Difference between revisions of "Anarchy 43/Reflections on parents, teachers and schools"

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<div style="text-align:justify;">{{sc|What anarch&shy;ists are after}} is per&shy;sonal and so&shy;cial auto&shy;nomy—the idea that in&shy;di&shy;viduals and their organ&shy;isa&shy;tions should be self-reg&shy;u&shy;lat&shy;ing auto&shy;no&shy;mous bodies. It is this which makes us ad&shy;voc&shy;ates of worker{{s|r}} control in in&shy;dus&shy;try and which makes us en&shy;thusi&shy;astic about such ex&shy;amples as we find of so&shy;cial organ&shy;isa&shy;tions spring up from below, from people{{s}} urge to sat&shy;isfy their own needs, as op&shy;posed to those which depend on a struc&shy;ture of hier&shy;archy, power and au&shy;thor&shy;ity in which one set of people give in&shy;struc&shy;tions and another set of people carry them out.
 
<div style="text-align:justify;">{{sc|What anarch&shy;ists are after}} is per&shy;sonal and so&shy;cial auto&shy;nomy—the idea that in&shy;di&shy;viduals and their organ&shy;isa&shy;tions should be self-reg&shy;u&shy;lat&shy;ing auto&shy;no&shy;mous bodies. It is this which makes us ad&shy;voc&shy;ates of worker{{s|r}} control in in&shy;dus&shy;try and which makes us en&shy;thusi&shy;astic about such ex&shy;amples as we find of so&shy;cial organ&shy;isa&shy;tions spring up from below, from people{{s}} urge to sat&shy;isfy their own needs, as op&shy;posed to those which depend on a struc&shy;ture of hier&shy;archy, power and au&shy;thor&shy;ity in which one set of people give in&shy;struc&shy;tions and another set of people carry them out.
  
{{tab}}The the&shy;or&shy;et&shy;ical ap&shy;pli&shy;ca&shy;tion of our ideas to the organ&shy;isa&shy;tion of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion is clear enough. The auto&shy;nom&shy;ous self-govern&shy;ing school is the aim, and in view of the ob&shy;vi&shy;ous limits within which chil&shy;dren may be said to govern them&shy;selves, this means in prac&shy;tice a school con&shy;trolled by teach&shy;ers by virtue of their func&shy;tional re&shy;spons&shy;ibil&shy;ity to chil&shy;dren, and by parents because of their bio&shy;lo&shy;gical re&shy;spons&shy;ibil&shy;ity for them. But the issue is more com&shy;pli&shy;ca&shy;ted, for in both prim&shy;it&shy;ive and com&shy;plex com&shy;mun&shy;it&shy;ies it is recog&shy;nised that all adults have a re&shy;spons&shy;ibil&shy;ity towards chil&shy;dren, which because of the vagar&shy;ies and vicis&shy;si&shy;tudes of in&shy;di&shy;vidual parent&shy;age, may have to be exer&shy;cised on its behalf or on the child{{s}} behalf. Once that is ad&shy;mit&shy;ted, we have of course ad&shy;mit&shy;ted that edu&shy;ca&shy;tion is the con&shy;cern of the com&shy;mun&shy;ity. But what com&shy;mun&shy;ity? The state as in {{w|France|Education_in_France}}, the local au&shy;thor&shy;ity as in the {{w|United States|Education_in_the_United_States}}, or a mix&shy;ture of the two as in {{w|Britain|Education_in_the_United_Kingdom}}? And where does the re&shy;spons&shy;ibil&shy;ity of the com&shy;mun&shy;ity begin and end?
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{{tab}}The the&shy;or&shy;et&shy;ical ap&shy;pli&shy;ca&shy;tion of our ideas to the organ&shy;isa&shy;tion of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion is clear enough. The auto&shy;nom&shy;ous self-govern&shy;ing school is the aim, and in view of the ob&shy;vi&shy;ous limits within which chil&shy;dren may be said to govern them&shy;selves, this means in prac&shy;tice a school con&shy;trolled by teach&shy;ers by virtue of their func&shy;tional re&shy;spons&shy;ibil&shy;ity to chil&shy;dren, and by parents because of their bio&shy;lo&shy;gical re&shy;spons&shy;ibil&shy;ity for them. But the issue is more com&shy;pli&shy;ca&shy;ted, for in both prim&shy;it&shy;ive and com&shy;plex com&shy;mun&shy;it&shy;ies it is recog&shy;nised that all adults have a re&shy;spons&shy;ibil&shy;ity towards chil&shy;dren, which because of the vagar&shy;ies and vicis&shy;si&shy;tudes of in&shy;di&shy;vidual parent&shy;age, may have to be exer&shy;cised on its behalf or on the child{{s}} behalf. Once that is ad&shy;mit&shy;ted, we have of course ad&shy;mit&shy;ted that edu&shy;ca&shy;tion is the con&shy;cern of the com&shy;mun&shy;ity. But what com&shy;mun&shy;ity? The state as in {{w|France|Education_in_France|Education in France}}, the local au&shy;thor&shy;ity as in the {{w|United States|Education_in_the_United_States|Education in the United States}}, or a mix&shy;ture of the two as in {{w|Britain|Education_in_the_United_Kingdom|Education in the United Kingdom}}? And where does the re&shy;spons&shy;ibil&shy;ity of the com&shy;mun&shy;ity begin and end?
  
{{tab}}Should edu&shy;ca&shy;tion be com&shy;puls&shy;ory anyway? (And is the com&shy;pul&shy;sion to be ap&shy;plied to the child or to the parent?) {{w|Bakunin|Mikhail_Bakunin}} saw the ques&shy;tion dia&shy;lect&shy;ic&shy;ally:
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{{tab}}Should edu&shy;ca&shy;tion be com&shy;puls&shy;ory anyway? (And is the com&shy;pul&shy;sion to be ap&shy;plied to the child or to the parent?) {{w|Bakunin|Mikhail_Bakunin|Mikhail Bakunin}} saw the ques&shy;tion dia&shy;lect&shy;ic&shy;ally:
  
 
<blockquote><font size="2">{{tab}}The prin&shy;ciple of au&shy;thor&shy;ity, in the edu&shy;ca&shy;tion of chil&shy;dren, con&shy;sti&shy;tutes the natural point of de&shy;par&shy;ture; it is leg&shy;itim&shy;ate, neces&shy;sary, when ap&shy;plied to chil&shy;dren of a tender age, whose intel&shy;li&shy;gence has not yet openly de&shy;veloped itself. But as the de&shy;velop&shy;ment of every&shy;thing, and con&shy;sequently of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion, im&shy;plies the gradual nega&shy;tion of the point of de&shy;par&shy;ture, this prin&shy;ciple must dimin&shy;ish as fast as edu&shy;ca&shy;tion and in&shy;struc&shy;tion ad&shy;vance, giving place to in&shy;creas&shy;ing liberty. All ra&shy;tional edu&shy;ca&shy;tion is at bottom nothing but this pro&shy;gres&shy;sive im&shy;mola&shy;tion of au&shy;thor&shy;ity for the benefit of liberty, the final ob&shy;ject of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion neces&shy;sarily {{p|276}}being the form&shy;a&shy;tion of free men full of re&shy;spect and love for the liberty of others. There&shy;fore the first day of the pupil{{s}} life, if the school takes infants scarcely able as yet to stam&shy;mer a few words, should be that of the great&shy;est au&shy;thor&shy;ity and an almost entire ab&shy;sence of liberty; but its last day should be that of the great&shy;est liberty and the ab&shy;solute aboli&shy;tion of every vestige of the animal or divine prin&shy;ciple of au&shy;thor&shy;ity.</font></blockquote>
 
<blockquote><font size="2">{{tab}}The prin&shy;ciple of au&shy;thor&shy;ity, in the edu&shy;ca&shy;tion of chil&shy;dren, con&shy;sti&shy;tutes the natural point of de&shy;par&shy;ture; it is leg&shy;itim&shy;ate, neces&shy;sary, when ap&shy;plied to chil&shy;dren of a tender age, whose intel&shy;li&shy;gence has not yet openly de&shy;veloped itself. But as the de&shy;velop&shy;ment of every&shy;thing, and con&shy;sequently of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion, im&shy;plies the gradual nega&shy;tion of the point of de&shy;par&shy;ture, this prin&shy;ciple must dimin&shy;ish as fast as edu&shy;ca&shy;tion and in&shy;struc&shy;tion ad&shy;vance, giving place to in&shy;creas&shy;ing liberty. All ra&shy;tional edu&shy;ca&shy;tion is at bottom nothing but this pro&shy;gres&shy;sive im&shy;mola&shy;tion of au&shy;thor&shy;ity for the benefit of liberty, the final ob&shy;ject of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion neces&shy;sarily {{p|276}}being the form&shy;a&shy;tion of free men full of re&shy;spect and love for the liberty of others. There&shy;fore the first day of the pupil{{s}} life, if the school takes infants scarcely able as yet to stam&shy;mer a few words, should be that of the great&shy;est au&shy;thor&shy;ity and an almost entire ab&shy;sence of liberty; but its last day should be that of the great&shy;est liberty and the ab&shy;solute aboli&shy;tion of every vestige of the animal or divine prin&shy;ciple of au&shy;thor&shy;ity.</font></blockquote>
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<blockquote><font size="2">{{tab}}At this point you per&shy;haps pro&shy;test, {{qq|But if there is no com&shy;pul&shy;sion, what hap&shy;pens if a child does not want to at&shy;tend school of any kind, and the parents are not con&shy;cerned to per&shy;suade him?}} It is quite simple. In that case the child does not at&shy;tend any school. As he becomes adoles&shy;cent he may wish to ac&shy;quire some learn&shy;ing. Or he may de&shy;velop school-going friends and wish to at&shy;tend school because they do. But if he doesn{{t}} he is never&shy;the&shy;less learn&shy;ing all the time, his natural child{{s}} creat&shy;ive&shy;ness work&shy;ing in happy alli&shy;ance with his free&shy;dom. No Utopian parent would think of using that moral coer&shy;cion we call {{q|per&shy;sua&shy;sion}}. By the time he reaches adoles&shy;cence the child grows tired of run&shy;ning wild, and begins to ident&shy;ify himself with grown-ups; he per&shy;ceives the use&shy;ful&shy;ness of know&shy;ing how to read and write and add, and there is prob&shy;ably some special thing he wants to learn—such as how to drive a train or build a bridge or a house. It is all very much simpler than our pro&shy;fes&shy;sional edu&shy;ca&shy;tion&shy;ists would have us believe.</font></blockquote>
 
<blockquote><font size="2">{{tab}}At this point you per&shy;haps pro&shy;test, {{qq|But if there is no com&shy;pul&shy;sion, what hap&shy;pens if a child does not want to at&shy;tend school of any kind, and the parents are not con&shy;cerned to per&shy;suade him?}} It is quite simple. In that case the child does not at&shy;tend any school. As he becomes adoles&shy;cent he may wish to ac&shy;quire some learn&shy;ing. Or he may de&shy;velop school-going friends and wish to at&shy;tend school because they do. But if he doesn{{t}} he is never&shy;the&shy;less learn&shy;ing all the time, his natural child{{s}} creat&shy;ive&shy;ness work&shy;ing in happy alli&shy;ance with his free&shy;dom. No Utopian parent would think of using that moral coer&shy;cion we call {{q|per&shy;sua&shy;sion}}. By the time he reaches adoles&shy;cence the child grows tired of run&shy;ning wild, and begins to ident&shy;ify himself with grown-ups; he per&shy;ceives the use&shy;ful&shy;ness of know&shy;ing how to read and write and add, and there is prob&shy;ably some special thing he wants to learn—such as how to drive a train or build a bridge or a house. It is all very much simpler than our pro&shy;fes&shy;sional edu&shy;ca&shy;tion&shy;ists would have us believe.</font></blockquote>
  
