher who won awards for his teaching but became disillusioned with the schooling system. There's also "School is Dead" by Everett Reimer, which asesses school systems from all over the world, from history and then puts forth suggestions for the future. At times I found it to be teetering on the philosophical (like Rousseau for education), but it was well sourced and definitely cogent.

 

[Minty]

Re: Mandatory Education

because schooling is important (seriously important, undeniable in today's world) and kids don't always know whats best for them. judging from some of the horrible cases i've heard of (why do most of them seem to be religiously motivated?) parents often don't either. the basic justification is that children need an education if they are to succeed in life

Define success. School teaches that the goal of a human's life is to get a job and make money. Seriously- when kids should be playing and learning about the real world, teachers are asking them what they want to be when they're older (note, the career is equated to the human in that construction). Also, given the chance, schools and places of education would arise in all sorts of forms on the free market. A lot of schools would not change that much and use the old model (which dates back to Prussia and Sparta, by the way) and it would be clear to the most incompetent parent which schools and school-models produce the most successful children.

and the state needs an educated populace (both to continue to run smoothly and to attract companies to seek labor there) so the state takes it over.

:roll: Please tell me you did not just say that. That doesn't even justify a response.

would you be against it if there was no law on it, but parents still forced their kids to go? i think thats fair, as kids haven't come into their full mental faculties yet and thus haven't obtained their full rights.

If you mean their civil liberties, such as drinking or being allowed out at night, then no- they haven't gained those yet. However, if you mean the right to free speech or the right outlined in documents such as the constitution that the government not force them into labour, then they are human beings as much as anybody.

the argument against this, however, is that a child shouldn't suffer because their parent(s) are too dumb/busy/indifferent to send them to school.

A child shouldn't have to suffer by having to go to school either. I can say with no exaggeration that 90% of the things you 'learn' in school are either forgotten after your examination or have absolutely no bearing on your life and work at all. Education reform *has* managed to bring such things as BTEC and other vocational courses into the hands of willing teenagers, which is a step up but doesn't fix the major flaw(s) in the education system.

now, you can argue about what ought to be taught, or how schools ought to be run, or indeed, whether the gov't should have anything to do with it, but you cannot argue with the fact that schooling is necessary if you want a good job later on. and kids just don't have the kind of foresight to make that kind of decision.

I'm willing to compromise here and suggest making primary education compulsory and when the child is at the right age, to allow them to choose homeschooling, another school-model, etc.
It would still irk me somewhat but how about it?

 

[Niocan]

Re: Mandatory Education

*Ahem* Allow me to add some fuel to this beautiful question
Charlotte Thomson Iserbyt's site/book

pinky: I keep having this recurring dream. It's like an endless slideshow of school buildings. They're all different but they also all kind of have that same generic "school look" you know? They're really creepy...

And in the background I can hear the voice of Ivan Illich - you know, the guy who wrote that book? Deschooling Society.

Ivan Illich: ... which characterizes our world view and language...

pinky: Well actually, I don't think it's really his voice... because in my dream, he kind of sounds like a girl... with a Japanese accent...

Ivan Illich: ...public education would profit from the deschooling of society, just as family life, politics, security, faith...

pinky: I think he's talking about how modern people have all become... institutionalized.

Ivan Illich: Many students, especially those who are poor, intuitively know what the schools do for them. They school them to confuse process and substance. Once these become blurred, a new logic is assumed - the more "treatment" there is, the better are the results. Or, "escalation" leads to success...

pinky: Actually... I kind of like this part.

Ivan Illich: ...The pupil is thereby schooled to confuse teaching with learning, schooled to confuse grade advancement with education, schooled to confuse a diploma with competence. His imagination is schooled to accept service in place of value. Medical treatment is mistaken for health care, social work for the improvement of community life, police protection is mistaken for safety, military poise is mistaken for national security, the rat race is mistaken for productive work. Health, learning, dignity, independence, and creative endeavor are defined as little more than the performance of the institutions which claim to serve these ends, and their improvement is made to depend on allocating more resources to the management of hospitals, schools, and other agencies in question...

pinky: That's so cool...

Ivan Illich: ...Since when are people born needy? In need, for instance, of education? Since when do we have to learn the language we speak by being taught by somebody? I wanted to find out where the idea came from that all over the world people have to be assembled in specific groups of not less than 15, otherwise it's not a class. Not more than forty, otherwise they are underprivileged. For yearly, not less than 800 hours, otherwise they don't get enough. Not more than 1,100 hours, otherwise it's considered a prison. For four-year periods by somebody else who has undergone this for a longer time.

