Thursday, December 09, 2010

True Education Reform: Get rid of the schools.

High School is obsolete

Very interesting article, but it fails in the same way today's schools fail; it forces all children into the same mold and requirements for education. Just as today's system works for a few, his proposed system would work for a few (though, I would expect more than today's system).

This is what we need to do:

  • Remove all compulsory attendance laws. No parent will ever be required to send their child to any school at any time. This puts education totally in control of the ones who know the child best, the parents. It will no longer be anyone else's business.
  • Pass one simple law that states, "All parents and guardians must provide an education sufficient for their child to learn to read by the age of twenty." If you can read, you can learn anything you need to. Twenty is the age of accountability in the Bible. Anyone who violates this law will be severely punished (but not until their child is twenty because everyone learns at different paces and not everyone is ready to read at five-and-a-half!)
What would happen (after the initial chaos of adjustment) is a whole new system of education would emerge. It would consist of computer, Internet, correspondence, seminars, and a few traditional classes. There would probably be a number of educational options that we haven't even dreamed of yet because traditional (ancient-style) schooling gets in our way.

Most parents would probably use a combination of methods (a computer program for math, a tutor from England over the Internet for Writing, correspondence course for science, seminars for art and music, an Internet forum run by an Egyptologist for history, etc). Really, with the ability to talk live (chat rooms, etc) for free to anyone on the planet, it is ridiculous that we jail children in classrooms all day. Why not let them talk to the actual archaeologists, scientists, writers, etc that are running our world today? Why make them accept some little teacher who has never done anything in her life but go to school?

Of course there will be a few who fall through the cracks, but I would expect it to be far fewer than who fall today. Today, if you are not the kind of person who just like to sit and be bossed around, you will not achieve your potential.

It's time we come out of the method of education used in ancient history. It is time we allowed children to be free.

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