Anarchy 103/Education: an immodest proposal - Revision history

imported>Ivanhoe at 19:04, 24 September 2016

2016-09-24T19:04:13Z

69.50.181.155 at 03:32, 24 September 2016

2016-09-24T03:32:29Z

69.50.181.155 at 03:14, 24 September 2016

2016-09-24T03:14:06Z

Show changes

69.50.181.155 at 06:57, 11 September 2016

2016-09-11T06:57:07Z

69.50.181.155 at 06:54, 11 September 2016

2016-09-11T06:54:33Z

69.50.181.155 at 05:45, 11 September 2016

2016-09-11T05:45:28Z

imported>Ivanhoe at 21:51, 7 September 2016

2016-09-07T21:51:51Z

imported>Ivanhoe at 01:32, 22 August 2016

2016-08-22T01:32:22Z

imported>Ivanhoe at 22:32, 4 April 2016

2016-04-04T22:32:04Z

imported>Ivanhoe at 21:32, 22 March 2016

2016-03-22T21:32:23Z

@@ Line 34: / Line 34: @@
 {{tab}}If education is primarily seen as a means to some utilitarian end: {{p|265}}the plant installed to manufacture suitable components for an all-<wbr>demanding technological society, compulsion is obviously as desirable as it was in the days when our industrial and imperial status called for a constant supply of literate and semi-<wbr>literate recruits. Those were also the days when young children represented a source of unskilled labour. What the economy approved for reasons of its own (increasing industrial sophistication exacting some degree of literacy), reformers demanded in order to save from ignorance and exploitation the helpless children of the poor.
-{{tab}}Economic requirements have nothing to do with the rights of children. But the concern which inspired Victorian philanthropists is still at the back of all our minds as the justification not only for retaining but for increasing compulsory school attendance today. Reforms of one age have a trick of turning if not into abuses at least into stumbling blocks for later generations, however, Perhaps our inherited approval of enforced education is as old-<wbr>fashioned now as is the progressive penal system of the nineteenth century.
+{{tab}}Economic requirements have nothing to do with the rights of children. But the concern which inspired {{popup|Victorian|1837–1901}} philanthropists is still at the back of all our minds as the justification not only for retaining but for increasing compulsory school attendance today. Reforms of one age have a trick of turning if not into abuses at least into stumbling blocks for later generations, however. Perhaps our inherited approval of enforced education is as old-<wbr>fashioned now as is the progressive penal system of the nineteenth century.
 {{tab}}With regard to primary schools at any rate this is certainly so. Children from five to twelve years old cannot be employed as labourers any longer nor have they any built-<wbr>in resistance to school as such. Babies spend all their spare time learning, so do little children whose play is education. And now that primary schools are being adapted to their pupils instead of the other way round and turning into places enjoyable to learn in, there is really no valid argument for enforced attendance. All young children are so naturally curious and gregarious that they cannot easily be kept from school except by extreme social handicaps such as suffered by {{l|Gypsies|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romani_people}} and for which the remedy lies elsewhere.
@@ Line 42: / Line 42: @@
 {{tab}}What is the alternative? Fears of juvenile unemployment and delinquency are not unreasonable seeing how wasteful and destructive adolescents can be in their spare time. But these children only exhibit the symptoms of an uneducated, uninterested society; if they are freed from the compulsory work which often fails to engage their attention or respect and so becomes enforced idleness of a demoralising sort; if education is freed from the straitjacket of compulsory attendance and the present examination system, the symptoms may diminish not in&shy;crease. Long-<wbr>term idleness is not a natural way of life except for a few {{p|266}}dedicated characters who would pursue it anyway. The majority of children badly want occupation of a constructive sort, their destructive&shy;ness is a protest against what they feel to be an irrelevant, uncaring environment which they are powerless to effect.
-{{tab}}Until the 19th century most adolescents were treated as adults. Nowadays many in the same age-<wbr>groups, maturing even sooner, we are told, want to be done with school and to try grown-<wbr>up life, assume responsibility, earn money, be treated as equals in an adult world. On the other hand it is common for fully grown men and women who have had their quota of education to feel cheated of it still. In a recent report on {{l|Glasgow|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glasgow}} gangs the only way out of the vicious circle of futility and violence (not poverty) suggested by one or two in the grown-<wbr>up members was to have had a better education. &ldquo;But it&rsquo;s too late now,&rdquo; they said. Secondary schooling is something that should be freely available at all times of life, is the natural conclusion if one views education as a process of individual growth, discovery and enrichment; a liberty to be enjoyed rather than a law to be obeyed. If these two concepts, voluntary and long term (or rather spread-<wbr>out) schooling are put to&shy;gether, they can be seen as two sides of a single workable solution. Fully supported secondary education could be made obtainable by means of a voucher system, a series perhaps of twelve monthly voucher forms automatically acquired at adolescence, and valid throughout life. Further vocational training could then be awarded with grants as it is now. After an interval of unskilled or apprentice work, restricted of course by protective legislation (which would benefit a number of secondary school children who work far too long hours at present), very many people would not only appreciate school more but be better equipped to profit by it. A probable loss in facility would be more than balanced by enthusiasm and experience of life. Single sex education, school uniform, compulsory religious instruction and corporal punish&shy;ment are questions which would solve themselves in this situation by vanishing; discipline becomes a matter for real self-<wbr>government in a voluntary school community. One envisages a state of affairs in which pupils and teachers could form a corporate and sometimes interchange&shy;able body and where school itself could be a real social centre.
