Feb 09 2009
Why We Have Public Schools
This is taken from the Kansas Edition of the Rand-McNally Grammar School Geography book ©1897
The republican form of government is the form consistent with the highest degree of civilization. It is a government of the people, by themselves, for their own benefit. As the sovereignty is vested in the whole people, the vote of the poorest, humblest, and most ignorant citizen is as potent as that of the wealthiest, greatest, and most learned.
The danger attending such a government is that ignorant citizens may so far outnumber wise men that, when misled by those who are designing and unprincipled, laws may be enacted that are hurtful to society.
As guard against this danger, republican governments establish systems of public education designed to give to all their citizens such knowledge and mental discipline as will enable them to act with intelligence and judgment in the exercise of sovereignty.
I’m short on time so won’t write any more. I’ll be happy to reply to comments though!
Edit: Look here for some scans from the aforementioned Geography book. Wish I had time to scan the whole thing in. It’s a fascinating look at what we used to teach in public schools.
22 responses so far
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Unfortunately, the leadership of the Republic during the past 8 years has believed that “public” education should not teach deductive/inductive reasoning and thinking skills. Teaching to a test does not utilize those critical skills that allow all their citizens such knowledge and mental discipline as will enable them to act with intelligence and judgment in the exercise of sovereignty.
But those same rules do not apply to private institution, which the next generation of the privileged attend and receive those skills denied to the public schools, by law in NCLB.
Harold
If only the public schools still performed their duties…
One could argue that the constitution could have simply banned all laws which prevented those freedoms which did not directly cause financial or physical harm against another. Then we could engage in a free-market school system, though I would agree that a public funding of such institutions may be prudent in the prevention of aristocracy, however the full blooded free-market individual wouldn’t even allow for this involvement of government intervention.
Your thoughts?
@Randy – Consider the words of founding father George Washington’s 1796 Farewell Address.
“It is substantially true that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The rule, indeed, extends with more or less force to every species of free government. Who that is a sincere friend to it can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the fabric?
“Promote then, as an object of primary importance, institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a government gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public opinion should be enlightened.
Washington doesn’t come right out and call for public education, does he? But he clearly sees the risks posed to freedom by an uninformed populace. Washington doesn’t really say where these “institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge” should come from, only that they should be promoted.
I support an educational system that teaches as @Harold suggests: “critical skills that allow all their citizens such knowledge and mental discipline as will enable them to act with intelligence and judgment in the exercise of sovereignty”
Free-market systems are driven by profit making. I think the free-market school system you envision would bring us schools available only to people with the means to pay for school, leaving those without means (the very people the founders are worried about) to rely upon charitable sources for education.
We have a free-market system for housing and while most people have shelter, there is a segment of the population that is homeless. Many simply refuse the charitable shelter that is available. What then of the people who would refuse or cannot secure charitable educations?
An overly simple answer comes to mind, although it may be very naive and possibly not attainable at this point. Individual virtue and responsibility sit at the base of all of our issues as a society. If each of us did our very best in whatever job we performed; if we were honest; if we had compassion; if we were humble and hard-working then we would produce a product (whatever that may be) that was worthy.
This applies to every segment of life and every job held here in the US. Many homeless people choose not to stay in their local shelter because they are chaotic and poorly run. Many kids do not learn in schools because they are chaotic and poorly run. Our economy is in shambles because our government is chaotic and poorly run – and that has not changed with the new administration, apparently. The money is there. The integrity is not.
None of these things will ever improve unless people gain some sense of personal responsibility (and I know some will disagree) but i firmly believe that only comes with a true recognition of a Divine Creator and our accountability to Him.
The guys who built the original framework of our country believed it and I’m sure they did it with the understanding that future generations would follow in their footsteps. They would be appalled.
I was a teacher in a private school that served students who were not successful in the public school system. The biggest problems that many of those students faced was the large class sizes and the inability of teachers having enough time to differentiate education to their learning styles, interests and strengths. In many of our public schools the staff are overworked with too many students in a classroom and to little funding to do anything about it.
Many students are able to overcome this, but others need more individual attention and when it is not provided they dropout. Public schools are at a disadvantage more due to funding levels and the many social requirements that our society has placed upon them.
Money will not cure all of public education’s ills, but it would solve many things that are problems today.
there is still individual choice and society can make everything available, but many are not ready to take the hand that is offered (if ever). So there is a great deal of individual choice in education, especially once you get to the high school years.
Public education has to be ready for those former students when they are ready to be educated. Adult education is a necessary adjunct to public education policy which has been neglected severely.
Gotta go, this could get into a very long winded soapbox
Harold
Interesting. So the purpose of public education is to raise informed citizens to make educated decisions as voters. I’ve never looked at it that way, but it does make sense for a government “for the people and by the people”. That’s assuming, of course, that propaganda is absent from the education process because it only attempts to educate students to think like those who placed it there, rather than in a truly intelligent and discerning manner. Of course, that leads to the question of what exactly is propaganda?