{{tab}}Some of us think it is not ''that'' simple. But the point is aca&shy;demic, for in prac&shy;tice the deci&shy;sion is that of the parents. Nowadays it is only highly soph&shy;ist&shy;ic&shy;ated and edu&shy;ca&shy;ted people who bother to argue about whether or not it is desir&shy;able that chil&shy;dren should learn the {{w|three Rs|The_three_Rs}}. The law in this country does not in fact re&shy;quire parents to send their chil&shy;dren to school; it im&shy;poses an obli&shy;ga&shy;tion on them to see that their chil&shy;dren while within the com&shy;puls&shy;ory age, are re&shy;ceiv&shy;ing {{qq|an ap&shy;propri&shy;ate edu&shy;ca&shy;tion}}. The oc&shy;ca&shy;sional pro&shy;secu&shy;tions of re&shy;calcit&shy;rant parents usually reveal a degree of apathy, in&shy;dif&shy;fer&shy;ence or parental in&shy;com&shy;pet&shy;ence that hardly pro&shy;vides a good case for the op&shy;ponents of com&shy;pul&shy;sion, though they do some&shy;times rope in highly con&shy;scien&shy;tious parents whose views on edu&shy;ca&shy;tion do not hap&shy;pen to co&shy;incide with those of the local au&shy;thor&shy;ity. (Mrs. {{popup|Joy Baker|Joy Elsbeth Baker}}{{s}} {{popup|ac&shy;count|Children in Chancery (1964)}} of her long and in the end suc&shy;cess&shy;ful struggle with the au&shy;thor&shy;it&shy;ies will be [[Anarchy 46/A partner not envisaged|re&shy;viewed]] in a coming issue of {{sc|anarchy}}). Usually, apart from a few of the rich, with their gover&shy;nesses and tutors, there are not many parents with the time or skill to teach their chil&shy;dren at home, and of those who could, many must feel it unfair to de&shy;prive their chil&shy;dren of the pleasures and so&shy;cial ex&shy;peri&shy;ence of be&shy;long&shy;ing to a com&shy;mun&shy;ity of their peers, or may cherish the right of parents to have the kids out of their way for some of the time—and the recip&shy;rocal right of their children to be outside the parental at&shy;mo&shy;sphere.
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{{tab}}Some of us think it is not ''that'' simple. But the point is aca&shy;demic, for in prac&shy;tice the deci&shy;sion is that of the parents. Nowadays it is only highly soph&shy;ist&shy;ic&shy;ated and edu&shy;ca&shy;ted people who bother to argue about whether or not it is desir&shy;able that chil&shy;dren should learn the {{w|three Rs|The_three_Rs|The three Rs}}. The law in this country does not in fact re&shy;quire parents to send their chil&shy;dren to school; it im&shy;poses an obli&shy;ga&shy;tion on them to see that their chil&shy;dren while within the com&shy;puls&shy;ory age, are re&shy;ceiv&shy;ing {{qq|an ap&shy;propri&shy;ate edu&shy;ca&shy;tion}}. The oc&shy;ca&shy;sional pro&shy;secu&shy;tions of re&shy;calcit&shy;rant parents usually reveal a degree of apathy, in&shy;dif&shy;fer&shy;ence or parental in&shy;com&shy;pet&shy;ence that hardly pro&shy;vides a good case for the op&shy;ponents of com&shy;pul&shy;sion, though they do some&shy;times rope in highly con&shy;scien&shy;tious parents whose views on edu&shy;ca&shy;tion do not hap&shy;pen to co&shy;incide with those of the local au&shy;thor&shy;ity. (Mrs. {{popup|Joy Baker|Joy Elsbeth Baker}}{{s}} {{popup|ac&shy;count|Children in Chancery (1964)}} of her long and in the end suc&shy;cess&shy;ful struggle with the au&shy;thor&shy;it&shy;ies will be [[Anarchy 46/A partner not envisaged|re&shy;viewed]] in a coming issue of {{sc|anarchy}}). Usually, apart from a few of the rich, with their gover&shy;nesses and tutors, there are not many parents with the time or skill to teach their chil&shy;dren at home, and of those who could, many must feel it unfair to de&shy;prive their chil&shy;dren of the pleasures and so&shy;cial ex&shy;peri&shy;ence of be&shy;long&shy;ing to a com&shy;mun&shy;ity of their peers, or may cherish the right of parents to have the kids out of their way for some of the time—and the recip&shy;rocal right of their children to be outside the parental at&shy;mo&shy;sphere.
  
  
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{{tab}}Histor&shy;ic&shy;ally, in this country, the strug&shy;gle to make edu&shy;ca&shy;tion free, com&shy;puls&shy;ory and uni&shy;versal, and out of the ex&shy;clus&shy;ive con&shy;trol of reli&shy;gious organ&shy;isa&shy;tions, was long and bitter, and the op&shy;po&shy;si&shy;tion to it came, not from liber&shy;tarian ob&shy;jectors, but from the up&shy;hold&shy;ers of priv&shy;ilege and dogma, and from those (both parents and em&shy;ploy&shy;ers) who had an eco&shy;nomic inter&shy;est in the labour of chil&shy;dren or a vested inter&shy;est in ignor&shy;ance. The very reason why it had to be made com&shy;puls&shy;ory ninety-four {{p|277}}years ago was because chil&shy;dren were an eco&shy;nomic asset. Read&shy;ers of chap&shy;ters {{l|8|https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch08.htm}} and {{l|12|https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch12.htm}} of {{w|Marx|Karl_Marx}}{{s}} ''{{l|Capital|https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/index.htm}}'' will not dis&shy;sent from the as&shy;ser&shy;tion that the {{w|in&shy;dus&shy;trial re&shy;volu&shy;tion|Industrial_Revolution}} was made by the chil&shy;dren of the poor. As late as 1935 {{w|Lord Halifax|Edward_Wood,_1st_Earl_of_Halifax}}, as {{w|Pres&shy;id&shy;ent of the Board of Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion|Secretary_of_State_for_Education}}, op&shy;pos&shy;ing the pro&shy;posal to raise the school leaving age from four&shy;teen to fif&shy;teen, de&shy;clared that {{qq|public opinion would not toler&shy;ate an un&shy;con&shy;di&shy;tional raising of the age}} and the {{w|Bradford|Bradford}} tex&shy;tile manu&shy;fac&shy;turers as&shy;sured him that {{qq|there was work for little fingers there.}}
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{{tab}}Histor&shy;ic&shy;ally, in this country, the strug&shy;gle to make edu&shy;ca&shy;tion free, com&shy;puls&shy;ory and uni&shy;versal, and out of the ex&shy;clus&shy;ive con&shy;trol of reli&shy;gious organ&shy;isa&shy;tions, was long and bitter, and the op&shy;po&shy;si&shy;tion to it came, not from liber&shy;tarian ob&shy;jectors, but from the up&shy;hold&shy;ers of priv&shy;ilege and dogma, and from those (both parents and em&shy;ploy&shy;ers) who had an eco&shy;nomic inter&shy;est in the labour of chil&shy;dren or a vested inter&shy;est in ignor&shy;ance. The very reason why it had to be made com&shy;puls&shy;ory ninety-four {{p|277}}years ago was because chil&shy;dren were an eco&shy;nomic asset. Read&shy;ers of chap&shy;ters {{l|8|https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch08.htm|Full text at Marxists Internet Archive}} and {{l|12|https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch12.htm|Full text at Marxists Internet Archive}} of {{w|Marx|Karl_Marx|Karl Marx}}{{s}} ''{{l|Capital|https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/index.htm|Full text at Marxists Internet Archive}}'' will not dis&shy;sent from the as&shy;ser&shy;tion that the {{w|in&shy;dus&shy;trial re&shy;volu&shy;tion|Industrial_Revolution|Industrial Revolution}} was made by the chil&shy;dren of the poor. As late as 1935 {{w|Lord Halifax|Edward_Wood,_1st_Earl_of_Halifax|Edward Wood, 1st Earl of Halifax}}, as {{w|Pres&shy;id&shy;ent of the Board of Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion|Secretary_of_State_for_Education|Secretary of State for Education}}, op&shy;pos&shy;ing the pro&shy;posal to raise the school leaving age from four&shy;teen to fif&shy;teen, de&shy;clared that {{qq|public opinion would not toler&shy;ate an un&shy;con&shy;di&shy;tional raising of the age}} and the {{w|Bradford|Bradford}} tex&shy;tile manu&shy;fac&shy;turers as&shy;sured him that {{qq|there was work for little fingers there.}}
  
{{tab}}The no&shy;tion that primary ecu&shy;ca&shy;tion should be free, com&shy;puls&shy;ory and uni&shy;versal is very much older than the {{w|English Act of 1870|Elementary_Education_Act_1870}}. It grew up with the print&shy;ing press and the rise of prot&shy;est&shy;ant&shy;ism. The rich had been edu&shy;cated by the {{w|Church|Church_of_England}} and the sons of the rising bour&shy;geoisie in the {{w|grammar schools|Grammar_school#Early_grammar_schools}} of the Middle Ages. From the 16th century on arose a grad&shy;ual demand that all should be taught. {{w|Martin Luther|Martin_Luther}} ap&shy;pealed {{qq|To the Coun&shy;cil&shy;men of all Cities in {{w|Germany|Holy_Roman_Empire}} that they estab&shy;lish and main&shy;tain Christian Schools}}, ob&shy;serv&shy;ing that the train&shy;ing chil&shy;dren get at home {{qq|at&shy;tempts to make us wise through our ex&shy;peri&shy;ence}} a task for which life itself is too short, and which could be ac&shy;cel&shy;er&shy;ated by sys&shy;tema&shy;tic in&shy;struc&shy;tion by means of books. Com&shy;puls&shy;ory uni&shy;versal edu&shy;ca&shy;tion was founded in {{w|Calvin&shy;ist|Calvinism}} {{w|Geneva|History_of_Geneva#Reformation}} in 1536, and {{w|Calvin|John_Calvin}}{{s}} {{w|Scottish|Scotland}} dis&shy;ciple {{w|John Knox|John_Knox}} {{qq|planted a school as well as a {{w|kirk|Church_of_Scotland}} in every parish.}} In {{w|puritan Mas&shy;sachu&shy;setts|Massachusetts_Bay_Colony}} free com&shy;puls&shy;ory primary edu&shy;ca&shy;tion was intro&shy;duced in 1647. The common school, writes {{w|Lewis Mumford|Lewis_Mumford}} in ''{{l|The Condi&shy;tion of Man|https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.188937}}'':
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{{tab}}The no&shy;tion that primary ecu&shy;ca&shy;tion should be free, com&shy;puls&shy;ory and uni&shy;versal is very much older than the {{w|English Act of 1870|Elementary_Education_Act_1870|Elementary Education Act 1870}}. It grew up with the print&shy;ing press and the rise of prot&shy;est&shy;ant&shy;ism. The rich had been edu&shy;cated by the {{w|Church|Church_of_England|Church of England}} and the sons of the rising bour&shy;geoisie in the {{w|grammar schools|Grammar_school#Early_grammar_schools|Grammar school}} of the Middle Ages. From the 16th century on arose a grad&shy;ual demand that all should be taught. {{w|Martin Luther|Martin_Luther}} ap&shy;pealed {{qq|To the Coun&shy;cil&shy;men of all Cities in {{w|Germany|Holy_Roman_Empire|Holy Roman Empire}} that they estab&shy;lish and main&shy;tain Christian Schools}}, ob&shy;serv&shy;ing that the train&shy;ing chil&shy;dren get at home {{qq|at&shy;tempts to make us wise through our ex&shy;peri&shy;ence}} a task for which life itself is too short, and which could be ac&shy;cel&shy;er&shy;ated by sys&shy;tema&shy;tic in&shy;struc&shy;tion by means of books. Com&shy;puls&shy;ory uni&shy;versal edu&shy;ca&shy;tion was founded in {{w|Calvin&shy;ist|Calvinism|Calvinism}} {{w|Geneva|History_of_Geneva#Reformation|History of Geneva: Reformation}} in 1536, and {{w|Calvin|John_Calvin|John Calvin}}{{s}} {{w|Scottish|Scotland|Scotland}} dis&shy;ciple {{w|John Knox|John_Knox}} {{qq|planted a school as well as a {{w|kirk|Church_of_Scotland|Church of Scotland}} in every parish.}} In {{w|puritan Mas&shy;sachu&shy;setts|Massachusetts_Bay_Colony|Massachusetts Bay Colony}} free com&shy;puls&shy;ory primary edu&shy;ca&shy;tion was intro&shy;duced in 1647. The common school, writes {{w|Lewis Mumford|Lewis_Mumford}} in ''{{l|The Condi&shy;tion of Man|https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.188937|Full text at the Internet Archive}}'':
  