+{{tab}}Until the 19th century most adolescents were treated as adults. Nowadays many in the same age-<wbr>groups, maturing even sooner, we are told, want to be done with school and to try grown-<wbr>up life, assume responsibility, earn money, be treated as equals in an adult world. On the other hand it is common for fully grown men and women who have had their quota of education to feel cheated of it still. In a recent report on {{l|Glasgow|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glasgow}} gangs the only way out of the vicious circle of futility and violence (not poverty) suggested by one or two of the grown-<wbr>up members was to have had a better education. &ldquo;But it&rsquo;s too late now,&rdquo; they said. Secondary schooling is something that should be freely available at all times of life, is the natural conclusion if one views education as a process of individual growth, discovery and enrichment; a liberty to be enjoyed rather than a law to be obeyed. If these two concepts, voluntary and long term (or rather spread-<wbr>out) schooling are put to&shy;gether, they can be seen as two sides of a single workable solution. Fully supported secondary education could be made obtainable by means of a voucher system, a series perhaps of twelve monthly voucher forms automatically acquired at adolescence, and valid throughout life. Further vocational training could then be awarded with grants as it is now. After an interval of unskilled or apprentice work, restricted of course by protective legislation (which would benefit a number of secondary school children who work far too long hours at present), very many people would not only appreciate school more but be better equipped to profit by it. A probable loss in facility would be more than balanced by enthusiasm and experience of life. Single sex education, school uniform, compulsory religious instruction and corporal punish&shy;ment are questions which would solve themselves in this situation by vanishing; discipline becomes a matter for real self-<wbr>government in a voluntary school community. One envisages a state of affairs in which pupils and teachers could form a corporate and sometimes interchange&shy;able body and where school itself could be a real social centre.
 {{tab}}The spectre of the eager child prevented from staying at school by his parents or by economic necessity does recur but even this situation becomes less acute than before if the assurance of further education is borne in mind. How to discover a child&rsquo;s genuine choice in the first place, how to safeguard his earnings while he works, how to arrive at a suitable financial allowance during school days, and what to do about students with children of their own, are all problems which need solving. If leisure becomes more general however, with the introduction of a four- or even three-<wbr>day week, one can see how practicable as well as how valuable spread-<wbr>out schooling could be.
@@ Line 54: / Line 54: @@
 {{tab}}But all this will be no good, the objection may still go, if the child chooses ''not'' to attend&mdash;puts off taking up his entitlement.
-{{tab}}At worst children making this deliberate choice would have gained something in terms of self-<wbr>respect. Their imaginations and intellects would not be damaged by enforced attention to what they see as dreary, {{p|268}}pointless tasks. Outside school it is true, the work opportunities for such a person are likely to be pretty dreary too but may well not be so demoralising, and the voucher scheme would mean that the opportunity to return to school would always be there. When this time came there is every chance that it would be with renewed interest.
+{{tab}}At worst children making this deliberate choice would have gained something in terms of self-<wbr>respect. Their imaginations and intellects would not be damaged by enforced attention to what they see as dreary, {{p|268}}pointless tasks. Outside school, it is true, the work opportunities for such a person are likely to be pretty dreary too but may well not be so demoralising, and the voucher scheme would mean that the opportunity to return to school would always be there. When this time came there is every chance that it would be with renewed interest.
-{{tab}}And if the entitlement were never taken up? Such cases would be rare, and certainly not significant for the well-<wbr>being of society. With schools competing with one another to make themselves attractive too students, with an unlimited breadth of courses available and with financial support for tue student appropriate to the needs of the equiv&shy;alent person out of school, most people would be eager to take advantage of the educational facilities to the full. Look at the flood of demand for adult education that exists now.
+{{tab}}And if the entitlement were never taken up? Such cases would be rare, and certainly not significant for the well-<wbr>being of society. With schools competing with one another to make themselves attractive to students, with an unlimited breadth of courses available and with financial support for the student appropriate to the needs of the equiv&shy;alent person out of school, most people would be eager to take advantage of the educational facilities to the full. Look at the flood of demand for adult education that exists now.
 {{tab}}And look once more at the dreary ranks of secondary school children who have opted out. Even the academically successful are often a poor advertisement for our present education system in terms of happiness, creativity, self-<wbr>fulfilment.
-{{tab}}It would seem that the violation of civil liberties represented by compulsory schooling is an inescapable issue in education today, from whichever standpoint one approaches it. One could go further an relate this problem to the central dilemma of our time. Now that the potential of human existence is so amazingly extended and so uniquely threatened, we all need educating first and foremost in the practice of freedom and the exercise of choice.</div>
+{{tab}}It would seem that the violation of civil liberties represented by compulsory schooling is an inescapable issue in education today, from whichever standpoint one approaches it. One could go further and relate this problem to the central dilemma of our time. Now that the potential of human existence is so amazingly extended and so uniquely threatened, we all need educating first and foremost in the practice of freedom and the exercise of choice.</div>
 -----