@Robin- Others may disagree with you but Washington did not. This is also from his farewell address:
“Let it simply be asked: Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice ? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.
Washington clearly felt, as do you, that for a free society to prosper it must also be a moral society. But some would say oh, those are just quaint, out of date ideas. To them he cautions, “resist with care the spirit of innovation upon its [founding] principles” Two hundred years later, how much have we innovated upon the founding principles?
@Karyn You raise a very valid point. Whoever controls education, in theory, controls the hearts and minds of the people.
In response to your note to Karyn, Bill, when this crazy country began it was understood among its peoples that God was the ultimate authority. He controlled the hearts and minds of people and guided their actions. If all people subscribed to that worldview then there was always a fair and just standard, lacking propaganda.
This reminds me of the maxim attributed to the Jesuits, “Give me a child until he is seven, and I will give you the man.” Of course, children are almost that old before compulsory education gets a hold of them.
It is important to remember that when Washington spoke, the enfranchised population was a much smaller subset than it is today. Arguably that makes this more important than it was even when the Kansas document your cite was written.
As Randy points out, one might be able to achieve some sort of universal education w/o the government. The question would be, what would the education of the poorest children look like if there was no government funding? I would ask Randy, “In an educational system free of the government, what incentive does the market have to expend resources for the education of those unable to pay for it?”
This takes one to the question, “To what extent did the founders wish to ‘level the field’ so that one’s opportunity was not dictated by inherited wealth or status?” The ban on titles of nobility suggests there was at least some thought in this direction.
I can’t see how a fully market driven system wouldn’t place the poor at a tremendous educational disadvantage. Of course money isn’t everything, but it does matter.
@Jason Just an observation; it seems to me that the poor are at a tremendous educational disadvantage in many cases already, although there are certainly exceptions.
@Robin comes right out and says what we as a culture are afraid to admit. If we in general had a more selfless spirit, schools could be more successful under the current public system, or under @Randy’s proposed free-market system as well. And education reformers like Michelle Rhee could be out of a job. “She is angry at a system of education that puts “the interests of adults” over the “interests of children,” i.e., a system that values job protection for teachers over their effectiveness in the classroom.”
Bill, I have been thinking about this thread all morning and what comes to mind is stories of teachers in low-income, dangerous neighborhoods. The worst of the worst living conditions with little hope of success at any level. There are teachers who have made it their life’s work to help kids achieve amazing things – whole classrooms full of them – even when the school has no money and they have to contend daily with drugs, guns, gangs, AWOL parents, and bad attitudes. Their job is their mission field and they pour themselves into it in order that kids’ lives might be changed.
I don’t believe more money is needed, just more passion and perserverance.
@Robin with all due respects, I vehemently disagree!
When teachers are using teaching materials from the 70’s and 80’s, buying stuff with their own money (and receiving tax breaks to do it – in acknowledgement that schools don’t have enough money), and other material things that schools require to function. How many times do teachers “find” new clothes for their students, how many times do teachers buy the room supplies that should come from the school budget.
Not to mention the money to keep good teachers (I say get rid of the bad!) that your comment regarding that more money is not need, just passion and perseverance is not the present reality of what the schools actually need. I don’t mean to simply throw money at the problem, but a lack of money in many urban and rural public schools is the problem and is a lot of the solution.
There is plenty of passion and perseverance in most teaching lounges (where they still have them) and classrooms, but not enough solid support by by the community, local/state/federal governments. NCLB was an unfunded or underfunded mandate…to states and local governments which has shown no real improvement in the education system in its 8 years.
I understand that many will disagree with my observations and experience and I am not going to write a long soapbox regarding this issue but…I know what I have seen and public education can and does succeed.
Talk to Chris Lehman, Richard Byrne, and many other dedicated and passionate public school teachers/leaders.
If people disagree with my observations and experience, if you are not a teacher and if you are qualified in your area, please volunteer to substitute teach at your local school for at least 5 days, volunteer to teach at the elementary, middle and high school levels. Then we can discuss your experiences and observations during that time. In fact Blog about your experience as a substitute teacher, I would be interested in reading it.
Until then more passion and perserverance are not enough to help public schools prepare our students for citizenship in this country.
Harold Shaw
Harold, so sorry to offend you. I suppose I need to clarify that money is needed, of course. Maybe, what I need to say is that I believe we need a more efficient use of the funds we already have?
I have never been a public school teacher or sub and so maybe I painted with too broad a brush. I certainly did not mean to suggest there is no passion or perserverance at all in the teacher workforce. I will stick to my guns, though, that a lot of federal money goes in to making schools work and we have a very low grade, as far as our students go, when compared with the rest of the world. So, where is the disconnect? What can we do to improve our schools?