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}&hellip; con&shy;trary to popular belief, is no be&shy;lated pro&shy;duct of 19th century demo&shy;cracy: I have pointed out that it played a neces&shy;sary part in the ab&shy;solu&shy;tist-mech&shy;an&shy;ical form&shy;ula. {{w|Friedrich Wilhelm I|Frederick_William_I_of_Prussia}} of {{w|Prussia|Brandenburg-Prussia}}, fol&shy;lowing Luther{{s}} pre&shy;cept, made primary edu&shy;ca&shy;tion com&shy;puls&shy;ory in his realm in 1717, and foun&shy;ded 1,700 schools to meet the needs of the poor. Two ordin&shy;ances of {{w|Louis XIV|Louis_XIV_of_France}} in 1694 and 1698 and one of {{w|Louis XV|Louis_XV_of_France}} in 1724 re&shy;quired regular at&shy;tend&shy;ance at school. Even {{w|England|England}}, a strag&shy;gler in such mat&shy;ters, had hun&shy;dreds of private char&shy;ity schools, some of them foun&shy;ded by the {{w|So&shy;ci&shy;ety for Pro&shy;moting Chris&shy;tian Know&shy;ledge|Society_for_Promoting_Christian_Knowledge}}, which had been in&shy;cor&shy;por&shy;ated in 1699. {{w|Vergerious<!-- as spelt in original -->|Pier_Paolo_Vergerio}}, one of the earliest renais&shy;sance school&shy;masters, had thought edu&shy;ca&shy;tion an es&shy;sen&shy;tial func&shy;tion of the State; and cen&shy;tral&shy;ised au&shy;thor&shy;ity was now be&shy;lat&shy;edly taking up the work that had been neg&shy;lected with the wiping out of mu&shy;ni&shy;cipal free&shy;dom in the greater part of Europe.</blockquote></font>
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<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}&hellip; con&shy;trary to popular belief, is no be&shy;lated pro&shy;duct of 19th century demo&shy;cracy: I have pointed out that it played a neces&shy;sary part in the ab&shy;solu&shy;tist-mech&shy;an&shy;ical form&shy;ula. {{w|Friedrich Wilhelm I|Frederick_William_I_of_Prussia|Frederick William I of Prussia}} of {{w|Prussia|Brandenburg-Prussia|Brandenburg-Prussia}}, fol&shy;lowing Luther{{s}} pre&shy;cept, made primary edu&shy;ca&shy;tion com&shy;puls&shy;ory in his realm in 1717, and foun&shy;ded 1,700 schools to meet the needs of the poor. Two ordin&shy;ances of {{w|Louis XIV|Louis_XIV_of_France}} in 1694 and 1698 and one of {{w|Louis XV|Louis_XV_of_France}} in 1724 re&shy;quired regular at&shy;tend&shy;ance at school. Even {{w|England|England}}, a strag&shy;gler in such mat&shy;ters, had hun&shy;dreds of private char&shy;ity schools, some of them foun&shy;ded by the {{w|So&shy;ci&shy;ety for Pro&shy;moting Chris&shy;tian Know&shy;ledge|Society_for_Promoting_Christian_Knowledge}}, which had been in&shy;cor&shy;por&shy;ated in 1699. {{w|Vergerious<!-- as spelt in original -->|Pier_Paolo_Vergerio|Pier Paolo Vergerio}}, one of the earliest renais&shy;sance school&shy;masters, had thought edu&shy;ca&shy;tion an es&shy;sen&shy;tial func&shy;tion of the State; and cen&shy;tral&shy;ised au&shy;thor&shy;ity was now be&shy;lat&shy;edly taking up the work that had been neg&shy;lected with the wiping out of mu&shy;ni&shy;cipal free&shy;dom in the greater part of Europe.</blockquote></font>
  
{{tab}}All the ra&shy;tion&shy;al&shy;ist philo&shy;sophers of the 18th century thought about the prob&shy;lems of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion, and of them, the two acutest edu&shy;ca&shy;tional think&shy;ers ranged them&shy;selves on op&shy;pos&shy;ite sides on the ques&shy;tion of the ''organ&shy;isa&shy;tion'' of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion: {{w|Rousseau|Jean-Jacques_Rousseau}} for the State, {{w|Godwin|William_Godwin}} against it. Rousseau, whose ''{{w|Emile|http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/5427}}'' pos&shy;tu&shy;lates a com&shy;pletely in&shy;di&shy;vidual edu&shy;ca&shy;tion (human so&shy;ciety is ig&shy;nored, the tutor{{s}} entire life is de&shy;voted to poor Emile), did never&shy;the&shy;less con&shy;cern himself with the so&shy;cial aspect, argu&shy;ing, in his ''{{l|Dis&shy;course on Polit&shy;ical Eco&shy;nomy|http://www.constitution.org/jjr/polecon.htm}}'' (1755)<!-- '(1758)' in original --> for public edu&shy;ca&shy;tion {{qq|under regu&shy;la&shy;tions pre&shy;scribed by the govern&shy;ment}}, for
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{{tab}}All the ra&shy;tion&shy;al&shy;ist philo&shy;sophers of the 18th century thought about the prob&shy;lems of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion, and of them, the two acutest edu&shy;ca&shy;tional think&shy;ers ranged them&shy;selves on op&shy;pos&shy;ite sides on the ques&shy;tion of the ''organ&shy;isa&shy;tion'' of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion: {{w|Rousseau|Jean-Jacques_Rousseau|Jean-Jacques Rousseau}} for the State, {{w|Godwin|William_Godwin|William Godwin}} against it. Rousseau, whose ''{{l|Emile|http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/5427|Full text at Project Gutenberg}}'' pos&shy;tu&shy;lates a com&shy;pletely in&shy;di&shy;vidual edu&shy;ca&shy;tion (human so&shy;ciety is ig&shy;nored, the tutor{{s}} entire life is de&shy;voted to poor Emile), did never&shy;the&shy;less con&shy;cern himself with the so&shy;cial aspect, argu&shy;ing, in his ''{{l|Dis&shy;course on Polit&shy;ical Eco&shy;nomy|https://archive.org/details/socialcontractd00rousgoog/page/n302/mode/2up|Full text at the Internet Archive}}'' (1755)<!-- '(1758)' in original --> for public edu&shy;ca&shy;tion {{qq|under regu&shy;la&shy;tions pre&shy;scribed by the govern&shy;ment}}, for
  
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}If chil&shy;dren are brought up in com&shy;mon in the bosom of equal&shy;ity; if they are im&shy;bued with the laws of the State and the pre&shy;cepts of the General Will &hellip; we can&shy;not doubt that they will cher&shy;ish one another mu&shy;tually as broth&shy;ers &hellip; to become in time de&shy;fenders and fath&shy;ers of the country of which they will have been so long the chil&shy;dren.</blockquote></font>
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}If chil&shy;dren are brought up in com&shy;mon in the bosom of equal&shy;ity; if they are im&shy;bued with the laws of the State and the pre&shy;cepts of the General Will &hellip; we can&shy;not doubt that they will cher&shy;ish one another mu&shy;tually as broth&shy;ers &hellip; to become in time de&shy;fenders and fath&shy;ers of the country of which they will have been so long the chil&shy;dren.</blockquote></font>
  
{{p|278}}{{tab}}William Godwin, who, in his ''{{l|En&shy;quirer|http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/godwin/enquirer.html}}'' at&shy;tacks the con&shy;cealed au&shy;thor&shy;it&shy;ar&shy;ian&shy;ism of Rousseau{{s}} edu&shy;ca&shy;tional theor&shy;ies, criti&shy;cises in his ''{{l|En&shy;quiry Con&shy;cern&shy;ing Polit&shy;ical Justice|http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/godwin/PJfrontpiece.html}}'' (1793)<!-- '(1792)' in original -->, the idea of na&shy;tional edu&shy;ca&shy;tion. He sum&shy;mar&shy;ises the argu&shy;ments in favour, which are those of Rousseau, adding to them the ques&shy;tion:
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{{p|278}}{{tab}}William Godwin, who, in his ''{{l|En&shy;quirer|http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/godwin/enquirer.html|Full text at Anarchy Archives}}'' at&shy;tacks the con&shy;cealed au&shy;thor&shy;it&shy;ar&shy;ian&shy;ism of Rousseau{{s}} edu&shy;ca&shy;tional theor&shy;ies, criti&shy;cises in his ''{{l|En&shy;quiry Con&shy;cern&shy;ing Polit&shy;ical Justice|http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/godwin/PJfrontpiece.html|Full Text at Anarchy Archives}}'' (1793)<!-- '(1792)' in original -->, the idea of na&shy;tional edu&shy;ca&shy;tion. He sum&shy;mar&shy;ises the argu&shy;ments in favour, which are those of Rousseau, adding to them the ques&shy;tion:
  
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}If the edu&shy;ca&shy;tion of our youth be en&shy;tirely con&shy;fined to the pru&shy;dence of their parents, or the ac&shy;cid&shy;ental be&shy;ne&shy;vol&shy;ence of private in&shy;di&shy;viduals, will it not be a neces&shy;sary con&shy;se&shy;quence, that some will be edu&shy;cated to virtue, others to vice, and others again en&shy;tirely neg&shy;lected?</blockquote></font>
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}If the edu&shy;ca&shy;tion of our youth be en&shy;tirely con&shy;fined to the pru&shy;dence of their parents, or the ac&shy;cid&shy;ental be&shy;ne&shy;vol&shy;ence of private in&shy;di&shy;viduals, will it not be a neces&shy;sary con&shy;se&shy;quence, that some will be edu&shy;cated to virtue, others to vice, and others again en&shy;tirely neg&shy;lected?</blockquote></font>
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{{tab}}Godwin{{s}} answer is:
 
