Sally Thomas is currently sitting in for the Anchoress:
One night over dinner with her twenty-six new best friends, the talk turned to the subject of what everyone wanted to be when he or she grew up. The girls, one by one, announced that they wanted to be lawyers. One girl said she wanted to go into politics, maybe. A few other girls thought they’d like to do some corporate kind of job.
At last my daughter’s turn came. “Well,” she said, “I want to be a mom.”
There was a silence. Finally someone asked, “Then why are you here?”
“Because I think the basic unit of society ought to be educated,” my daughter said.
It is obvious what has been gained through our current system of education even when peering through the mist of current awful education related issues. But what of what has been lost?
With the advent of government education a massive shift of control over history (an agreed upon lie) and choice of pertinent knowledge to be taught fell to government. This was a massive abdication of power on the part of the individual in this nation that has been obscured by a form of generational delay - the impact of what is being taught today is not truly understood for twenty years or more.
We the people no longer "write" our own history through choosing the knowledge we most value as we once did when education flowed from family. Instead, our government "writes" our history with that power of choice and by extension imparts influence on our social values, values that should be under the sole purview of family.
What of homogeneity of thought? It seems to me that at a time when diversity is coveted more than ever by our educators there has been a frightening rise in the homogeneity of thought. Although mass produced education has as an inherent flaw, uniformity, when applied to humanity, there is a more subtle issue of the biases of the educators that often results in the wholesale rejection of unpalatable thought. Global Warming Theology is a perfect example of group think that does not even allow for contrary thought. Not only have testbeds of original thought been eliminated, but like minded thinkers within education actively reject unacceptable thinking, often going so far as to labeling what they view as objectionable as offensive.
The biggest loss, though, has been the marginalization of family. The assumption of failure in response to learning that someone desires to be a homemaker exemplifies the saddest result of mass produced education. The fact that one mom can, in the face of all contrary social pressure, guide her daughter to believe with conviction that educating family is worthy of an education is a stunning success.
out
Thanks for the links and the kind words. As to the mom's success, I think it can be summed up in one word: grace.
ReplyDelete(and the kid is pretty darn great, I have to admit. I'm sort of pre-missing her already.)