When I think about all of the brilliant people in our history here in the US and worldwide who never received a public education I wonder what are we missing?
I have homeschooled my children for 9 years, we pay high taxes for school even though we don’t use them and we certainly don’t spend $8000+ (or whatever the current rate is, that’s an old #) for each of them a year to be educated. They all test well above average.
I just think we could do a better job, that’s all. And, that is not necessarily all on the teacher level. I think our teacher’s hands are tied, in many ways by over-administration. The point I made about passionate teachers shows that some overcome the obstacles they face and get the job done anyways.
ok, I wrote this with many distractions while grilling chicken so please don’t think I’m ignorant or flippant if I left something out- just a multi-tasking mom!
I don’t disagree with you, Bill. However, I think there are a couple of questions that society has to answer before we can really move forward.
1. To what extent ought society and/or government try to mitigate the educational disadvantage of those who because of environment are educationally disadvantaged?
2. Why, in a market economy, where other needs are met by the pursuit of rational self-interest, do we expect our educators to be selfless? I think it’s great that so many are, but we by and large don’t expect our lawyers or mechanics to behave selflessly in order for those sectors to function.
Sorry to interject with ya’ll chat chat but I really think it is a mixture of things… the school itself, the student, peers, teachers, parents, …………., …………………………., and much more. For an true education to take place. is learning and keeping what you learned and then apply it to the “real world”.
MY theory is to have half/half home school and public. and have more life skills in school. But do I know I am just losing my college-out image. When they say it takes a village to raise a child, they mean it! A + B + C + D + … Z= Child…. What Letter are you?
I’ve been hesitant to add more to this conversation because I am not an educator, and even more so, we have not used the public schools to educate our children…not because we weren’t happy with what they had to offer, but because we wanted something that they don’t offer — an education with a biblical worldview.
In Texas, we are digging out from years of the “Robin Hood” plan where wealthier districts have subsidized less-wealthy districts (by paying property taxes at the maximum amount allowed by Texas law…and let me tell you, it is high). Mix in illegal immigration, and you have a stew of complaints as funds are being sent to areas with high illegals.
If public education is a civic duty, should the illegals receive it? Will they be able to vote? According to Bill’s original post, the purpose is to educate the future voters (who will hold the direction of the country in their hands).
Personally, I see public education not so much as a civic duty but a moral one. While I don’t like high taxes (and will probably move from this county when we sell our current home) I do believe those with more should help those with less. Much of the help we as a society do is under duress (taxes). For the last several years, my children and I have spent a week in the summers tutoring kids in a very poor area of Dallas. It has been an eye-opening experience. I know this is trite but a mind truly is a terrible thing to waste!
I have the utmost regard for teachers. You truly do hold the future of America in your hands.
@jason – I don’t think teachers should be selfless martyrs. Funny you should mention mechanics and lawyers though. Many people would hold that those two groups could stand to improve in the selfishness category.
@karyn – I’m glad you chimed in, teacher or no. The original post is a quote and not my personal view. It does have an interesting ring to it though. I’m still sorting through points of view on this issue, thanks for adding yours.
I find it interesting that you (we) are engaging in the very process the Kansas excerpt implies should happen in our form of government…….something is working. Perfect? No. But had former systems been efficient/effective ours would not exist. I believe there are many reasons why Public Education isn’t meeting our expectations……..and there are many reasons why it is. A switch to a free market system will bring advantages but will also reveal its own set of concerns. It seems to me to be a philosophical argument which will be played out through our democratic process. A process where the people always have an opportunity to reflect on their knowledge, engage in the dialogue, and speak with their vote.
Sam, I agree with you and, of course, the process works best when the people who exercise their right to vote have full knowledge of what they are voting for.
From the same book:
“The Caucasian race develops and renders prosperous any country it inhabits. The wonderful progress of the United States is due mainly to the fact that it is peopled by this race, with all it good qualities stimulated by natural conditions superior to those existing in Europe. The power of this race is based upon its intellectual superiority.” (p. 113)
Education has always and ever been a system used by the bourgeoisie to silence the dissent voice from “ignorant citizens that may so far outnumber wise men” i.e. the voice from Native Americans, Black people, communists, homosexuals, and the likes. Why else would it be possible that a moron like Bush survived Yale and became president? Well, this is exactly what Yale is made for. So, when reading things like the above, always remember who decides what characteristics make someone “wise” or “ignorant.” A people knowing this is key to real democracy and freedom. And this is what education should be all about.
[...] 8th grade education themselves. Yet somehow the children learned. In fact, when I look through the 1897 Geography book I have, I am amazed at the complexity of information presented in [...]