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from Natural Life magazine,
November/December 2008
A Teacher Questions Compulsory Schooling
by Jim Strickland
You can
barely open a newspaper these days without being inundated with cries for
various reforms and innovations aimed at curing what ails our public education
system. There are obviously many passionately committed souls out there who care
deeply about children and who are willing to do whatever it takes to provide the
nurture and support they need to grow up into good human beings and lifelong
learners.
But what is
it that actually “ails” public education, and what is it that children really
need from us? In all the discussions about vouchers, charter schools and higher
standards, I never hear anything about what I have come to believe is the one
proposal that would do the most to improve the quality, integrity, effectiveness
and democratic character of our current system.
Can one
change really make that much of a difference? In the book The Predictable Failure of Educational Reform: Can We Change Course Before It's Too Late
, psychologist and educator Seymour Sarason
invites readers to imagine a situation where we are empowered to initiate one
change, and only one, in a school system. The only restriction is that the
change cannot cost discernibly more money than is now available. “On what basis
should your decision rest? Obviously, you will seek that change which, if
appropriately implemented, (quite an assumption!) will have over time desirable
percolating effects on other problems in other parts of the system. The
important point is that you do not choose a change because it addresses an
important problem – of which there are many – but because what you seek to
change is so embedded in a system of interacting parts that if it is changed,
then changes elsewhere are likely to occur.”
The proposal
I am making is one that meets Sarason’s criteria of having a long-term and
far-reaching percolating effect at no additional cost. Imagine what would happen
if our current compulsory school attendance laws were simply rescinded? This
legal change would ...
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which includes access to this and other back issues.
Jim Strickland is a community-based educator in Marysville, Washington. He says
that if he could focus all of his energy on one issue that he believes would
have the greatest long-term impact on moving our world in the right direction,
it would be to abolish compulsory schooling. He invites response from readers
who are interested in raising public awareness and inviting political action. He
can be reached by email at livedemocracy@hotmail.com.
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