{{tab}}Godwin{{s}} answer is:
  
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}The injur&shy;ies that re&shy;sult from a system of na&shy;tional edu&shy;ca&shy;tion are, in the first place, that all public estab&shy;lish&shy;ments in&shy;clude in them the idea of per&shy;man&shy;ence. They en&shy;deavour, it may be, to se&shy;cure and to dif&shy;fuse what&shy;ever of ad&shy;vant&shy;age to so&shy;ciety is already known, but they forget that more re&shy;mains to be known &hellip; But public edu&shy;ca&shy;tion has always ex&shy;pended its en&shy;er&shy;gies in the sup&shy;port of pre&shy;jud&shy;ice; it teaches its pupils not the fort&shy;i&shy;tude that shall bring every pro&shy;pos&shy;i&shy;tion to the test of exam&shy;ina&shy;tion, but the art of vin&shy;dic&shy;at&shy;ing such tenets as may chance to be previ&shy;ously estab&shy;lished &hellip; This feature runs through every spe&shy;cies of public estab&shy;lish&shy;ment; and, even in the petty in&shy;sti&shy;tu&shy;tion of {{w|Sunday schools|Sunday_school}}, the chief les&shy;sons that are taught are a super&shy;sti&shy;tious vener&shy;a&shy;tion for the {{w|Church of England|Church_of_England}}, and to bow to every man in a hand&shy;some coat &hellip; Refer them to read&shy;ing, to con&shy;ver&shy;sa&shy;tion, to medi&shy;ta&shy;tion, but teach them neither creeds nor {{w|cat&shy;ech&shy;isms|Catechism}}, neither moral nor polit&shy;ical &hellip;</blockquote></font>
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<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}The injur&shy;ies that re&shy;sult from a system of na&shy;tional edu&shy;ca&shy;tion are, in the first place, that all public estab&shy;lish&shy;ments in&shy;clude in them the idea of per&shy;man&shy;ence. They en&shy;deavour, it may be, to se&shy;cure and to dif&shy;fuse what&shy;ever of ad&shy;vant&shy;age to so&shy;ciety is already known, but they forget that more re&shy;mains to be known &hellip; But public edu&shy;ca&shy;tion has always ex&shy;pended its en&shy;er&shy;gies in the sup&shy;port of pre&shy;jud&shy;ice; it teaches its pupils not the fort&shy;i&shy;tude that shall bring every pro&shy;pos&shy;i&shy;tion to the test of exam&shy;ina&shy;tion, but the art of vin&shy;dic&shy;at&shy;ing such tenets as may chance to be previ&shy;ously estab&shy;lished &hellip; This feature runs through every spe&shy;cies of public estab&shy;lish&shy;ment; and, even in the petty in&shy;sti&shy;tu&shy;tion of {{w|Sunday schools|Sunday_school|Sunday school}}, the chief les&shy;sons that are taught are a super&shy;sti&shy;tious vener&shy;a&shy;tion for the {{w|Church of England|Church_of_England}}, and to bow to every man in a hand&shy;some coat &hellip; Refer them to read&shy;ing, to con&shy;ver&shy;sa&shy;tion, to medi&shy;ta&shy;tion, but teach them neither creeds nor {{w|cat&shy;ech&shy;isms|Catechism|Catechism}}, neither moral nor polit&shy;ical &hellip;</blockquote></font>
  
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}Secondly, the idea of na&shy;tional edu&shy;ca&shy;tion is foun&shy;ded in an in&shy;at&shy;ten&shy;tion to the nature of mind. What&shy;ever each man does for him&shy;self is done well; what&shy;ever his neigh&shy;bours or his country under&shy;take to do for him is done ill. It is our wisdom to in&shy;cite men to act for them&shy;selves, not to retain them in a state of per&shy;petual pupil&shy;lage. He that learns because he desires to learn will listen to the in&shy;struc&shy;tions he re&shy;ceives and ap&shy;pre&shy;hend their mean&shy;ing. He that teaches because he desires to teach will dis&shy;charge his oc&shy;cupa&shy;tion with en&shy;thusi&shy;asm and energy. But the moment polit&shy;ical in&shy;sti&shy;tu&shy;tion under&shy;takes to as&shy;sign to every man his place, the func&shy;tions of all will be dis&shy;charged with supine&shy;ness and in&shy;dif&shy;fer&shy;ence &hellip;</blockquote></font>
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}Secondly, the idea of na&shy;tional edu&shy;ca&shy;tion is foun&shy;ded in an in&shy;at&shy;ten&shy;tion to the nature of mind. What&shy;ever each man does for him&shy;self is done well; what&shy;ever his neigh&shy;bours or his country under&shy;take to do for him is done ill. It is our wisdom to in&shy;cite men to act for them&shy;selves, not to retain them in a state of per&shy;petual pupil&shy;lage. He that learns because he desires to learn will listen to the in&shy;struc&shy;tions he re&shy;ceives and ap&shy;pre&shy;hend their mean&shy;ing. He that teaches because he desires to teach will dis&shy;charge his oc&shy;cupa&shy;tion with en&shy;thusi&shy;asm and energy. But the moment polit&shy;ical in&shy;sti&shy;tu&shy;tion under&shy;takes to as&shy;sign to every man his place, the func&shy;tions of all will be dis&shy;charged with supine&shy;ness and in&shy;dif&shy;fer&shy;ence &hellip;</blockquote></font>
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{{p|279}}{{tab}}In practice, in this country today people who want to try an anarch&shy;ist ap&shy;proach to edu&shy;ca&shy;tion have two pos&shy;sible courses of action: to work in the private sector—in&shy;de&shy;pend&shy;ent schools of one kind or an&shy;other, a minor&shy;ity of which are pro&shy;gres&shy;sive, or to work in the normal school system and try to in&shy;flu&shy;ence it in a {{qq|pro&shy;gres&shy;sive}} direc&shy;tion. These two courses are by no means mu&shy;tu&shy;ally ex&shy;clus&shy;ive, and there is plenty of evid&shy;ence of the in&shy;flu&shy;ence of the former on the latter.
 
{{p|279}}{{tab}}In practice, in this country today people who want to try an anarch&shy;ist ap&shy;proach to edu&shy;ca&shy;tion have two pos&shy;sible courses of action: to work in the private sector—in&shy;de&shy;pend&shy;ent schools of one kind or an&shy;other, a minor&shy;ity of which are pro&shy;gres&shy;sive, or to work in the normal school system and try to in&shy;flu&shy;ence it in a {{qq|pro&shy;gres&shy;sive}} direc&shy;tion. These two courses are by no means mu&shy;tu&shy;ally ex&shy;clus&shy;ive, and there is plenty of evid&shy;ence of the in&shy;flu&shy;ence of the former on the latter.
  
{{tab}}It is sur&shy;pris&shy;ing, and cer&shy;tainly sad&shy;den&shy;ing, con&shy;sider&shy;ing the number of people in&shy;ter&shy;ested in {{qq|pro&shy;gres&shy;sive}} schools, how few of them there are and how they seldom in&shy;spire other people to start them. For ex&shy;ample, the pub&shy;lica&shy;tion of ''{{w|Summer&shy;hill|Summerhill_(book)}}'' a com&shy;pil&shy;a&shy;tion of the writ&shy;ings of [[Author:A. S. Neill|A. S. Neill]] brought about a great deal of in&shy;ter&shy;est in his school and his ideas in {{w|America|United_States}}; there was an embar&shy;ras&shy;sing pro&shy;ces&shy;sion of over&shy;seas vis&shy;it&shy;ors to Neill{{s}} little school in {{w|Suffolk|Suffolk}}, but how few of the ad&shy;mirers and vis&shy;it&shy;ors set about start&shy;ing more schools on similar lines. A few did: one of the [[Anarchy 43/High School U.S.A.|con&shy;trib&shy;u&shy;tions]] in this issue of {{sc|anarchy}} comes from people who are trying to.
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{{tab}}It is sur&shy;pris&shy;ing, and cer&shy;tainly sad&shy;den&shy;ing, con&shy;sider&shy;ing the number of people in&shy;ter&shy;ested in {{qq|pro&shy;gres&shy;sive}} schools, how few of them there are and how they seldom in&shy;spire other people to start them. For ex&shy;ample, the pub&shy;lica&shy;tion of ''{{w|Summer&shy;hill|Summerhill_(book)|Summerhill (book)}}'' a com&shy;pil&shy;a&shy;tion of the writ&shy;ings of [[Author:A. S. Neill|A. S. Neill]] brought about a great deal of in&shy;ter&shy;est in his school and his ideas in {{w|America|United_States|United States}}; there was an embar&shy;ras&shy;sing pro&shy;ces&shy;sion of over&shy;seas vis&shy;it&shy;ors to Neill{{s}} little school in {{w|Suffolk|Suffolk}}, but how few of the ad&shy;mirers and vis&shy;it&shy;ors set about start&shy;ing more schools on similar lines. A few did: one of the [[Anarchy 43/High School U.S.A.|con&shy;trib&shy;u&shy;tions]] in this issue of {{sc|anarchy}} comes from people who are trying to.
  
{{tab}}Why shouldn{{t}} the parents of a group of babies in the same age-group get together and plan a school for them well in ad&shy;vance, so as to ac&shy;cum&shy;ul&shy;ate the funds re&shy;quired before they are needed? They could as several groups of parents do, run their own {{w|nurs&shy;ery school|Preschool}} when their chil&shy;dren reach the ap&shy;pro&shy;pri&shy;ate age and then de&shy;velop from the primary stage onward. The wealthy who are also in&shy;tent on edu&shy;ca&shy;ting their chil&shy;dren in in&shy;de&shy;pend&shy;ent schools, have found a vari&shy;ety of ways for fin&shy;ancing them by way of Deeds and Coven&shy;ant, en&shy;dow&shy;ment pol&shy;icies and so on. ({{w|John Vaizey|John_Vaizey,_Baron_Vaizey}} es&shy;tim&shy;ates that at present some&shy;thing like &pound;60 mil&shy;lion a year is spent on school fees and &pound;15-&pound;20 mil&shy;lion of this is found by tax-avoid&shy;ance).
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{{tab}}Why shouldn{{t}} the parents of a group of babies in the same age-group get together and plan a school for them well in ad&shy;vance, so as to ac&shy;cum&shy;ul&shy;ate the funds re&shy;quired before they are needed? They could as several groups of parents do, run their own {{w|nurs&shy;ery school|Preschool|Preschool}} when their chil&shy;dren reach the ap&shy;pro&shy;pri&shy;ate age and then de&shy;velop from the primary stage onward. The wealthy who are also in&shy;tent on edu&shy;ca&shy;ting their chil&shy;dren in in&shy;de&shy;pend&shy;ent schools, have found a vari&shy;ety of ways for fin&shy;ancing them by way of Deeds and Coven&shy;ant, en&shy;dow&shy;ment pol&shy;icies and so on. ({{w|John Vaizey|John_Vaizey,_Baron_Vaizey}} es&shy;tim&shy;ates that at present some&shy;thing like &pound;60 mil&shy;lion a year is spent on school fees and &pound;15-&pound;20 mil&shy;lion of this is found by tax-avoid&shy;ance).
  