How did it come about that such a crazy process like schooling would become necessary? Then I realized that it was something like engineering people - that our society doesn't only produce artifact things, but artifact people. And that it doesn't do that by the content of the curriculum, but by getting them through this ritual which makes them believe that learning happens as a result of being taught...

pinky: Yeah... [ chuckles ] some people are... so stupid...

Ivan Illich: I'm not talking about "some people" - I'm talking about everybody. I'm talking about you too, Pinky. Pinky!! Are you paying attention, Pinky?

pinky: Huh?

<3

 

[WRT54G]

Re: Mandatory Education

but children can learn that stuff anywhere

Quite simply not true. I can't learn how long the War of 1812 lasted while plowing fields. I can't learn long division in a street alley. There may be alternatives to public school, but school itself is necessary for basic education.

at home or at a voluntary institution offered by the free market to cater for the demand of education made clear by the fact that government schooling is there in the first place.

Both home schooling and private schools exist in the US. The latter is quite popular among people who can actually afford them. The former is popular among tools who like having their children grow up with no social skills.

Riddle me this: if government provides such a necessary service with schooling, why do they need to make it compulsory? I mean, food is even more necessary than education and imagine if the government took over food production and forced everyone to eat their 3 square meals a day, regardless of weight, stature, age and fitness; it would be the disaster in parallel to what schooling is now.
I wonder what the "free-thinking" community reckons about that which is blatantly in opposition to free thought, intellectualism and freedom.

Because eating doesn't need to be compulsory to avoid the breakdown of modern society. Eating is one of the strongest biological urges. Biology is also responsible (indirectly) for the converse reaction to schooling: many adolescents would not go given the chance. They're too busy trying to be rebellious for such frivolities as ensuring they (and thus the entire next generation) have a future.

The rights of children are marginal. They don't have the psychological maturity to make their own decisions, so you can hardly consider compulsory schooling a breech of their constitutional rights. Compulsory college would be a whole other story. (In case you didn't know, school is only compulsory up to around 16.)

It's necessary because the alternative is detrimental to society. If we expect to be a high-functioning first-world power, we need an educated population. You can't have engineers and scientists without education. And you can have a thriving society without engineers and scientists (and other smart people). It may strip civil liberties, but it's stripping marginal liberties at the expense of providing basic infrastructure that the government exists to provide in the first place.

The law exists for as good a reason as any law exists. I think. And that's coming from a self-described libertarian who hated school.

 

[obsidianavenger]

Re: Mandatory Education

Please tell me you did not just say that. That doesn't even justify a response.

o

its true!

if the majority of people are uneducated, who works for the government? who headquarters their company in a place where the majority of people are unqualified to do the work? plus i remember clearly the founding fathers believed that a democracy required an educated/informed populace to run smoothly.

 

[Minty]

Re: Mandatory Education

Quite simply not true. I can't learn how long the War of 1812 lasted while plowing fields. I can't learn long division in a street alley. There may be alternatives to public school, but school itself is necessary for basic education.

Right, because:
a) Learning how long the 1812 war lasted is critical in getting a job and being able to put something into society by the product of your labour. I can ask, say, any electrician(!)
and b) Books, the internet, and other people simply do not exist.

Both home schooling and private schools exist in the US. The latter is quite popular among people who can actually afford them. The former is popular among tools who like having their children grow up with no social skills.

They do exist, but they are seen as not the norm. Private schooling is only expensive at the moment because that's what they are there for at the moment- to provide a 'better' education for the upper-middle and upper classes. However, without the schooling institution of today, private education would be a tautology and the expense would be about as cheap as public schooling (Everett Reimer thinks even cheaper, but I'll not get into that because it's irrelevant). You're also disregarding the fact that private schools must follow the government curriculum as much as public schools, so they're not private in the ideal sense.
Also, I know one of those 'tools' who home-schools their child and your claim is laughable and based on the extreme fringe that home-schooling tends to attract.
http://www.school-survival.net/wiki/Social_skills_outside_school

Because eating doesn't need to be compulsory to avoid the breakdown of modern society. Eating is one of the strongest biological urges. Biology is also responsible (indirectly) for the converse reaction to schooling: many adolescents would not go given the chance. They're too busy trying to be rebellious for such frivolities as ensuring they (and thus the entire next generation) have a future.

