Radical Change

Though getting at an extremely important subject–education justice–Gatto in Against School ultimately misses the mark with the overarching issue and its subsequent solution. Starting off with a relatable issue in many classrooms, the feeling of boredom, Gatto uses the backdrop of his thirty years in the public school system to segue into a conversation about the true purpose of education or rather the lack thereof. Gatto paints a picture strikingly similar to Lois Lowry’s The Giver where students are heavily patrolled, analyzed and eventually funneled into a system that teaches them conformity rather than dissidence. Alexander Inglis, author of Principles of Secondary Education, details six functions of the education system: the adjustice or adapative function, the integrating function, the diagnostic and directive function, the differentiating function and the selective function. I can see some truths to each of these potential functions (some more than others) but the following parts of Gatto’s article is where I feel he lacked to really seek revolutionary, radical change. The solution to America’s education problem is not to abandon education entirely nor is it only to “teacher your own to be leaders and adventurers”, it is a drastic and systematic change to the current state of public education. For one, we have to talk critically about The Common Core, a national education system that sets out specific guidelines/benchmarks for school systems to attain in mathematics, the sciences, and literacy. This strategic form of education manipulatively sets itself off as an equalizing factor for all states, but actually it just forces the education system to focus more on standardized testing and test preparation than an actual intellectual experience–hence what Gatto is pointing at. In this process, those who are unable to afford test preparation get left behind. In addition, public schools are highly underfunded and under resourced which becomes a breeding ground for students who will be systematically ignored and stigmatized. But the answer to the lack of opportunities in the public schools is not privatization. Students should be able to acquire an all-encompassing education that sets them up for intellectual success without parents having to dish out $50,000 every year. These elitist institutions will bring in students of color and students from low-income backgrounds in hopes of creating more “equal opportunities” and “diversifying” the school but failing to provide spaces in which these students can succeed both academically and emotionally. All in all, Gatto understands the importance of rewiring our education system but this can not just happen on an individual level as he seems to insist, this radical transformation must occur on a wide-scale level in which the future of our students as self-governing, highly-motivated individuals will be placed at the forefront of the movement.

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