Public schools are essential to make the American dream work, but schools are also the arena in which many Americans first fail
I like the word use of Arena. It portraits schools as where competition happens rather than actual learning. We left out the function and objective of selection in our discussion of the purpose of schools.
The paradox stems from the fact that the success of one generation depends at least partly on the success of their parents or guardians
This is a great analysis of educational inequality. When people refuse to give up the resources, as they should be logically, it would never be true equality for children. Since the children grow up, the environments they are exposed largely decided whether some of their talents could be discovered or receive positive feedback from them. For example, a genius pianist would never redeem their talent if growing up in a household that is not able to afford a piano class, let alone a piano in their houses.
also to make them good citizens who will maintain the nation's values and• in-stitutions, help them flouri~h, and pass them on to the next generation. 1'he American public widely endorses both of these broad goals, values public ed-ucation, and supports it with an extraordinary level of resources.
This reminds me of the debate of what schools are for. To a traditional understanding of education, schools are places where learning happens. However, what exactly are the students learning? They are growing on themselves physically and intellectually. They are not only learning about maths and history, but also morality and how to interact with one another. Is the question of primary goal a valuable question when all the qualities are developed simultaneously?
We have a great national opportunity-to ensure that every child, in every school, is challenged by high standards, ... to build a culture of achievement that matches the optimism and aspirations of our country.
I am not sure whether this would work well. High standards is a vague term, it could mean critical thinking, high test scores or even being obedient to accomplish difficult tasks. The culture of achievement is even less preferable. Meritocracy has never been a successful approach towards education.
All things considered, it appears that schooling and educationclearly have had a substantial impact on society, even as they havebeen shaped by urbanization, political conflict, and other societalchanges.
I would love for all schools to be charter schools as they seem more independent from the the impact of geopolitics and other forced changes. It would also give the freedom for the school to choose what they want to accomplish. No one need to change anything but they would rather simply need to choose the right one.
Some would say that it became amechanism for assigning people to different positions in the socialorder, a large-scale sorting machine (Spring, 1976). In the words ofone observer, the schools helped to produce inequality (Kaye, 1973)
I do not think it is fair to judge schools solely as a means towards inequality and maintaining the social status people have now. Without education, there would certainly be no social fluidity, without public education to be precise. We have observed schools producing inequality, but there are more instances where the absence of education created the problem in the first place.
Schools have become an integral element of American culture.
It is quite true. I can say for certain, nearly, that the similar imagery would appear in people's mind if they all went to a high school in the US. However, there will also be subtle differences. I believe that schools not only resemble culture of a collective entity, but also the culture of the local community.
Truly revolutionary changeoccurred in the more distant past (Aghion & Williamson, 1998). Andit was those earlier developments that set the stage for today. One ofthe values in history, consequently, is to appreciate the origins of ourown time, and the challenges faced by those who came before us
I agree with this point and yet I think we need to be cautious about this It is true that the foundations of our society was established long ago and we need to reference them for our modern day world. However, they might also have been established falsely through the liitations they had at their time.
educational reform potent enough to affect sweeping change? Oris its impact more limited, destined to ultimate disappointment?
I think the answer to this question largely depends on the definition of remedying social problems. The education of engineers would build better houses and that is an aspect of social problems to think about. In this sense, education is powerful. In the other sense of perception of people and nurturing good citizens, education might not be as powerful as people have different ideas regarding the very question of what is a social problem that needs to be solved, let alone the arguments regarding solutions.
The only practicable method to reform mankind is to begin with children, to banish, if possible, from their company every low-bred, drunken, immoral character.
This sounds like an allusion to what what Webster thought human nature appear to be. It is quite impactful to how a person approach education and practices. For people like Webster, they would attempt to correct the characters instead of promoting them.
A foreign education is the very source of this evil; it gives young gentlemen of fortune a relish for manners and amusements which are not suited to this country, which, however, when introduced by this class of people will always become fashionable.
Would the rejection of foreign education both stop domestic students from getting their chances in other countries and also stop foreign students from learning in the US according to this logic? It is interesting to see a blame on a scarecrow of "foreignness" instead of asking the true question why we need to corporate ideas from other people.
A fondness for the company and conversation of ladies of character may be considered as a young man's best security against the attractives of a dissipated life.
This is a very interesting way to argue for the right of education for women. However, this is strongly patriarchal. It might have been novel at the time when this piece was written to argue for such a bold idea that women should receive education, but the entire argument stands on the basis that women are a tool of men.
But a low-bred clown or morose tyrant can command neither love nor respect, and that pupil who has no motive for application to books but the fear of a rod will not make a scholar.
I am quite surprised to see emphasize on motivation this early. In the vision of schools in the late 18th and early 19th century, people are already pointing towards the fact that the students need to be interested in the material to gain knowledge and go far in the field they so choose to pursue.
The first error that I would mention is a too general attention to the dead languages, with a neglect of our own.
This is a very interesting idea to bring up. Whether or not a language is dead is quite debatable. It would largely depend on what the policy makers or schools. For example, there are voices from other countries that English is not necessary anymore so should not be taught in school. This might sound absurd but the same could happen if we keep this mindset of seeing teaching "dead" languages a mistake.