Today's Project
Write a short essay on the Horribility of American Education.
It may not be entirely fair to say that America's people are badly educated, but the fact is that many of us are; America must have more half-educated people than have existed in any nation at any prior time.
This is partly because America is so big, and so ambitious in its educational scope; we actually say (and believe) that every American can and should be educated to some minimal standard, including functional literacy and numeracy, which would have been a jaw-droppingly weird idea at any time up to the present. There are other countries that aspire to this same goal, but all of them are smaller in population and more homogeneous in culture (both of which make it a lot easier, for reasons we will not go into at present).
It is also because "education", in America, has come to mean "job preparation", which would be another jaw-droppingly weird idea at any time up to, say, the introduction of the GI bill or thereabouts. Literacy and numeracy were entirely superfluous to making a living until recently; America's transition to an information and service economy is partly a result and partly a cause of the education/job preparation confusion.
To Be Continued.
It may not be entirely fair to say that America's people are badly educated, but the fact is that many of us are; America must have more half-educated people than have existed in any nation at any prior time.
This is partly because America is so big, and so ambitious in its educational scope; we actually say (and believe) that every American can and should be educated to some minimal standard, including functional literacy and numeracy, which would have been a jaw-droppingly weird idea at any time up to the present. There are other countries that aspire to this same goal, but all of them are smaller in population and more homogeneous in culture (both of which make it a lot easier, for reasons we will not go into at present).
It is also because "education", in America, has come to mean "job preparation", which would be another jaw-droppingly weird idea at any time up to, say, the introduction of the GI bill or thereabouts. Literacy and numeracy were entirely superfluous to making a living until recently; America's transition to an information and service economy is partly a result and partly a cause of the education/job preparation confusion.
To Be Continued.
Posted by sealionii on
Wednesday August 29, 2007 at 8:32pm