On The Purpose of Education

As has been repeatedly argued here, the knowledge that got into schools in the past and gets into schools now is not random. It is selected and organized around sets of principles and values that come from somewhere, that represent particular views of normality and deviance, of good and bad, and of what “good people act like.”

                                                                       --Apple, pp 60-61

Similar to the adage that the winners of wars write the history, Apple has concisely summed up the same thought in his quote above regarding our educational system today. Apple goes on to explain that the historical implications of social change (i.e. agrarian to industrial) played a crucial role in the formation and thoughts of our early curricularists and that those influences, whether right or wrong, still persist today despite a changing society. As we enter into the millennial age, it will be interesting to observe the major influences in our education systems to see where the “pushes” come from and to test the theories and ideologies of Michael Apple regarding social control.

I think it is also important to further distinguish the levels of education and determine the appropriateness of and level of social control in effect. For example, I would consider the level and degree of social control Apple references as inappropriate at the elementary level. However, at the post secondary level, perhaps social control by industry is not such a harmful thing. Consider the advent of Corporate Campuses. While obviously controlled by industry with a very select and biased perspective, it also serves to prepare those students interested in that industry in ways that a liberal arts degree could not. Is it then wrong to say that a corporate sponsored university that enforces specific social control is inappropriate? I would think not.

So then, the question that arises as important is how we define the purpose of each level of our education. We have clearly identified standards that each grade level should achieve, but standards do little to define purpose; and without purpose, the process of achievement looses meaning. Perhaps this is one reason so many students in our educational system get lost along the way and “drop out”: they do not have a clear understanding of their purpose in school.

In juxtaposition, I consider a national educational model such as Japan’s where students have a very clear and well communicated purpose: to take and pass college entrance exams. Whether the purpose is right or wrong is not of importance here; what is important is that each student knows exactly why they are in school and share in a common goal of achievement. Peer pressure also suddenly becomes leverage for students to achieve (sometimes in detrimental ways) the same purpose as their peers. Again, while I think there are disadvantages to the educational system Japan employees, it is hard to ignore the data: “91% of the relevant age cohort now graduates from upper secondary education” (https://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/41/12/35341224.pdf). 

Purpose obviously serves a purpose.