I have seen the testimonials of many, many parents who were worried about, when it boiled down to it, "he would just play video games alI day" and variations upon that. They were all proven wrong. The kids said that they got bored of their computers and things and, with their own free will as human beings, chose to educate themselves and let themselves be educated. I'm not saying that all kids would choose to learn, but those are the ones who fall asleep or mess about in class anyway.
How old are you? because I think you've forgotten what it's like to be a teenager. One is not 'busy being rebellious', the fact that teenagers are often rebellious is that it is when they are trying to come to terms with the world and with themselves as individuals. Sending a teenager into an environment with hundreds of other teenagers, forcing interaction when they want to be alone, being subject to peer pressure and pressure to make lots of friends and fit into social castes, being exposed to groups that attract them into the ideas of drinking and smoking (or worse), having to take shit from teachers and other teenagers, etc. etc. and still expecting them to perform well on the mountains of banal tasks, essays and exams you throw onto them; all of that is not helpful. Of course you're going to be rebellious, or depressed, depending on the strength of your character.
Every teenager goes through stages of rebellion, experimentation and so on, but the school environment can only exacerbate it.
http://www.hslda.org/docs/news/washingtontimes/200705070.asp

It's necessary because the alternative is detrimental to society. If we expect to be a high-functioning first-world power, we need an educated population. You can't have engineers and scientists without education. And you can have a thriving society without engineers and scientists (and other smart people). It may strip civil liberties, but it's stripping marginal liberties at the expense of providing basic infrastructure that the government exists to provide in the first place.

Again, you assume that school equals education and education only equals school. Did these engineers really learn anything useful about engineering in school? Did the scientists really need art? I actually want to be a scientist and I learnt absolutely nothing in science today that I couldn't have looked up in a book in 5 minutes, yet it took my teacher an hour to drone on about it and bore the class stiff, most of whom will forget about it some time between leaving the class and just after their exams.
I don't have the time now but at some point I'll have to pick you up on this society nonsense. I will add, though, that the liberties compulsory education strips are far from marginal.

 

[Minty]

Re: Mandatory Education

if the majority of people are uneducated, who works for the government? who headquarters their company in a place where the majority of people are unqualified to do the work? plus i remember clearly the founding fathers believed that a democracy required an educated/informed populace to run smoothly.

See that shit? Stop it! Education does not equal government-run or government-mandated schools, 30 to a class, teacher lecturing students, students doing standardised tests, etc.
Silly, school wasn't mandatory in the US until the early 1900s, and even then it was only elementary school. The founding fathers would probably be horrified at the state of modern schooling (conjecture, I know).

 

[Unwardil]

Re: Mandatory Education

See, it's a bit of a catch 22.

Children learn much better than adults, their brains haven't been wired up yet and are still growing, so that's the time when all the relevant information they're going to need to know has to find it's way in there. Plus, I mean, you've got to stick them SOMEWHERE right? You can't just have them running around going feral.

So school certainly seems the best place for them.

The trouble is, especially now, who's responsibility is it to decide what information they should be learning? Is it the state? That is definitely a recipe for tyrannical indoctrination, but if it's up to the parents of the individual, that's simply unfeasible over a large scale and children haven't learned enough either way to make up their own minds yet.

Unfortunately there's no simple solution to this problem. I'd agree that public education is broken, but I'd also be the first to say that something very much like it needs to exist and should be mandatory up to the legal age of adulthood.

 

[Case]

Re: Mandatory Education

If you don't mind... how old are you? You do seem to have a quite profound lack of understanding of the reason why mandatory schooling came into being, and why it is necessary. Let me, shall I say, ... educate you.

Sir, you err in your assumption that mandatory education was wrong and tyrannical. I searched your posts for arguments against mandatory schooling, but all your text offers comes down to opinions. Accordingly, I will simply dismantle the notion that mandatory education was wrong.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Part I----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------The (abridged) History of Mandatory Education
------The first law making school mandatory for children was signed in 1592 in what nowadays is a part of Germany.*1 Martin Luther demanded there be 'public schools any child could attend' in 1524 already - his motivation being that "If education dies, stupidity will reign" (or more gently put - he was discontent with the quality of the results of homeschooling), but, well, it took a while for the word to get around. That, and Luther wasn't exactly the most powerful person during the time (he was declared 'vogelfrey', which basically means he could've been murdered without the murderer facing any consequences). Farmers later opposed the idea, as they wanted their children to work on the fields. This, on a sidenote, led to the introduction of autumn half-term (vacation) so the children could at least help during the harvest.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Part II----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Why Your Opinion is not a Valid Argument
------You say mandatory education was tyrannical and wrong, but all your 'evidence' amounts to is the notion that it was tyrannical for the state to force the citizen to adhere to a certain obligation. By the same logic, child custody obligation would be utterly tyrannical and accordingly, it should be in the interest of freedom to deem it every parent's free choice whether to feed their child or let it die in agony. The world doesn't work this way, pal. Luckily.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Part III----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Why Compulsory Education (CE) is Awesome
------Firstly, you make sure as many children as possible (as there are some exceptions) receive a part-of-society-starter-kit. Well, not you. You'd apparently make sure all the crazy idiots and (religious) fundamentalists and all the other wacky people can indoctrinate their children without them ever hearing a second opinion. Or more truthfully, real arguments. Back to my point, CE (if done right, mind you) ensures that every child has both access and opportunity to basic knowledge needed to function in our society. Basic (as opposed to university-style in-depth) language, math, science, history and culture as well as health knowledge helps children to make sense of the world, offers the opportunity to engage in strategic approaches to learn, make use of their natural curiosity.
------Secondly, children are confronted, probably for the first time in their lives, with large-scale social interaction. They learn basic social skills, make friends, learn from them, plot, gather, get into arguments or even fights, reconcile, and so on and so forth. They practice for the challenges that await them when they're older, with less severe consequences.
------Thirdly, it is made sure that children are not somewhere else during school time, which may seem like a tautology, but is really an insurance that children aren't being made to work for their parents. This was a major issue during industrialization, by the way, and I doubt you would have preferred work over school.
------Furthermore, neither does every parent have the same qualifications to be able to teach their children, nor is it realistic they will have the time needed to do so, nor would it be realistic to assess every parent's teaching ability if they were to consider home schooling. If there is no quality check, so to speak, it cannot be ensured that the child has the opportunity to learn all the necessary things to be able to contribute to society in a meaningful way.
There's more, but I have to take care of my own education now. See, if you think there's something wrong with the quality of teaching today, make an effort and propose a better system. And by system I mean entire system, not just a 'bunch of opinions on what sucks'.

*1 Sehling, Emil: Die evangelischen Kirchenordnungen des 16. Jahrhunderts, Band 18: Rheinland-Pfalz I, Tà¼bingen (Mohr-Siebeck) 2006, p. 406.

(Is it maybe possible to allow tabs and centered text?)

 

[obsidianavenger]

Re: Mandatory Education

if the majority of people are uneducated, who works for the government? who headquarters their company in a place where the majority of people are unqualified to do the work? plus i remember clearly the founding fathers believed that a democracy required an educated/informed populace to run smoothly.

See that shit? Stop it! Education does not equal government-run or government-mandated schools, 30 to a class, teacher lecturing students, students doing standardised tests, etc.
Silly, school wasn't mandatory in the US until the early 1900s, and even then it was only elementary school. The founding fathers would probably be horrified at the state of modern schooling (conjecture, I know).

of course it doesn't, i am just trying to give a fair rendering of the gov't justification for mandatory schooling. and all you do is hear the word government and cry bullshit. i also never said the founders advocated mandatory schooling

you have to consider what the economy was like then vs now. i hate to use vague sounding buzzwords, but we have a knowledge-based economy. not being educated is a *huge* disadvantage for an individual. government stepped in because of 2 concerns:

1. people being unfailrly disadvantaged by their parents lack of education and
2. the need of the gov't to have an educated populace to keep the economy/gov't itself running smoothly.

why do you think slave owners were so insistent on keeping their slaves from learning to read or write? because, and here comes another cliche, knowledge is power. those slaves who became educated became unmanageable.

of course, you could argue that "levelling the playing field" as in one isn't the job of the government, and you could argue that two would be better served by privately rather that gov't funded schools, but you can't argue that school is unimportant.

 

[borrofburi]

Re: Mandatory Education

The trouble is, especially now, who's responsibility is it to decide what information they should be learning? Is it the state? That is definitely a recipe for tyrannical indoctrination, but if it's up to the parents of the individual, that's simply unfeasible over a large scale and children haven't learned enough either way to make up their own minds yet.

This combined with religious parents and others who hate knowledge/science/etc.

 

[Gnomesmusher]

Re: Mandatory Education

If you made public school education voluntary, take some guesses what happens eh? Seriously, I grow tired of these imagined slights against our "freedoms".

