Democracy in Education Matters
A unified nation should not abuse one another in order to create a manufactured identity.
The ultimate goal of education should liberate people. Only then can we have true democracy. (Introduction)
“We need this insight.” Mike Kernell, Board Member, Shelby County Schools, Tennessee (Memphis)
This work came to fruition during my doctoral dissertation process. My initial inquiry when beginning my doctoral journey was to find out why the child was removed from education. Why do they not see the child? The reason this was important to me is personal. I began having challenges with the school system as a parent. This actually began even earlier than the school system, with the daycares my oldest child was enrolled in during the 1990’s. Much of the tactics used by said daycares were what I considered abuse. However, as the parent, they spoke down to me as if the reason they had to treat my child in such a manner was my fault. They would then point out that they had my child more than I did, so they knew my child better than I did. All this told me was that the behavior issues they were having had to be a direct result of their interactions with my child if they had my child more than I did. The constant attacks received as a parent did not stop when my child entered the public school system.?
As early as kindergarten, my child was being removed from the classroom and ostracized from the learning environment. Teachers were telling me to utilize punishment and reward systems. They were encouraging me to drug my child so he could comply with their limited restrictions. I had resisted the drugging aspect until he was in 3rd grade. The attacks on my child only continued to grow as he aged, even after he was drugged for the school system’s needs. So, I became a teacher in order to find out why. I’ve since completed a Masters in Education and Doctorate in Educational Leadership and Change (short of full completion of the dissertation. I ran out of funding). This work was a personal determination to finish my doctoral research and find the solutions I was desperately seeking for my son, who is now a young adult.?
It may be too late for my first-born child, but my second and third children were raised differently based upon the research I have done for this book. I can personally attest that absolutely none of the issues faced with my first child are present in my other two children and I firmly believe it has everything to do with what I have done in my research. I did expose these other two children to the public school system in short spurts and it did not take long before the attacks on my children began. My youngest was attacked within the first 2 weeks of kindergarten by the teacher. He hasn’t been in a public school since.?
My children do not demonstrate any of the behavioral issues that are so common in public schooled children. They are incredibly respectful, kind, considerate, responsible, eager to accomplish their goals, serious researchers, and what most people consider normal childhood behavior issues (or teen behavior issues) are absolutely non-existent with them. Having raised a child the traditional way and then having a second chance with children born 12-13 years after my first born and doing it very differently and carefully researched, I can say that it definitely is the belief system in the current educational system that is ruining our children. This includes parenting that is reinforced by schools and “parent” experts who support authoritarian derived parent-child domination.?
I did teach in the public school system for two decades, and I worked with thousands of children. That journey into teaching also showed me the way in which teachers spoke to children on a regular basis. I was also exposed to their negative and derogatory banter about children in their classrooms and in the teacher’s lounge. I am not saying there weren’t good teachers or good administrators, but the good ones were frequently attacked by other teachers and the administration as a whole. It is very difficult to be a teacher who cares for the emotional development of children in a public school system. I can’t speak for private schools, but I would assume it is quite similar since they all derive from the same educational belief system that began in the 1850’s.?
This research was derived from personal experience as a parent and as a teacher. My interest in brain development and psychology became paramount as it is very clear that our school systems do not take these aspects into consideration. They have been using the same behavioral conditioning models that were created at the turn of the 20th century. The only change that has occurred since that time is the increase of propaganda material to direct minds to focus on what those in power determined was important. Those who make these decisions were very frequently not experts in the field. They were those in a position of influence in their communities and had their own goals for schooled outcomes.?
Many could easily attest that the focus of the curriculum has left out many voices and it is frequently labeled as racist. I personally feel that all ethnicities were abolished in our curriculum and that the goal was to create a unified nation that would have the same beliefs. I can see how they thought this would be beneficial to prevent individual cultural groups from fighting one another.?
Working in a melting pot country like this creates challenges not present in one culture societies. Comparing the educational outcomes of a melting pot country with one that has an individual culture is highly unfair to the students. Erasing their identity is epigenetically traumatic and has clearly been unsuccessful. We only need to look around us to see the fallout from this decision. European Americans have little to no awareness of their own individual ancestral heritages and they treat European cultures as some kind of fantasy or something to mock. Many are attacked for attempting to maintain their cultural identities or their ancestry as it goes against the manufactured curriculum designed to align with a generic western European high ideal. Even within western Europe, this is not in alignment with who they are. It’s a manufactured identity with carefully sculpted stories that were designed to make the students believe certain things about “others” and to keep their eyes focused on how “others” are the enemy.?
Later education attempted more cultural inclusion, but really only treated it as some kind of fantasy observation. The mere treatment of ancestral cultural traditions as things of the past is actually quite peculiar since these very traditions are practiced in their native countries to this day. They were only erased in melting pot countries with the intention of moving society away from their identities and toward the direction of the purveyors of the education system’s goals.?
I’m not saying the issues with my children were in direct correlation with this particular aspect, but it is a huge aspect worthy of consideration. I know for myself, I know very little about my ancestral heritage. Same with my children. We are a mix of various European cultures, but we have no identity. We are a generic “White” group now. That feels entirely soulless to me, and it has spurned me to take my younger children around the world to be exposed to cultures in their native lands in order to see what normal cultural behavior looks like. I do believe this has had a significant impact on the way that my own children perceive others and themselves. They do not feel threatened by any other culture, and they try very hard to be respectful and considerate of their traditions, customs, and beliefs. We are able to discuss what we see and how the behaviors of those we come into contact with align with their beliefs, their cultural identity, and their current environment. This has also allowed us to review the behaviors witnessed in our own country of birth, the United States of America. After several years of traveling globally, we can honestly say that it is incredibly obvious to us the grand degree to which Americans are in pain due to the treatment of their individual cultural identities and the way in which they have been programmed by the education system. It has created a society that is eager to abuse and is incredibly selfish. To behave in a manner that honors others is to also find oneself attacked. This should be alarming to citizens. A unified nation should not abuse one another in order to create a manufactured identity.?
I think what should be more pressing at this juncture is the impact of that constant abuse on the psychological development of our youth and how that manifests in each generation. What kind of society are we actually creating with these efforts? It is far more than cultural identity lost. It is loss of personal healthy boundaries, respect of self and others, and the courage to take on great challenges without fear. We have crippled our society. The amount of money spent on our current education system has not produced a higher educated society either. Only those who had a vested interest in learning the material truly do learn. The rest learn how to manipulate the system and others in order to achieve undeserved gains. This has created a society of abusers and systems that ensure that the abuse cycle continues. Those who have grown up in it don’t even realize they are in it. That’s how abuse works. It becomes normalized.
I encourage you to read the breadth of this research to more deeply understand how we have come to this point in our democracy. The book can be found in its entirety here: