As another poster has mentioned, schools have taken on an information-center role where PSAs find a captive audience and classroom teachers attempt to fill the roles of educator, nurse, career counsellor, etc. all simultaneously. A book I’m eager to read is The Gospel According to Starbucks, which apparently gives a model for the modern church based on the role Starbucks has taken (not simply a vendor of beverages, Starbucks sells an experience). I wonder if a rethinking of education along the same lines wouldn’t be in order. Sometimes I think a Montessori-style pod learning model would fit better with the learning style of today’s kids, but because it’s interdisciplinary, it would be particularly difficult to achieve at the high school level at which I teach.

All this to say that I think it’s valid and valuable that schools (and churches) seek new models to deliver their same core product, which hasn’t really changed.

That’s a great point I hadn’t thought of. The role of religion changing to address all kinds of issues that really it was never intended? Considering that things like mixing religion and politics usually ends up badly makes me wonder about how school’s role as places of learning now includes so many other things which have little to do with learning and in turn frustrates and gets its way. Hmmm… thinking about a whole new post.

Much like the medieval church that grew beyond its spiritual boundaries to take on more political and commercial activities, our public schools are lost in myriad of programs imposed by our government to indoctrinate to certain ideas: smoking (don’t do it), drinking (don’t do it), sex (do it with proper protection) there is no real opportunity for kids to learn in these situations and it cuts into the teachers’ opportunity to guide personal learning in the classroom.

Likewise we have schools of education that are functioning much like the seminaries that produce priests, preachers, rabbis, and mullahs for religion. Newly minted teachers exit these schools with their heads filled with the latest orthodoxy for teaching, and woe be the parent who questions that orthodoxy. So what’s the answer? I don’t know. I’ve heard calls to shut down the schools of education, bring in individuals knowledgeable in their fields. I certainly believe that NCLB is a double-edged sword, but as long as we have school boards adopting requirements that graduating seniors have been accepted to a college as a requirement to get their diploma then we need to make sure they are capable of functioning in the college environment.

My head is already spinning and I feel like a medieval monk debating how many angels can dance on the head of a pin…opps, there’s that analogy again.

You are a shining example of one who never liked school, but loved learning. Thanks for the comment.

Losing your religion is not such a bad thing.

“Whom the Son sets free is free indeed.”

I left school (retired in ‘ 03), but I still find ways to work with students.

I remember what I used to teach…”freedom within structure”.

I drew a box on the board with a whole lot of squiggly lines inside it.

Like the structure was important, but let’s have some freedom for learning within that structure.

Sad thing is my experience was the structure snuffed out a whole lot of freedom for the students and for me.

Maybe that’s why I avoid schools and embrace students.

Derek you present likely the most compelling reason for the existence of schools and in one sense ties in well with Barbara’s thoughts about the role of the church as a community.

I don’t think the church and schools are dying or dead but to me the point is to stop focusing on traditional structures that bind both of these valuable institutions.

Bruxy’s talk and his book try and help those who have become disillusioned with religion. To me this equates to students who have become disillusioned with school. I think the little graphic I copied points to those students who we know want to learn but school’s not working for them. In Derek’s examples, schools work for many more kids because it’s relevant and meaningful to their lives. Most people reading this blog already get this but to my it was a good comparison and helps me to remember to look past structure and tradition and focus on what school should be doing….helping kids learn.

I am not very religious but I see some things happening in the churches that I thought needed to be mentioned. I live in an urban area where the churches are the community for many in the black community. You won’t see that changing. They need their churches and I see how they bring people together, encourage them to help each other. In SF the Glide Memorial is a haven for the down and out. A good friend of mine’s church feeds the homeless, goes to Guatemala to build schools, and does one good thing after another.

I see some schools that are the community hubs for learning. They are open before and after school for tutoring, extended learning, and activities for the entire school community. I do agree that the structure of schools is antiquated and needs change. It just is going to take time and hope that school communities look at what is happening in their local area when they design the new learning environment.

Are schools closing? Are businesses leaving? What happens to your graduates? Is the graduation rate declining? Are people moving from your area? and so on… I just feel schools tend to work in isolation and need to include what is happening in the whole community.

While structure of some sort is essential, I believe that schools are unlikely to facilitate truly effective learning for the majority of enrolled students until there is profound and widespread structural change. Schools as credentialing factories, with an assembly-line approach, are doomed to fail the majority of “learners”. As I see it, there is hope, and incremental change is possible within the current structures, as the nature of the relationship between teacher and learner is redefined, and as the unique needs of each learner are better recognized.

thanks. O.D.

It really has much to do with perspective. There are days when it seems most schools are so far from where they need to be and then other times I get glimpses of hope. Obviously the time I spend in my online network reinforces the hope part but even in schools, the teachers who begin by “teaching kids” not teaching subject are closest to abandoning the structure of schooliness. Yet they often run into roadblocks as they try to break from the expectations of the hierarchies.

You’ve accurately identified many of the school design issues that cripple learning. But I wonder if Jesus even 2000 years later is happy with many of religious confines. Even though he spend time with prostitutes and others of lower societal standing, he was chastised for that and many religious leaders of our day might still take the same stance. That example doesn’t say much for the chance of schools to reform.

However, just as we’ve seen more diversity in religion and spirituality, I think we’ll continue to see this in education. Mine and I’m sure your exposure to a global network is already revealing such a variety in learning and schools. My guess this will continue to expand. We’ll see the “back to the basic” movement take root as well as the push to personal learning.

So you ask…Are schools dead? I think not, I hope not. I still believe in the transformative power of a group of people working together for a common goal and the role that school can play in that endeavor. I have just come to realize that I need to join a new ‘church’ and finding or creating a ‘new’ space for students has proven to be oh so challenging.