 

[Minty]

Re: Mandatory Education

of course it doesn't, i am just trying to give a fair rendering of the gov't justification for mandatory schooling. and all you do is hear the word government and cry bullshit. i also never said the founders advocated mandatory schooling

you have to consider what the economy was like then vs now. i hate to use vague sounding buzzwords, but we have a knowledge-based economy. not being educated is a *huge* disadvantage for an individual. government stepped in because of 2 concerns:

1. people being unfailrly disadvantaged by their parents lack of education and
2. the need of the gov't to have an educated populace to keep the economy/gov't itself running smoothly.

why do you think slave owners were so insistent on keeping their slaves from learning to read or write? because, and here comes another cliche, knowledge is power. those slaves who became educated became unmanageable.

of course, you could argue that "levelling the playing field" as in one isn't the job of the government, and you could argue that two would be better served by privately rather that gov't funded schools, but you can't argue that school is unimportant.

Define 'educated'. Define 'economy'. Define 'running smoothly'. I can't address that point without further elucidation.

Also, read "School is Dead", which addresses directly and devotes at least one chapter to the ignorance of slaves/untouchables. It would be impossible for me to summarise. One good point from the book is how the knowledge in the curriculum is not knowledge that frees, as you imply, but knowledge that is at the expense of real life, useful knowledge that would teach children to think for themselves or to develop real skills.

 

[Minty]

Re: Mandatory Education

The trouble is, especially now, who's responsibility is it to decide what information they should be learning? Is it the state? That is definitely a recipe for tyrannical indoctrination, but if it's up to the parents of the individual, that's simply unfeasible over a large scale and children haven't learned enough either way to make up their own minds yet.

This combined with religious parents and others who hate knowledge/science/etc.

You mean the lunatic fringe who consitute most current home-schoolers? Please, they will always exist and they will teach their kids what they will, regardless of the existance of forced education.

If you made public school education voluntary, take some guesses what happens eh? Seriously, I grow tired of these imagined slights against our "freedoms".

What would happen? And I'm imagining this "slight" against my freedom, am I? :lol:

 

[obsidianavenger]

Re: Mandatory Education

in order to get a job- any job- one needs to be able to read and write. further, the majority of jobs require basic math skills. any non-service, non-physical labor job is going to require extensive knowledge in whatever field- business, science, finance, etc. jobs are specialized, which means it takes seriously training to be able to do them well. some service jobs (ie nursing, tech support) require specialized knowledge as well.

if large swaths of the population lack the skills required by a company, they will not base their company in the US. it makes no sense for them to do so when there are other places in the world with the educated workforce they need already trained. if companies start relocating elsewhere, an no new ones spring up (since people in the US are uneducated we can also assume they would be ineffective at starting or running a successful business) we lose jobs, we lose money, downward spiral etc.

mandatory schooling handily solves all these problems, whether its the best solution or not.

 

[Gnomesmusher]

Re: Mandatory Education

Crap Double Post. Read Below.

 

[Gnomesmusher]

Re: Mandatory Education

What would happen? And I'm imagining this "slight" against my freedom, am I? :lol:

I asked YOU first. And, Ok maybe it's not an imagined slight for YOU. But it's sure a frivolous one, since you CAN homeschool in the UK (and here in the U.S.) if you don't like this "mandatory" schooling that you seem to think is such a bad thing.

Also:

Riddle me this: if government provides such a necessary service with schooling, why do they need to make it compulsory?

It's compulsory even though it's a necessary service to help those most in need of it: children of apathetic and neglectful parents. It's like how there are laws against neglect of your child even though it's a "necessary service" to feed and keep a roof over your child.

 

[Minty]

Re: Mandatory Education

I asked YOU first. And, Ok maybe it's not an imagined slight for YOU. But it's sure a frivolous one, since you CAN homeschool in the UK (and here in the U.S.) if you don't like this "mandatory" schooling that you seem to think is such a bad thing.

You can homeschool, but many parents are too busy with jobs or think homeschooling is for religious people or think that it is lacking as an education or think that school isn't damaging to their child. The problem still remains that you have to teach what the government tells you to and if you don't, they can force you to take them to school. Some states/countries even make you take the same standardised tests as everyone else, and what the fucking point in that? The only benefit is taking your child out of the school environment. The problem is worse with so-called private schools, which might as well be called privately-funded public schools.

It's compulsory even though it's a necessary service to help those most in need of it: children of apathetic and neglectful parents. It's like how there are laws against neglect of your child even though it's a "necessary service" to feed and keep a roof over your child.

Well, there's services for that anyway, so why not use them? If a parent is truly neglecting their childs education, i.e. not homeschooling or sending them to some sort of educational facility, then that would fall under the same category as neglecting to give them clean clothes or something. Then you can take the necessary steps to make sure the child is getting some sort of education.