@@ Line 28: / Line 28: @@
 {{tab}}The child is born a &ldquo;free&rdquo; citizen, so he is told, lives in a &ldquo;free&rdquo; country where he is part of the &ldquo;free&rdquo; world. At the age of five he learns otherwise. He becomes subject to a state decree which funda&shy;mentally affects his daily life and his whole future and which is inescap&shy;able, even unchallengeable. This is, in effect, and perhaps is intended to be, a traumatic experience conditioning the person to the concept of obedience on which the authoritarian state system depends.
-{{tab}}Compulsory attendance at school also places the teachers in a difficult position and forces them into an authoritarian role. Because dissent cannot be expressed by withdrawal from the educational insti&shy;tution, it has either to be repressed or expressed as rebellion. Rebellion has to be ruthlessly crushed for the sake of the continuing operation of the establishment. It is more convenient if the pupils can be forced to submit to authority, and thus powers of coercion have to be assumed leading to a system of punishment sufficiently severe to generate mental and bodily fear in the intending dissenter. Small wonder that teachers are reluctant to give up the right to use corporal punishment as a &ldquo;last resort&rdquo;. The entire relationship between pupil and teacher is sound by the fact of compulsion and this is a handicap that few teachers have the power to overcome. Not only a child&rsquo;s civil liberties therefore but the whole quality of education is at stake.
+{{tab}}Compulsory attendance at school also places the teachers in a difficult position and forces them into an authoritarian role. Because dissent cannot be expressed by withdrawal from the educational insti&shy;tution, it has either to be repressed or expressed as rebellion. Rebellion has to be ruthlessly crushed for the sake of the continuing operation of the establishment. It is more convenient if the pupils can be forced to submit to authority, and thus powers of coercion have to be assumed leading to a system of punishment sufficiently severe to generate mental and bodily fear in the intending dissenter. Small wonder that teachers are reluctant to give up the right to use corporal punishment as a &ldquo;last resort&rdquo;. The entire relationship between pupil and teacher is soured by the fact of compulsion and this is a handicap that few teachers have the power to overcome. Not only a child&rsquo;s civil liberties therefore but the whole quality of education is at stake.
 {{tab}}Compulsory attendance became part of our school system at a time when our assumptions about the nature of children, our view of human rights and the needs of our society differed radically from those of today. Now that we are beginning to recognise a child&rsquo;s claim to full human dignity and moving towards the educational enfranchisement this view entails, it should be possible to re-<wbr>examine the social function of compulsory schooling and find out how essential we feel it to be.

@@ Line 11: / Line 11: @@
 <div style="max-width:500px; margin:auto;">
-<font size="5">'''Education: an immodest proposal &hellip;'''</font>
+<font size="5">'''Education:<br>an immodest proposal &hellip;'''</font>
 <font size="4">'''[[Author:Jane Kingshill|JANE KINGSHILL]]<br>AND<br>[[Author:Brian Richardson|BRIAN RICHARDSON]]'''</font>

@@ Line 71: / Line 71: @@
 {{DEFAULTSORT:Education : an immodest proposal}}
 [[Category:Children]]
 [[Category:Education]]