{{tab}}Many of us on the other hand, are more con&shy;cerned with changing the ordin&shy;ary primary and second&shy;ary schools which the vast ma&shy;jor&shy;ity of chil&shy;dren at&shy;tend, changing the teach&shy;ing methods and changing parental and so&shy;cial at&shy;ti&shy;tudes. Some will simply say that this can&shy;not be done—this would be the view of the {{w|second&shy;ary modern|Secondary_modern_school}} [[Author:Mister P.|school-teacher]] who con&shy;trib&shy;utes an honest [[Anarchy 43/Teacher's dilemma|ac&shy;count]] of his prob&shy;lems else&shy;where in this issue. But others will say that it would be fool&shy;ish not to try to take ad&shy;vant&shy;age of the present wave of in&shy;ter&shy;est in edu&shy;ca&shy;tion and in the state of the schools.
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{{tab}}Many of us on the other hand, are more con&shy;cerned with changing the ordin&shy;ary primary and second&shy;ary schools which the vast ma&shy;jor&shy;ity of chil&shy;dren at&shy;tend, changing the teach&shy;ing methods and changing parental and so&shy;cial at&shy;ti&shy;tudes. Some will simply say that this can&shy;not be done—this would be the view of the {{w|second&shy;ary modern|Secondary_modern_school|Secondary modern school}} [[Author:Mister P.|school-teacher]] who con&shy;trib&shy;utes an honest [[Anarchy 43/Teacher's dilemma|ac&shy;count]] of his prob&shy;lems else&shy;where in this issue. But others will say that it would be fool&shy;ish not to try to take ad&shy;vant&shy;age of the present wave of in&shy;ter&shy;est in edu&shy;ca&shy;tion and in the state of the schools.
  
 
{{tab}}The anarch&shy;ist, seek&shy;ing func&shy;tional, as op&shy;posed to polit&shy;ical, answers to so&shy;cial needs, and con&shy;trast&shy;ing the so&shy;cial prin&shy;ciple with the polit&shy;ical prin&shy;ciple, sees in the state{{s}} con&shy;trol of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion a usurp&shy;a&shy;tion of a so&shy;cial func&shy;tion. (His&shy;tor&shy;ic&shy;ally of course, the Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion Act of 1870 didn{{t}} {{qq|usurp}} any&shy;body{{s}} func&shy;tion, but if you ac&shy;cept the con&shy;cep&shy;tion of an in&shy;verse rela&shy;tion&shy;ship between the state and so&shy;ciety—the strength of one re&shy;sult&shy;ing from the weak&shy;ness of the other—you can see how the so&shy;cial organ&shy;isa&shy;tion of popular edu&shy;ca&shy;tion was, so to speak, at&shy;rophied in ad&shy;vance, by its polit&shy;ical organ&shy;isa&shy;tion. That this has not been the dis&shy;aster—though some would say it has—that anarch&shy;ist think&shy;ers like {{p|280}}Godwin pre&shy;dic&shy;ted, has been due to the local dif&shy;fu&shy;sion of con&shy;trol, the di&shy;ver&shy;gent aims of teach&shy;ers and the re&shy;sili&shy;ence of chil&shy;dren).
 
{{tab}}The anarch&shy;ist, seek&shy;ing func&shy;tional, as op&shy;posed to polit&shy;ical, answers to so&shy;cial needs, and con&shy;trast&shy;ing the so&shy;cial prin&shy;ciple with the polit&shy;ical prin&shy;ciple, sees in the state{{s}} con&shy;trol of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion a usurp&shy;a&shy;tion of a so&shy;cial func&shy;tion. (His&shy;tor&shy;ic&shy;ally of course, the Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion Act of 1870 didn{{t}} {{qq|usurp}} any&shy;body{{s}} func&shy;tion, but if you ac&shy;cept the con&shy;cep&shy;tion of an in&shy;verse rela&shy;tion&shy;ship between the state and so&shy;ciety—the strength of one re&shy;sult&shy;ing from the weak&shy;ness of the other—you can see how the so&shy;cial organ&shy;isa&shy;tion of popular edu&shy;ca&shy;tion was, so to speak, at&shy;rophied in ad&shy;vance, by its polit&shy;ical organ&shy;isa&shy;tion. That this has not been the dis&shy;aster—though some would say it has—that anarch&shy;ist think&shy;ers like {{p|280}}Godwin pre&shy;dic&shy;ted, has been due to the local dif&shy;fu&shy;sion of con&shy;trol, the di&shy;ver&shy;gent aims of teach&shy;ers and the re&shy;sili&shy;ence of chil&shy;dren).
  
{{tab}}Func&shy;tion&shy;ally, the ad&shy;min&shy;istra&shy;tion of the school is the con&shy;cern of parents and teach&shy;ers, and if we really seek a so&shy;ciety of auto&shy;nom&shy;ous free as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions we must see such bodies as {{w|parent-teacher as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions|Parent-Teacher_Association}} as the kind of organ&shy;isa&shy;tion whose even&shy;tual and {{qq|natural}} func&shy;tion is to take over the schools from the {{w|Ministry|Ministry_of_Education_(United_Kingdom)}}, the {{w|County Coun&shy;cils|County_council#United_Kingdom}}, the Dir&shy;ect&shy;ors, In&shy;spect&shy;ors, Managers and Gov&shy;ern&shy;ors who, in a so&shy;ciety domi&shy;nated by the polit&shy;ical prin&shy;ciple are in&shy;evit&shy;ably their con&shy;trol&shy;lers. I don{{t}} know whether schools so ad&shy;min&shy;istered would be any better or any wrose than they are at present, but I do believe that a {{qq|self-regula&shy;ting}} so&shy;ciety would run its schools that way. Among in&shy;de&shy;pend&shy;ent schools in this country which ex&shy;em&shy;plify this kind of organ&shy;isa&shy;tion, there used to be [[Anarchy 43/Progressive experience|Burgess Hill School]] (de&shy;scribed by one of the [[Author:Olive Markham|parents]] in this issue of {{sc|anarchy}}) which was owned by a Friendly So&shy;ciety of parents and teach&shy;ers and there still is {{w|King Alfred School|King_Alfred_School,_London}}, governed by a so&shy;ciety of people in&shy;ter&shy;ested in modern edu&shy;ca&shy;tional methods and {{qq|ad&shy;min&shy;istered by an ad&shy;vis&shy;ory coun&shy;cil of pupils and staff}}. I have not heard of any parent-teacher as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions in the ordin&shy;ary school system which aspire to such func&shy;tions, though with the de&shy;velop&shy;ment of a vari&shy;ety of organ&shy;isa&shy;tions in the last few years con&shy;cerned with in&shy;ter&shy;est&shy;ing parents in edu&shy;ca&shy;tion, one can imagine the mem&shy;bers re&shy;flect&shy;ing after a time on whether their own in&shy;tense {{qq|par&shy;ti&shy;cip&shy;a&shy;tion}} had not rendered the usual com&shy;plic&shy;ated and ex&shy;pens&shy;ive bureau&shy;cracy of school ad&shy;min&shy;istra&shy;tion super&shy;flu&shy;ous.
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{{tab}}Func&shy;tion&shy;ally, the ad&shy;min&shy;istra&shy;tion of the school is the con&shy;cern of parents and teach&shy;ers, and if we really seek a so&shy;ciety of auto&shy;nom&shy;ous free as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions we must see such bodies as {{w|parent-teacher as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions|Parent-Teacher_Association|Parent-Teacher Association}} as the kind of organ&shy;isa&shy;tion whose even&shy;tual and {{qq|natural}} func&shy;tion is to take over the schools from the {{w|Ministry|Ministry_of_Education_(United_Kingdom)|Ministry of Education}}, the {{w|County Coun&shy;cils|County_council#United_Kingdom|County council}}, the Dir&shy;ect&shy;ors, In&shy;spect&shy;ors, Managers and Gov&shy;ern&shy;ors who, in a so&shy;ciety domi&shy;nated by the polit&shy;ical prin&shy;ciple are in&shy;evit&shy;ably their con&shy;trol&shy;lers. I don{{t}} know whether schools so ad&shy;min&shy;istered would be any better or any wrose than they are at present, but I do believe that a {{qq|self-regula&shy;ting}} so&shy;ciety would run its schools that way. Among in&shy;de&shy;pend&shy;ent schools in this country which ex&shy;em&shy;plify this kind of organ&shy;isa&shy;tion, there used to be [[Anarchy 43/Progressive experience|Burgess Hill School]] (de&shy;scribed by one of the [[Author:Olive Markham|parents]] in this issue of {{sc|anarchy}}) which was owned by a Friendly So&shy;ciety of parents and teach&shy;ers and there still is {{w|King Alfred School|King_Alfred_School,_London}}, governed by a so&shy;ciety of people in&shy;ter&shy;ested in modern edu&shy;ca&shy;tional methods and {{qq|ad&shy;min&shy;istered by an ad&shy;vis&shy;ory coun&shy;cil of pupils and staff}}. I have not heard of any parent-teacher as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions in the ordin&shy;ary school system which aspire to such func&shy;tions, though with the de&shy;velop&shy;ment of a vari&shy;ety of organ&shy;isa&shy;tions in the last few years con&shy;cerned with in&shy;ter&shy;est&shy;ing parents in edu&shy;ca&shy;tion, one can imagine the mem&shy;bers re&shy;flect&shy;ing after a time on whether their own in&shy;tense {{qq|par&shy;ti&shy;cip&shy;a&shy;tion}} had not rendered the usual com&shy;plic&shy;ated and ex&shy;pens&shy;ive bureau&shy;cracy of school ad&shy;min&shy;istra&shy;tion super&shy;flu&shy;ous.
  
 
{{tab}}The men&shy;tion of parent-teacher as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions—in theory an epitome of the kind of so&shy;cial organ&shy;isa&shy;tion which anarch&shy;ists en&shy;vis&shy;age—re&shy;minds us of their greater de&shy;velop&shy;ment in America, and the fact that this has not had ex&shy;actly the re&shy;sults that we as anarch&shy;ists would find de&shy;sir&shy;able. In his book ''On Being Human'', writing about the school as {{qq|a most im&shy;port&shy;ant agency in the teach&shy;ing of the art and sci&shy;ence of human rela&shy;tions}}, the an&shy;thro&shy;po&shy;lo&shy;gist and bio&shy;lo&shy;gist {{w|Ashley Montagu|Ashley_Montagu}} de&shy;clares:
 
{{tab}}The men&shy;tion of parent-teacher as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions—in theory an epitome of the kind of so&shy;cial organ&shy;isa&shy;tion which anarch&shy;ists en&shy;vis&shy;age—re&shy;minds us of their greater de&shy;velop&shy;ment in America, and the fact that this has not had ex&shy;actly the re&shy;sults that we as anarch&shy;ists would find de&shy;sir&shy;able. In his book ''On Being Human'', writing about the school as {{qq|a most im&shy;port&shy;ant agency in the teach&shy;ing of the art and sci&shy;ence of human rela&shy;tions}}, the an&shy;thro&shy;po&shy;lo&shy;gist and bio&shy;lo&shy;gist {{w|Ashley Montagu|Ashley_Montagu}} de&shy;clares:
Line 75: Line 75:
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}We must shift the em&shy;phasis from the three Rs to the fourth R, human rela&shy;tions, and place it first, fore&shy;most, and always in that order of im&shy;port&shy;ance as the prin&shy;cipal reason for the ex&shy;ist&shy;ence of the school. It must be clearly under&shy;stood, once and for all time, that human rela&shy;tions are the most im&shy;port&shy;ant of all rela&shy;tions. Upon this under&shy;stand&shy;ing must be based all our edu&shy;ca&shy;tional poli&shy;cies &hellip; Our teach&shy;ers must, there&shy;fore, be spe&shy;cially quali&shy;fied to teach human rela&shy;tions &hellip;</blockquote></font>
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}We must shift the em&shy;phasis from the three Rs to the fourth R, human rela&shy;tions, and place it first, fore&shy;most, and always in that order of im&shy;port&shy;ance as the prin&shy;cipal reason for the ex&shy;ist&shy;ence of the school. It must be clearly under&shy;stood, once and for all time, that human rela&shy;tions are the most im&shy;port&shy;ant of all rela&shy;tions. Upon this under&shy;stand&shy;ing must be based all our edu&shy;ca&shy;tional poli&shy;cies &hellip; Our teach&shy;ers must, there&shy;fore, be spe&shy;cially quali&shy;fied to teach human rela&shy;tions &hellip;</blockquote></font>
  
