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Forbes.com recently developed a report on K-12 education as part of their “On Solutions” series. A wide variety of people, including myself, were asked to write a short opinion piece about things that might be done to fix the education system in America.
Although it seemed like a simple request, in the end, Forbes.com presented all of us with an incredible challenge. Education is a complicated subject, and trying to offer a constructive opinion – in 300 words or less – is difficult.
Young people are exposed to so many new situations, often navigating the world by themselves using new technology. More than ever, kids need a consistent internal set of values that will allow them to make principled decisions each day.
My contribution speaks to that issue. It is fascinating to read all of the responses Forbes.com received, from interesting people like Bill Gates, Chris Whittle, Margaret Spellings and Clayton Christensen, who raise many other issues that should concern us and solutions that put us on the path to implementing positive change.
http://www.forbes.com/2008/01/25/solutions-education-seidman-oped-cx_dor_0125seidman.html
http://www.forbes.com/2008/01/23/solutions-education-teaching-oped-cx_hpm_0123solutionsland.html
Last 5 posts by Dov Seidman
• The Certainty Gap - June 26th, 2008
• Of Doughnuts, Aristotle and Children... - May 28th, 2008
• Southwest Flies Into Crisis - April 3rd, 2008
• Even the Boss Has Stupid Rules - March 6th, 2008
• What's Next? - February 27th, 2008
2 Responses to “The State of K-12 Education”
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April 23rd, 2008 at 1:06 pm
“It takes a village to raise a child.” The truth of that tenet becomes clearer to me every day, as I raise my own.
Children are exposed to examples of bad behavior on a daily basis. They are bombarded with images of violence in music, on television and at the movies, and all too often, in real life. Many of them mimic what they see simply because they haven’t reached a level of maturity that allows them to truly discern what is right, what is wrong, and why.
The only chance children really have to develop the knowledge and the skills necessary to process and reject bad behavior is to have adults in their lives who not only teach them values such as gratitude, respect, compassion and community, but who actually live and breathe those values everyday. Of course, whether or not adults who embrace and embody these values are present in children’s lives is completely beyond their control. Children are, quite simply, stuck with the hand they are dealt.
For this reason, it is pivotally important that adults collectively acknowledge and embrace their responsibility to serve as positive role models to children everywhere, and to support them in dealing with and transcending all of the ugliness in the world, so that they, as the next generation, understand their obligation to leave this earth better than they found it, and are empowered to use their unique talents and gifts to do just that. Teaching values as part of an educational curriculum is vitally important, however we can’t stop there. Collectively, as adults, we must send our children to school already possessing the foundational character necessary to absorb and manifest the values taught, discussed and experimented with there. Even more importantly, we must pick up where schools leave off, and tirelessly yet lovingly reinforce to our children that they have an obligation to be the change they want to see.
The challenge to do this may seem daunting, and its purpose unattainable, but I truly believe it is the only chance we’ve got to create a better world and to consistently and honorably deliver it to future generations.
May 30th, 2008 at 11:43 am
This is EXACTLY why my wife and I have decided to homeschool our kids. We have two sets of boy-girl twins, ages 5 and 8.
Faith and values are two critical components of their education and when we planned to start our family, my wife and I agreed we would have them attend Catholic school at our parish. Of course, this was before we starting having them two at a time and were faced with the choice of either saving for college or putting them in private grade-school!
As the older two approached school age, we got more and more concerned about the ability of the local public school system to help cement the values we want our kids to learn and emulate. We ultimately decided that the best way for us was the homeschooling route - where we could provide them with a faith and values foundation, while at the same time tailoring their educational experience to each of their learning styles and paces.
The straw that broke the camel’s back was when our local school paper published the fact that they were doing away with halloween celebrations, as they wanted to be respectful of the faith beliefs of the wicken community (of course the year before they had done away with Christmas celebrations). Farther down the same page they touted the fact that they were lowering the age at which they would begin demonstrating condom use in health class to the 6th grade level.
This is not a slap at public schools. My wife and I struggled mightily over this decision and still feel somewhat selfish at not choosing to fight/improve the system. At the end of the day, we simply were unwilling to pur our kids’ values at risk, given the likelihood of being able to influence the direction in which the local schools had clearly chosen to go.
I offer this as a recommended solution for others struggling with the same issues to investigate.