@@ Line 8: / Line 8: @@
   | notes      =
 }}
 <div style="max-width:500px; margin:auto;">
@@ Line 14: / Line 15: @@
 <font size="4">'''[[Author:Jane Kingshill|JANE KINGSHILL]]<br>AND<br>[[Author:Brian Richardson|BRIAN RICHARDSON]]'''</font>
 {{sc|In [[Anarchy 53|anarchy 53]]}} published in July 1965, [[Author:Colin Ward|Colin Ward]] made a modest (but consciously outrageous) [[Anarchy 53/A modest proposal for the repeal of the Education Act|proposal]] for the repeal of the {{l|Education Act|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_Act_1944}}. Since then the movement for change in our schools has grown much stronger. New primary schools are being built entirely differently from the ones we adults attended, with freely-planned internal spaces to suit informal group working, and the new methods, having been publicised on television, are discussed in millions of homes. {{l|Edward Blishen|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Blishen}} has edited a collection of children&rsquo;s essays ''The School that I&rsquo;d Like'', published by Penguin, that constitutes a passionate and sustained attack upon our present educational order. {{l|Michael Duane|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Duane}}&rsquo;s radical but short-lived regime at {{l|Risinghill|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risinghill_School}} has become widely known and discussed through the publication of [[Author:Leila Berg|Leila Berg]]&rsquo;s Penguin {{popup|book|Risinghill: Death of a Comprehensive School (1968)}}.
 And, of course, student unrest is spreading from the colleges to the schools, and the {{l|Free Schools|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_school_movement}} Campaign has got under way. Now, if not repeal, at least a new Education Act is being talked about, current ideas are being evaluated and new thinking sought after. It is an important moment for anarchists to develop and communicate their view of the educational scene.
@@ Line 58: / Line 60: @@
 And look once more at the dreary ranks of secondary school children who have opted out. Even the academically successful are often a poor advertisement for our present education system in terms of happiness, creativity, self-fulfilment.
-It would seem that the violation of civil liberties represented by compulsory schooling is an inescapable issue in education today, from whichever standpoint one approaches it. One could go further an relate this problem to the central dilemma of our time. Now that the potential of human existence is so amazingly extended and so uniquely threatened, we all need educating first and foremost in the practice of freedom and the exercise of choice.
+It would seem that the violation of civil liberties represented by compulsory schooling is an inescapable issue in education today, from whichever standpoint one approaches it. One could go further an relate this problem to the central dilemma of our time. Now that the potential of human existence is so amazingly extended and so uniquely threatened, we all need educating first and foremost in the practice of freedom and the exercise of choice.</div>
 -----
@@ Line 64: / Line 66: @@
 {| border="1" style="border-collapse:collapse" cellpadding="10"
 |-
-| The 5th issue of ''{{popup|The Libertarian Teacher|journal of the Libertarian Teachers' Association, London}}'' is obtainable for 3s. post free from 36 Devonshire Road, Mill Hill, London, N.W.7.
+| align="justify" | The 5th issue of ''{{popup|The Libertarian Teacher|journal of the Libertarian Teachers' Association, London}}'' is obtainable for 3s. post free from 36 Devonshire Road, Mill Hill, London, N.W.7.
 |}
 </div>
 [[Category:Children]]
 [[Category:Education]]