{{tab}}But the kind of thing that hap&shy;pens when this point of view filters into the school system is dis&shy;cussed by {{w|David Riesman|David_Riesman}} in his {{qq|Thoughts on Teach&shy;ers and Schools}}. The teach&shy;ing func&shy;tion, he ob&shy;serves, {{qq|has been ex&shy;tended to in&shy;clude train&shy;ing in group co-opera&shy;tion, manners, the arts, and self-under&shy;stand&shy;ing, as well as large residues of the tradi&shy;tional cur&shy;ricu&shy;lum}}. For Human Rela&shy;tions has in fact already become a class&shy;room sub&shy;ject, but some&shy;how not in Montagu{{s}} sense. {{qq|The school is im&shy;plica&shy;ted and em&shy;broiled}}, says Riesman, {{qq|in the changing forms {{p|281}}of America{{s}} pre&shy;oc&shy;cu&shy;pa&shy;tion with suc&shy;cess—the patina of suc&shy;cess now being de&shy;fined by such terms as {{q|group co-opera&shy;tion}}, {{q|self-under&shy;stand&shy;ing}}, {{q|per&shy;sonal ad&shy;just&shy;ment}} and {{q|get&shy;ting along with people}}.}}<!-- end quotation omitted in original; all inner quotations double in original --> The pro&shy;gres&shy;sive edu&shy;ca&shy;tion move&shy;ment, spread&shy;ing in a dis&shy;torted fashion through the state school systems, has, he feels, dove&shy;tailed with the {{qq|mind&shy;less prag&shy;mat&shy;ism and voca&shy;tion&shy;al&shy;ism}} which the schools ab&shy;sorb from their so&shy;cial sur&shy;round&shy;ings, from parents, super&shy;vis&shy;ors, tax&shy;payers and the vari&shy;ety of pres&shy;sure groups, great and small which sur&shy;round the American school boards. Mean&shy;while the teach&shy;ers lead lives of harried des&shy;per&shy;a&shy;tion fight&shy;ing a {{qq|losing battle in de&shy;fence of the tradi&shy;tional intel&shy;lec&shy;tual values}}. And he evolves, on the ana&shy;logy of {{w|Keynes&shy;ian eco&shy;nomics|Keynesian_economics}} a ''counter-cyc&shy;lical'' theory of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion. Just as {{w|Keynes|John_Maynard_Keynes}} re&shy;com&shy;mended spend&shy;ing in times of {{w|de&shy;pres&shy;sion|Depression_(economics)}}, so Riesman re&shy;com&shy;mends that {{qq|teach&shy;ers, in se&shy;lect&shy;ing among the ex&shy;pecta&shy;tions held out to them, have some modest op&shy;por&shy;tun&shy;ities to op&shy;pose life in its moment&shy;ary ex&shy;cesses}}. He wants {{qq|to en&shy;courage some of them to give up trying to be psy&shy;chi&shy;at&shy;rists, mothers<!-- 'mothersm' in original --> and moral&shy;ists, to give up making cit&shy;izens, demo&shy;crats, and toler&shy;ant chil&shy;dren. Could they not be per&shy;suaded to con&shy;cen&shy;trate more than many now feel justi&shy;fied in doing, on their roles as teach&shy;ers of spe&shy;cific sub&shy;jects? This is, after all, a job no one else is as&shy;signed or trained to do.}}
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{{tab}}But the kind of thing that hap&shy;pens when this point of view filters into the school system is dis&shy;cussed by {{w|David Riesman|David_Riesman}} in his {{qq|Thoughts on Teach&shy;ers and Schools}}. The teach&shy;ing func&shy;tion, he ob&shy;serves, {{qq|has been ex&shy;tended to in&shy;clude train&shy;ing in group co-opera&shy;tion, manners, the arts, and self-under&shy;stand&shy;ing, as well as large residues of the tradi&shy;tional cur&shy;ricu&shy;lum}}. For Human Rela&shy;tions has in fact already become a class&shy;room sub&shy;ject, but some&shy;how not in Montagu{{s}} sense. {{qq|The school is im&shy;plica&shy;ted and em&shy;broiled}}, says Riesman, {{qq|in the changing forms {{p|281}}of America{{s}} pre&shy;oc&shy;cu&shy;pa&shy;tion with suc&shy;cess—the patina of suc&shy;cess now being de&shy;fined by such terms as {{q|group co-opera&shy;tion}}, {{q|self-under&shy;stand&shy;ing}}, {{q|per&shy;sonal ad&shy;just&shy;ment}} and {{q|get&shy;ting along with people}}.}}<!-- end quotation omitted in original; all inner quotations double in original --> The pro&shy;gres&shy;sive edu&shy;ca&shy;tion move&shy;ment, spread&shy;ing in a dis&shy;torted fashion through the state school systems, has, he feels, dove&shy;tailed with the {{qq|mind&shy;less prag&shy;mat&shy;ism and voca&shy;tion&shy;al&shy;ism}} which the schools ab&shy;sorb from their so&shy;cial sur&shy;round&shy;ings, from parents, super&shy;vis&shy;ors, tax&shy;payers and the vari&shy;ety of pres&shy;sure groups, great and small which sur&shy;round the American school boards. Mean&shy;while the teach&shy;ers lead lives of harried des&shy;per&shy;a&shy;tion fight&shy;ing a {{qq|losing battle in de&shy;fence of the tradi&shy;tional intel&shy;lec&shy;tual values}}. And he evolves, on the ana&shy;logy of {{w|Keynes&shy;ian eco&shy;nomics|Keynesian_economics}} a ''counter-cyc&shy;lical'' theory of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion. Just as {{w|Keynes|John_Maynard_Keynes|John Maynard Keynes}} re&shy;com&shy;mended spend&shy;ing in times of {{w|de&shy;pres&shy;sion|Depression_(economics)|Depression (economics)}}, so Riesman re&shy;com&shy;mends that {{qq|teach&shy;ers, in se&shy;lect&shy;ing among the ex&shy;pecta&shy;tions held out to them, have some modest op&shy;por&shy;tun&shy;ities to op&shy;pose life in its moment&shy;ary ex&shy;cesses}}. He wants {{qq|to en&shy;courage some of them to give up trying to be psy&shy;chi&shy;at&shy;rists, mothers<!-- 'mothersm' in original --> and moral&shy;ists, to give up making cit&shy;izens, demo&shy;crats, and toler&shy;ant chil&shy;dren. Could they not be per&shy;suaded to con&shy;cen&shy;trate more than many now feel justi&shy;fied in doing, on their roles as teach&shy;ers of spe&shy;cific sub&shy;jects? This is, after all, a job no one else is as&shy;signed or trained to do.}}
  
{{tab}}Montagu writes that {{qq|A so&shy;ciety such as ours, in which human rela&shy;tions are sub&shy;merged in the eco&shy;nomic system, can rescue itself only by sub&shy;merging its eco&shy;nomy in the matrix of human rela&shy;tions &hellip; And this is the task that the schools must assist in under&shy;taking, no less that the rescue of man from his de&shy;basing en&shy;slave&shy;ment to the prin&shy;ciples and prac&shy;tices of an aquis&shy;it&shy;ive so&shy;ciety}}. But how does the at&shy;tempt work out? We may gain a clue from the book {{popup|''Crestwood Heights'': ''A North American Suburb''|University of Toronto Press (1956)}} by {{popup|Seeley|John R. Seeley}}, {{popup|Sim|R. Alexander Sim}} and {{popup|Loosley|Elizabeth W. Loosley}}. {{w|Crest&shy;wood Heights|Forest_Hill,_Toronto}}<!-- "Crestwood Heights" is pseudonymous and refers to Toronto's Forest Hill, according to Allan Levine in Toronto: Biography of a City (2014). --> is built around its modern, well-equipped and en&shy;light&shy;ened schools. It is par&shy;ticu&shy;larly {{qq|child-ori&shy;ented}} and the Crest&shy;wood Heights parents {{qq|ap&shy;pear to have ac&shy;cepted nearly all the values which the human&shy;ists, the liber&shy;als, and the psy&shy;chi&shy;atric&shy;ally ori&shy;ented speak&shy;ers and writers have ad&shy;voc&shy;ated over the last fifty years.}} All the right ad&shy;ject&shy;ives are used. {{qq|In the city}}, writes William J. Newman, {{qq|com&shy;peti&shy;tion is open, ac&shy;know&shy;ledged, and brutal; in the suburb toler&shy;a&shy;tion, per&shy;mis&shy;sive&shy;ness, and in&shy;di&shy;vidual choice are the rule. The child is brought up as an auto&shy;no&shy;mous spon&shy;tan&shy;eous in&shy;di&shy;vidual: thus the open glass school. The suburb will pro&shy;vide the arena in which the family and espe&shy;cially the chil&shy;dren can emerge as {{q|free}} and {{q|re&shy;spons&shy;ible}}, ready to take their place in the world.}} But the well-meaning parents of Crest&shy;wood Heights are pur&shy;su&shy;ing for their chil&shy;dren two contra&shy;dict&shy;ory goals, {{qq|suc&shy;cess}} and {{qq|psy&shy;cho&shy;logical matur&shy;ity}}. The authors ob&shy;serve that:
+
{{tab}}Montagu writes that {{qq|A so&shy;ciety such as ours, in which human rela&shy;tions are sub&shy;merged in the eco&shy;nomic system, can rescue itself only by sub&shy;merging its eco&shy;nomy in the matrix of human rela&shy;tions &hellip; And this is the task that the schools must assist in under&shy;taking, no less that the rescue of man from his de&shy;basing en&shy;slave&shy;ment to the prin&shy;ciples and prac&shy;tices of an aquis&shy;it&shy;ive so&shy;ciety}}. But how does the at&shy;tempt work out? We may gain a clue from the book {{popup|''Crestwood Heights'': ''A North American Suburb''|University of Toronto Press (1956)}} by {{popup|Seeley|John R. Seeley}}, {{popup|Sim|R. Alexander Sim}} and {{popup|Loosley|Elizabeth W. Loosley}}. {{w|Crest&shy;wood Heights|Forest_Hill,_Toronto|Forest Hill, Toronto}}<!-- "Crestwood Heights" is pseudonymous and refers to Toronto's Forest Hill, according to Allan Levine in Toronto: Biography of a City (2014). --> is built around its modern, well-equipped and en&shy;light&shy;ened schools. It is par&shy;ticu&shy;larly {{qq|child-ori&shy;ented}} and the Crest&shy;wood Heights parents {{qq|ap&shy;pear to have ac&shy;cepted nearly all the values which the human&shy;ists, the liber&shy;als, and the psy&shy;chi&shy;atric&shy;ally ori&shy;ented speak&shy;ers and writers have ad&shy;voc&shy;ated over the last fifty years.}} All the right ad&shy;ject&shy;ives are used. {{qq|In the city}}, writes William J. Newman, {{qq|com&shy;peti&shy;tion is open, ac&shy;know&shy;ledged, and brutal; in the suburb toler&shy;a&shy;tion, per&shy;mis&shy;sive&shy;ness, and in&shy;di&shy;vidual choice are the rule. The child is brought up as an auto&shy;no&shy;mous spon&shy;tan&shy;eous in&shy;di&shy;vidual: thus the open glass school. The suburb will pro&shy;vide the arena in which the family and espe&shy;cially the chil&shy;dren can emerge as {{q|free}} and {{q|re&shy;spons&shy;ible}}, ready to take their place in the world.}} But the well-meaning parents of Crest&shy;wood Heights are pur&shy;su&shy;ing for their chil&shy;dren two contra&shy;dict&shy;ory goals, {{qq|suc&shy;cess}} and {{qq|psy&shy;cho&shy;logical matur&shy;ity}}. The authors ob&shy;serve that:
  
