My wife and I are educators and organizers... and we are deaply commited to accessible and quality public education.
I know that in HS, I had a wonderful educational experience, since I was in all the "advanced" classes and was a great athlete and generally well liked by both teachers and peers.
However, the practice of public schooling, with its dominant authoritarianism (except for the most exceptional), its coersive pedagogy, and banking education, and focus on testing instead of learning to love learning, really puts me ill at ease with public schools. My wife is actually a "Field Instructor" that teaches teachers here at the University of Michigan. She gets to see first hand how teaching is done by teachers and principals and how teachers learn to teach. She does this in what is generally considered one of the best school districts in the entire United States.
It is terribly disheartening.
As a person who is committed to public schools, I am having a hard time holding on to that idealism in the face of the reality of the public schools.
I'm not sure what we will do. We will look into alternative school systems... but we can hardly afford that. We will look into home schooling too.
Either way, the public and institutional problems of education need to be solved with public schools in mind. While a private or home schooling might work for us in the short term, it certainly won't work for the whole of society in the long term.
Right now, we aren't sure what we will do.
Perhaps we'll start our own school with fellow teachers in SE Michigan. A vegan school that allows students to learn compassion, experience the world, and make meaning in their lives... and to love learning and to do the best that they can do. Anyone interested in enrolling their kids?
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