@@ Line 14: / Line 14: @@
 <font size="4">'''[[Author:Jane Kingshill|JANE KINGSHILL]]<br>AND<br>[[Author:Brian Richardson|BRIAN RICHARDSON]]'''</font>
-{{sc|In [[Anarchy 53|anarchy 53]]}} published in July 1965, [[Author:Colin Ward|Colin Ward]] made a modest (but consciously outrageous) [[Anarchy 53/A modest proposal for the repeal of the Education Act|proposal]] for the repeal of the {{l|Education Act|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_Act_1944}}. Since then the movement for change in our schools has grown much stronger. New primary schools are being built entirely differently from the ones we adults attended, with freely-planned internal spaces to suit informal group working, and the new methods, having been publicised on television, are discussed in millions of homes. {{l|Edward Blishen|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Blishen}} has edited a collection of children&rsquo;s essays ''The School that I&rsquo;d Like'', published by Penguin, that constitutes a passionate and sustained attack upon our present educational order. {{l|Michael Duane|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Duane}}&rsquo;s radical but short-lived regime at {{l|Risinghill|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risinghill_School}} has become widely known and discussed through the publication of {{l|Leila Berg|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leila_Berg}}&rsquo;s Penguin {{popup|book|Risinghill: Death of a Comprehensive School (1968)}}.
+{{sc|In [[Anarchy 53|anarchy 53]]}} published in July 1965, [[Author:Colin Ward|Colin Ward]] made a modest (but consciously outrageous) [[Anarchy 53/A modest proposal for the repeal of the Education Act|proposal]] for the repeal of the {{l|Education Act|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_Act_1944}}. Since then the movement for change in our schools has grown much stronger. New primary schools are being built entirely differently from the ones we adults attended, with freely-planned internal spaces to suit informal group working, and the new methods, having been publicised on television, are discussed in millions of homes. {{l|Edward Blishen|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Blishen}} has edited a collection of children&rsquo;s essays ''The School that I&rsquo;d Like'', published by Penguin, that constitutes a passionate and sustained attack upon our present educational order. {{l|Michael Duane|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Duane}}&rsquo;s radical but short-lived regime at {{l|Risinghill|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risinghill_School}} has become widely known and discussed through the publication of [[Author:Leila Berg|Leila Berg]]&rsquo;s Penguin {{popup|book|Risinghill: Death of a Comprehensive School (1968)}}.
 And, of course, student unrest is spreading from the colleges to the schools, and the {{l|Free Schools|https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_school_movement}} Campaign has got under way. Now, if not repeal, at least a new Education Act is being talked about, current ideas are being evaluated and new thinking sought after. It is an important moment for anarchists to develop and communicate their view of the educational scene.
@@ Line 26: / Line 26: @@
 The child is born a &ldquo;free&rdquo; citizen, so he is told, lives in a &ldquo;free&rdquo; country where he is part of the &ldquo;free&rdquo; world. At the age of five he learns otherwise. He becomes subject to a state decree which fundamentally affects his daily life and his whole future and which is inescapable, even unchallengeable. This is, in effect, and perhaps is intended to be, a traumatic experience conditioning the person to the concept of obedience on which the authoritarian state system depends.
-Compulsory attendance at school also places the teachers in a difficult position and forces them into an authoritarian role. Because dissent cannot be expressed by withdrawal from the educational institution, it has either to be repressed or expressed as rebellion. Rebellion has to be ruthlessly crushed for the sake of the continuing operation of the establishment. It is more convenient if the pupils can be forced to submit to authority, and thus powers of coercion have to be assumed leading to a system of punishment sufficiently severe to generate mental and bodily fear in the intending dissenter. Small wonder that teachers are reluctant to give up the right to use corporal punishment as a &ldquo;last resort&rdquo;. The entire relationship between pupil and teacher is sound by the fact of copulsion and this is a handicap that few teachers have the power to overcome. Not only a child&rsquo;s civil liberties therefore but the whole quality of education is at stake.
+Compulsory attendance at school also places the teachers in a difficult position and forces them into an authoritarian role. Because dissent cannot be expressed by withdrawal from the educational institution, it has either to be repressed or expressed as rebellion. Rebellion has to be ruthlessly crushed for the sake of the continuing operation of the establishment. It is more convenient if the pupils can be forced to submit to authority, and thus powers of coercion have to be assumed leading to a system of punishment sufficiently severe to generate mental and bodily fear in the intending dissenter. Small wonder that teachers are reluctant to give up the right to use corporal punishment as a &ldquo;last resort&rdquo;. The entire relationship between pupil and teacher is sound by the fact of compulsion and this is a handicap that few teachers have the power to overcome. Not only a child&rsquo;s civil liberties therefore but the whole quality of education is at stake.
 Compulsory attendance became part of our school system at a time when our assumptions about the nature of children, our view of human rights and the needs of our society differed radically from those of today. Now that we are beginning to recognise a child&rsquo;s claim to full human dignity and moving towards the educational enfranchisement this view entails, it should be possible to re-examine the social function of compulsory schooling and find out how essential we feel it to be.

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
-'''[[Anarchy 103|ANARCHY 103 (Vol 9 No 9) SEPTEMBER 1969]]'''
+{{header
------
+ | title      = [[../|ANARCHY 103 (Vol 9 No 9) SEPTEMBER 1969]]<br>Education: an immodest proposal &hellip;
+ | author     =
 <font size="5">'''Education: an immodest proposal &hellip;'''</font>

← Older revision		Revision as of 21:32, 22 March 2016
Line 59:		Line 59:
	\| The 5th issue of ''{{popup\|The Libertarian Teacher\|journal of the Libertarian Teachers' Association, London}}'' is obtainable for 3s. post free from 36 Devonshire Road, Mill Hill, London, N.W.7.		\| The 5th issue of ''{{popup\|The Libertarian Teacher\|journal of the Libertarian Teachers' Association, London}}'' is obtainable for 3s. post free from 36 Devonshire Road, Mill Hill, London, N.W.7.
	\|}		\|}
		+
		+	[[Category:Children]]
		+	[[Category:Education]]