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}The child must be free in ac&shy;cord&shy;ance with demo&shy;cratic ideo&shy;logy; but he must, by no means, become free to the point of re&shy;noun&shy;cing either the ma&shy;terial suc&shy;cess goals or the en&shy;gin&shy;eered co-opera&shy;tion in&shy;tegral to the ad&shy;equate func&shy;tion&shy;ing of an in&shy;dus&shy;trial civil&shy;isa&shy;tion.</blockquote></font>
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}The child must be free in ac&shy;cord&shy;ance with demo&shy;cratic ideo&shy;logy; but he must, by no means, become free to the point of re&shy;noun&shy;cing either the ma&shy;terial suc&shy;cess goals or the en&shy;gin&shy;eered co-opera&shy;tion in&shy;tegral to the ad&shy;equate func&shy;tion&shy;ing of an in&shy;dus&shy;trial civil&shy;isa&shy;tion.</blockquote></font>
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{{tab}}In this country the pioneer of parent-teacher co-opera&shy;tion was the Home and School Com&shy;mit&shy;tee of the {{l|New Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion Fel&shy;low&shy;ship|http://www.wef-international.org/}}. An&shy;other body, the Na&shy;tional Fed&shy;er&shy;a&shy;tion of {{w|Parent-Teacher As&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions|Parent-Teacher_Association#United_Kingdom}} was founded in 1956, link&shy;ing together many exist&shy;ing bodies. Some of these as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions have sprung up in a neg&shy;at&shy;ive way to resist, and in some cases suc&shy;cess&shy;fully avert {{qq|closing-down}} orders for schools. In the case of one in&shy;de&shy;pend&shy;ent school in London ({{w|St. Paul{{s}} Junior School|St_Paul's_Juniors}}, {{w|Hammer&shy;smith|Hammersmith}}) due to be closed down because the exist&shy;ing build&shy;ing could not eco&shy;nom&shy;ically be kept in repair while the trust&shy;ees could not find the money for a new build&shy;ing, the parents suc&shy;cess&shy;fully raised loans for it, an&shy;noun&shy;cing that they {{qq|would ac&shy;cept finan&shy;cial and edu&shy;ca&shy;tional re&shy;spons&shy;ibil&shy;ity for a new school}}. Other as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions con&shy;nected with both primary and second&shy;ary schools have pro&shy;vided their schools with swim&shy;ming baths, or have seen their func&shy;tion in im&shy;prov&shy;ing the school{{s}} equip&shy;ment—pro&shy;viding such equip&shy;ment as record-players, film-pro&shy;jec&shy;tors, stage-light&shy;ing and so on. On the pit&shy;falls and pos&shy;sibil&shy;ities of this kind of organ&shy;isa&shy;tion, the staff at one school re&shy;ported that:
+
{{tab}}In this country the pioneer of parent-teacher co-opera&shy;tion was the Home and School Com&shy;mit&shy;tee of the {{l|New Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion Fel&shy;low&shy;ship|http://www.wef-international.org/|World Education Fellowship web site}}. An&shy;other body, the Na&shy;tional Fed&shy;er&shy;a&shy;tion of {{w|Parent-Teacher As&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions|Parent-Teacher_Association#United_Kingdom|Parent-Teacher Association}} was founded in 1956, link&shy;ing together many exist&shy;ing bodies. Some of these as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions have sprung up in a neg&shy;at&shy;ive way to resist, and in some cases suc&shy;cess&shy;fully avert {{qq|closing-down}} orders for schools. In the case of one in&shy;de&shy;pend&shy;ent school in London ({{w|St. Paul{{s}} Junior School|St_Paul's_Juniors|St Paul's Juniors}}, {{w|Hammer&shy;smith|Hammersmith}}) due to be closed down because the exist&shy;ing build&shy;ing could not eco&shy;nom&shy;ically be kept in repair while the trust&shy;ees could not find the money for a new build&shy;ing, the parents suc&shy;cess&shy;fully raised loans for it, an&shy;noun&shy;cing that they {{qq|would ac&shy;cept finan&shy;cial and edu&shy;ca&shy;tional re&shy;spons&shy;ibil&shy;ity for a new school}}. Other as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions con&shy;nected with both primary and second&shy;ary schools have pro&shy;vided their schools with swim&shy;ming baths, or have seen their func&shy;tion in im&shy;prov&shy;ing the school{{s}} equip&shy;ment—pro&shy;viding such equip&shy;ment as record-players, film-pro&shy;jec&shy;tors, stage-light&shy;ing and so on. On the pit&shy;falls and pos&shy;sibil&shy;ities of this kind of organ&shy;isa&shy;tion, the staff at one school re&shy;ported that:
  
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}&hellip; the pro&shy;gress of several chil&shy;dren in arith&shy;metic was being im&shy;peded by well-inten&shy;tioned ef&shy;forts to help them at home. At a series of even&shy;ing meet&shy;ings, the staff worked through spe&shy;ci&shy;men arith&shy;metic papers with the fath&shy;ers and moth&shy;ers, ex&shy;plain&shy;ing the par&shy;tic&shy;u&shy;lar methods in use at the school. Simil&shy;arly, the head&shy;mis&shy;tress of a village school intro&shy;duced italic hand&shy;writ&shy;ing, a move which ap&shy;peared to per&shy;turb some parents. As a result of dis&shy;cus&shy;sion several moth&shy;ers became inter&shy;ested and asked her to ar&shy;range even&shy;ing classes so that they might learn it for them&shy;selves.</blockquote></font>
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}&hellip; the pro&shy;gress of several chil&shy;dren in arith&shy;metic was being im&shy;peded by well-inten&shy;tioned ef&shy;forts to help them at home. At a series of even&shy;ing meet&shy;ings, the staff worked through spe&shy;ci&shy;men arith&shy;metic papers with the fath&shy;ers and moth&shy;ers, ex&shy;plain&shy;ing the par&shy;tic&shy;u&shy;lar methods in use at the school. Simil&shy;arly, the head&shy;mis&shy;tress of a village school intro&shy;duced italic hand&shy;writ&shy;ing, a move which ap&shy;peared to per&shy;turb some parents. As a result of dis&shy;cus&shy;sion several moth&shy;ers became inter&shy;ested and asked her to ar&shy;range even&shy;ing classes so that they might learn it for them&shy;selves.</blockquote></font>
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{{tab}}Another of the dif&shy;fi&shy;culties fre&shy;quently met in the rela&shy;tions of parents and teach&shy;ers is the narrow con&shy;cern dis&shy;played so fre&shy;quently by the anxious middle-class parents in little Johnny{{s}} {{w|11-plus|Eleven-plus}} or {{w|GCE|General_Certificate_of_Education}} pro&shy;spects, to the ex&shy;clu&shy;sion of an interest in the class or the school or the age-group as a whole. The at&shy;ti&shy;tude may be under&shy;stand&shy;able, but it is never&shy;the&shy;less prim&shy;itive to those who see as one of the pleas&shy;ures of parent&shy;hood an en&shy;large&shy;ment of sym&shy;pathy and con&shy;cern from one{{s}} own bio&shy;lo&shy;gical off&shy;spring to chil&shy;dren in general. Two other more recent de&shy;velop&shy;ments in edu&shy;ca&shy;tional organ&shy;isa&shy;tions may help to bring about this wider view which is cer&shy;tainly a pre&shy;requis&shy;ite for the parent-teacher control of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion which we see as an eventual aim.
+
{{tab}}Another of the dif&shy;fi&shy;culties fre&shy;quently met in the rela&shy;tions of parents and teach&shy;ers is the narrow con&shy;cern dis&shy;played so fre&shy;quently by the anxious middle-class parents in little Johnny{{s}} {{w|11-plus|Eleven-plus|Eleven-plus}} or {{w|GCE|General_Certificate_of_Education|General Certificate of Education}} pro&shy;spects, to the ex&shy;clu&shy;sion of an interest in the class or the school or the age-group as a whole. The at&shy;ti&shy;tude may be under&shy;stand&shy;able, but it is never&shy;the&shy;less prim&shy;itive to those who see as one of the pleas&shy;ures of parent&shy;hood an en&shy;large&shy;ment of sym&shy;pathy and con&shy;cern from one{{s}} own bio&shy;lo&shy;gical off&shy;spring to chil&shy;dren in general. Two other more recent de&shy;velop&shy;ments in edu&shy;ca&shy;tional organ&shy;isa&shy;tions may help to bring about this wider view which is cer&shy;tainly a pre&shy;requis&shy;ite for the parent-teacher control of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion which we see as an eventual aim.
  
