Education As A Civil & Human Right/Peace As A Civil & Human Right
Education As A Civil & Human Right/Peace As A Civil & Human Right
As we prepare for our trip to Israel mid April, I reflect on the purposes of education as stated by the noted late historian Lawrence Cremin: "By moving full force into public education, the...direct harnessing of education to social ends [is] an effort to solve social problems indirectly through education instead of directly through politics." As we know, a proper education can unleash human capital in ways which can transform the world. An educated mind is one whose choices reflect, like Santayana, that truth in its outlines, is as old as Aristotle, and that all we need to do "...today is to inform and vary the design with our transient needs." So for Plato, like Shakespeare, "...we borrow from every store, making these stolen good his own by transforming them with beauty." Our borrowing comes from the theories and practices such as Reuven Feuerstein whose life has been dedicated to thinking and mindfulness. Our leadership is gained through activists such as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. who recognized the power of [knowledge, advocacy and] nonviolence as a means to coerce social change. And our work is meant to bridge the gap between performance and potential.
Clearly those who read newspaper essays meant to engage readers in notions of possibilities, can step back objectively and recognize that reading between the lines is as important as the literal. For example, Jay Mathews below points to the strength of a particular brand of charter schools, while neglecting to mention that many charters are massively subsidized by corporate and community foundations. Is this a strategy aimed at meeting the needs of a broad-based urban population as suggested by Peter Martinez of Chicago-based MacArthur Foundation? Or is it as Bill Bennett, a strategy which "...seek not simply to reform but to redefine everything about contemporary education: public schools teachers, local control, students and curricula...Redefinition, in their formulation, [being] the prelude to
privatization."
But I write not to tilt at windmills, I write to reinforce a renewed call for balance and pragmatism. Seeking to learn from what works, and extending a balanced viewpoint which enables students to enter workplaces and communities with clearly defined democratic values and a clear vision for humanity. As Jefferson: "...an enlightened citizenry is indispensable to the proper functioning of a republic." As Mark Dowie has so importantly described:
"What educational philanthropists [may] have learned after a century of cautious grantmaking is that the Jeffersonian dream is a vision with many components. To be attained, every level of education, every class of student, and every school district in the country would have to be nurtured. We ignore one branch or level of education at the peril of the rest...and if money is showered upon schools and school districts without attending to the social systems in which they are embedded, how can educational reform succeed?" And extended, how can any country succeed if too many of its citizens are left behind?
Malcolm Gladwell writes recently of the Robert Merton's phenomenon the "Matthew Effect" after the New Testament verse in the Gospel of Matthew:
"It's the rich who get the biggest tax breaks. It's the best student who get the best teaching and most attention."
Is it no wonder a growing number of America's students "graduate" directly from school to prison, Dowie asks?
Is it not time for a broad-based strategy which recognizes the publics within schools and outside, the theories and practices which can enable going to scale through a comprehensive focus on education reform versus school by school commitments -- enabling a few while others wither? And is it not time to enlist the dormant advocacy and activism which enabled a world to transform itself through a unique moment of time: The American Civil Rights Movement? Jewish and black faith-based leaders joined by a broadly defined common experience, shaped by firm beliefs, hope, determination and confidence. Erecting a tent which enabled all religions, all races, all creeds to embrace as one. Building and reinforcing the leadership exemplars of Rabbi Marc Schneier and others who stand on "uncommon common ground," where one group is not pitted against another. Durant has written that apparently beauty is born in suffering, and wisdom is the child of grief. Each child has a narrative which has yet to be realized. Can't we as a nation, as a member of a global community, write them more promising life stories? If the American community and other nations develop the political will, the answer is yes.
Eric @
www.nuatc.org
As we prepare for our trip to Israel mid April, I reflect on the purposes of education as stated by the noted late historian Lawrence Cremin: "By moving full force into public education, the...direct harnessing of education to social ends [is] an effort to solve social problems indirectly through education instead of directly through politics." As we know, a proper education can unleash human capital in ways which can transform the world. An educated mind is one whose choices reflect, like Santayana, that truth in its outlines, is as old as Aristotle, and that all we need to do "...today is to inform and vary the design with our transient needs." So for Plato, like Shakespeare, "...we borrow from every store, making these stolen good his own by transforming them with beauty." Our borrowing comes from the theories and practices such as Reuven Feuerstein whose life has been dedicated to thinking and mindfulness. Our leadership is gained through activists such as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. who recognized the power of [knowledge, advocacy and] nonviolence as a means to coerce social change. And our work is meant to bridge the gap between performance and potential.
Clearly those who read newspaper essays meant to engage readers in notions of possibilities, can step back objectively and recognize that reading between the lines is as important as the literal. For example, Jay Mathews below points to the strength of a particular brand of charter schools, while neglecting to mention that many charters are massively subsidized by corporate and community foundations. Is this a strategy aimed at meeting the needs of a broad-based urban population as suggested by Peter Martinez of Chicago-based MacArthur Foundation? Or is it as Bill Bennett, a strategy which "...seek not simply to reform but to redefine everything about contemporary education: public schools teachers, local control, students and curricula...Redefinition, in their formulation, [being] the prelude to
privatization."
But I write not to tilt at windmills, I write to reinforce a renewed call for balance and pragmatism. Seeking to learn from what works, and extending a balanced viewpoint which enables students to enter workplaces and communities with clearly defined democratic values and a clear vision for humanity. As Jefferson: "...an enlightened citizenry is indispensable to the proper functioning of a republic." As Mark Dowie has so importantly described:
"What educational philanthropists [may] have learned after a century of cautious grantmaking is that the Jeffersonian dream is a vision with many components. To be attained, every level of education, every class of student, and every school district in the country would have to be nurtured. We ignore one branch or level of education at the peril of the rest...and if money is showered upon schools and school districts without attending to the social systems in which they are embedded, how can educational reform succeed?" And extended, how can any country succeed if too many of its citizens are left behind?
Malcolm Gladwell writes recently of the Robert Merton's phenomenon the "Matthew Effect" after the New Testament verse in the Gospel of Matthew:
"It's the rich who get the biggest tax breaks. It's the best student who get the best teaching and most attention."
Is it no wonder a growing number of America's students "graduate" directly from school to prison, Dowie asks?
Is it not time for a broad-based strategy which recognizes the publics within schools and outside, the theories and practices which can enable going to scale through a comprehensive focus on education reform versus school by school commitments -- enabling a few while others wither? And is it not time to enlist the dormant advocacy and activism which enabled a world to transform itself through a unique moment of time: The American Civil Rights Movement? Jewish and black faith-based leaders joined by a broadly defined common experience, shaped by firm beliefs, hope, determination and confidence. Erecting a tent which enabled all religions, all races, all creeds to embrace as one. Building and reinforcing the leadership exemplars of Rabbi Marc Schneier and others who stand on "uncommon common ground," where one group is not pitted against another. Durant has written that apparently beauty is born in suffering, and wisdom is the child of grief. Each child has a narrative which has yet to be realized. Can't we as a nation, as a member of a global community, write them more promising life stories? If the American community and other nations develop the political will, the answer is yes.
Eric @
www.nuatc.org
posted by Eric J. Cooper at 6:23 AM
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