{{p|284}}{{tab}}The first of these is ACE, the {{l|Advis&shy;ory Centre for Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion|http://www.socialinnovationexchange.org/categories/read/advisory-centre-education}} founded in 1960. This is an&shy;other brain-child of {{w|Michael Young|Michael_Young,_Baron_Young_of_Dartington}} who started the {{w|Insti&shy;tute of Commun&shy;ity Studies|Institute_of_Community_Studies}} and the Con&shy;sum&shy;er{{s|r}} As&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tion, and just as the latter organ&shy;isa&shy;tion and its journal {{w|''Which''|Which%3F}} seeks to im&shy;prove the qual&shy;ity of our con&shy;sump&shy;tion of goods and ser&shy;vices, so ACE and its journal ''Where''? (sub&shy;scrip&shy;tion &pound;1 a year) seeks to give the same kind of in&shy;depend&shy;ent, un&shy;biased as&shy;sess&shy;ment and ad&shy;vice for the con&shy;sum&shy;ers of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion. The con&shy;sumer ap&shy;proach with its im&shy;plied philo&shy;sophy of {{qq|he who pays the piper calls the tune}} could be the vehicle of a narrow {{w|phil&shy;istin&shy;ism|Philistinism}}, but in prac&shy;tice it is sound and sens&shy;ible. Michael Young returns to the theme in the annual report of the Con&shy;sum&shy;er{{s|r}}<!-- no apostrophe in original --> As&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tion, pub&shy;lished last month. The at&shy;ti&shy;tude of re&shy;gard&shy;ing parents as intrud&shy;ers in the schools is ruin&shy;ous to good edu&shy;ca&shy;tion, he de&shy;clares, {{qq|How can parents take an in&shy;ter&shy;est if they are barely al&shy;lowed inside the schools? The sooner parents play a part in our schools, the sooner will the money be found for their im&shy;prove&shy;ment.}} In fact, ACE, as readers of ''Where''? will agree, is an in&shy;valu&shy;able medium for closing the gap between parents and teachers.
+
{{p|284}}{{tab}}The first of these is ACE, the {{l|Advis&shy;ory Centre for Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion|https://socialinnovationexchange.org/insights/advisory-centre-education|Social Innovation Exchange article}} founded in 1960. This is an&shy;other brain-child of {{w|Michael Young|Michael_Young,_Baron_Young_of_Dartington}} who started the {{w|Insti&shy;tute of Commun&shy;ity Studies|Institute_of_Community_Studies}} and the Con&shy;sum&shy;er{{s|r}} As&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tion, and just as the latter organ&shy;isa&shy;tion and its journal {{w|''Which''|Which%3F|Which?}} seeks to im&shy;prove the qual&shy;ity of our con&shy;sump&shy;tion of goods and ser&shy;vices, so ACE and its journal ''Where''? (sub&shy;scrip&shy;tion &pound;1 a year) seeks to give the same kind of in&shy;depend&shy;ent, un&shy;biased as&shy;sess&shy;ment and ad&shy;vice for the con&shy;sum&shy;ers of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion. The con&shy;sumer ap&shy;proach with its im&shy;plied philo&shy;sophy of {{qq|he who pays the piper calls the tune}} could be the vehicle of a narrow {{w|phil&shy;istin&shy;ism|Philistinism|Philistinism}}, but in prac&shy;tice it is sound and sens&shy;ible. Michael Young returns to the theme in the annual report of the Con&shy;sum&shy;er{{s|r}}<!-- no apostrophe in original --> As&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tion, pub&shy;lished last month. The at&shy;ti&shy;tude of re&shy;gard&shy;ing parents as intrud&shy;ers in the schools is ruin&shy;ous to good edu&shy;ca&shy;tion, he de&shy;clares, {{qq|How can parents take an in&shy;ter&shy;est if they are barely al&shy;lowed inside the schools? The sooner parents play a part in our schools, the sooner will the money be found for their im&shy;prove&shy;ment.}} In fact, ACE, as readers of ''Where''? will agree, is an in&shy;valu&shy;able medium for closing the gap between parents and teachers.
  
{{tab}}The second of these new trends is the spring&shy;ing-up of {{w|As&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions for the Ad&shy;vance&shy;ment of State Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion|Campaign_for_State_Education}}. This move&shy;ment again began in {{w|Cambridge|Cambridge}} in 1960, when a group of parents tried to hurry along im&shy;prove&shy;ments to a {{w|Newnham|Newnham,_Cambridgeshire}} primary school. They found that the poor con&shy;di&shy;tions were more wide&shy;spread than they had real&shy;ised and that re&shy;stric&shy;tions in edu&shy;ca&shy;tional ex&shy;pend&shy;i&shy;ture pre&shy;vented any&shy;thing from being done. From the ori&shy;ginal pres&shy;sure group, others sprang up in dif&shy;fer&shy;ent parts of the country and today there are bout 90 such as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions with a total of 10,000 members feder&shy;ated in CASE, the Con&shy;feder&shy;a&shy;tion of As&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions for the Ad&shy;vance&shy;ment of State Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion, which has been con&shy;duct&shy;ing na&shy;tional en&shy;quiries on a vari&shy;ety of edu&shy;ca&shy;tional topics. Un&shy;doubt&shy;edly this move&shy;ment—co-exist&shy;ing, not com&shy;peting, with Parent-Teacher As&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions—<!-- comma rather than dash in original -->has helped to widen people{{s}} field of con&shy;cern from one child in one school, to the schools of the city or county and of the country.
+
{{tab}}The second of these new trends is the spring&shy;ing-up of {{w|As&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions for the Ad&shy;vance&shy;ment of State Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion|Campaign_for_State_Education|Campaign for State Education}}. This move&shy;ment again began in {{w|Cambridge|Cambridge}} in 1960, when a group of parents tried to hurry along im&shy;prove&shy;ments to a {{w|Newnham|Newnham,_Cambridgeshire}} primary school. They found that the poor con&shy;di&shy;tions were more wide&shy;spread than they had real&shy;ised and that re&shy;stric&shy;tions in edu&shy;ca&shy;tional ex&shy;pend&shy;i&shy;ture pre&shy;vented any&shy;thing from being done. From the ori&shy;ginal pres&shy;sure group, others sprang up in dif&shy;fer&shy;ent parts of the country and today there are bout 90 such as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions with a total of 10,000 members feder&shy;ated in CASE, the Con&shy;feder&shy;a&shy;tion of As&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions for the Ad&shy;vance&shy;ment of State Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion, which has been con&shy;duct&shy;ing na&shy;tional en&shy;quiries on a vari&shy;ety of edu&shy;ca&shy;tional topics. Un&shy;doubt&shy;edly this move&shy;ment—co-exist&shy;ing, not com&shy;peting, with Parent-Teacher As&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions—<!-- comma rather than dash in original -->has helped to widen people{{s}} field of con&shy;cern from one child in one school, to the schools of the city or county and of the country.
  
 
{{tab}}Before get&shy;ting too ex&shy;cited about this trend of course, we should at&shy;tend an as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tion meet&shy;ing, to dis&shy;cover, once again, the solidly middle-class at&shy;tend&shy;ance and the dis&shy;con&shy;cert&shy;ingly vo&shy;ca&shy;tional at&shy;ti&shy;tudes to edu&shy;ca&shy;tion ex&shy;pressed from the floor. However, what better forum could there be for the edu&shy;ca&shy;tion of parents? And is it in&shy;con&shy;ceiv&shy;able that some, without adopt&shy;ing an at&shy;ti&shy;tude of patron&shy;age or su&shy;peri&shy;or&shy;ity, could de&shy;vote them&shy;selves to bring&shy;ing others in?
 
{{tab}}Before get&shy;ting too ex&shy;cited about this trend of course, we should at&shy;tend an as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tion meet&shy;ing, to dis&shy;cover, once again, the solidly middle-class at&shy;tend&shy;ance and the dis&shy;con&shy;cert&shy;ingly vo&shy;ca&shy;tional at&shy;ti&shy;tudes to edu&shy;ca&shy;tion ex&shy;pressed from the floor. However, what better forum could there be for the edu&shy;ca&shy;tion of parents? And is it in&shy;con&shy;ceiv&shy;able that some, without adopt&shy;ing an at&shy;ti&shy;tude of patron&shy;age or su&shy;peri&shy;or&shy;ity, could de&shy;vote them&shy;selves to bring&shy;ing others in?
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{{tab}}Are there ways in which parents can push further into the de&shy;cision-making bodies on edu&shy;ca&shy;tion?<!-- period in original --> The ori&shy;ginal Cambridge As&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tion for the Ad&shy;vance&shy;ment of State Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion put up two members as in&shy;depend&shy;ent can&shy;did&shy;ates for the county council elec&shy;tions. One was elected and is now on the edu&shy;ca&shy;tion com&shy;mit&shy;tee. This is hardly a pro&shy;cedure which fits into an anarch&shy;ist ap&shy;proach to the prob&shy;lem, although one of our fre&shy;quent con&shy;trib&shy;ut&shy;ors, [[Author:Paul Goodman|Paul Goodman]] is proud to be a School Board member in {{w|New York|New_York_City}}. But what about parents as school gov&shy;ernors or school man&shy;agers? (Readers inter&shy;ested will find an article on what their func&shy;tions are and how they are ap&shy;pointed in ''Where''? No. 10). Dis&shy;cus&shy;sing parent-teacher rela&shy;tions in a letter to the {{w|''New States&shy;man''|New_Statesman}} in March this year, Mr. John McCann made an inter&shy;est&shy;ing point which most of us never knew and which should pro&shy;vide useful am&shy;muni&shy;tion in argu&shy;ments with local au&shy;thor&shy;ities: that back in 1944 the gov&shy;ern&shy;ment gave a pledge that parents would be properly rep&shy;res&shy;ented on the man&shy;aging bodies of the schools at&shy;tended by their chil&shy;dren. Mr. McCann says:
+
{{tab}}Are there ways in which parents can push further into the de&shy;cision-making bodies on edu&shy;ca&shy;tion?<!-- period in original --> The ori&shy;ginal Cambridge As&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tion for the Ad&shy;vance&shy;ment of State Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion put up two members as in&shy;depend&shy;ent can&shy;did&shy;ates for the county council elec&shy;tions. One was elected and is now on the edu&shy;ca&shy;tion com&shy;mit&shy;tee. This is hardly a pro&shy;cedure which fits into an anarch&shy;ist ap&shy;proach to the prob&shy;lem, although one of our fre&shy;quent con&shy;trib&shy;ut&shy;ors, [[Author:Paul Goodman|Paul Goodman]] is proud to be a School Board member in {{w|New York|New_York_City|New York City}}. But what about parents as school gov&shy;ernors or school man&shy;agers? (Readers inter&shy;ested will find an article on what their func&shy;tions are and how they are ap&shy;pointed in ''Where''? No. 10). Dis&shy;cus&shy;sing parent-teacher rela&shy;tions in a letter to the {{w|''New States&shy;man''|New_Statesman}} in March this year, Mr. John McCann made an inter&shy;est&shy;ing point which most of us never knew and which should pro&shy;vide useful am&shy;muni&shy;tion in argu&shy;ments with local au&shy;thor&shy;ities: that back in 1944 the gov&shy;ern&shy;ment gave a pledge that parents would be properly rep&shy;res&shy;ented on the man&shy;aging bodies of the schools at&shy;tended by their chil&shy;dren. Mr. McCann says:
  
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}At the Com&shy;mit&shy;tee stage of the {{w|1944 Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion Act|Education_Act_1944}} the gov&shy;ern&shy;ment gave an under&shy;taking to see that parents would be pro&shy;perly rep&shy;res&shy;ented on the man&shy;aging bodies of primary schools. It was stated that they were not to be {{qq|drawn from a dif&shy;fer&shy;ent so&shy;cial stratum from that in which the pupils of the schools are found, but that some, at least, of the Man&shy;agers will be people who live the daily life of the village or town, who are in close as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tion with the parents, and can make the wishes of the parents known to the Man&shy;agers and to the teach&shy;ers.}} This ad&shy;mir&shy;able prin&shy;ciple was laid down in the form of an under&shy;taking which is binding—for it was on that as&shy;sur&shy;ance that a Member of Par&shy;lia&shy;ment with&shy;drew an amend&shy;ment he had pro&shy;posed.</blockquote></font>
+
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}At the Com&shy;mit&shy;tee stage of the {{w|1944 Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion Act|Education_Act_1944|Education Act 1944}} the gov&shy;ern&shy;ment gave an under&shy;taking to see that parents would be pro&shy;perly rep&shy;res&shy;ented on the man&shy;aging bodies of primary schools. It was stated that they were not to be {{qq|drawn from a dif&shy;fer&shy;ent so&shy;cial stratum from that in which the pupils of the schools are found, but that some, at least, of the Man&shy;agers will be people who live the daily life of the village or town, who are in close as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tion with the parents, and can make the wishes of the parents known to the Man&shy;agers and to the teach&shy;ers.}} This ad&shy;mir&shy;able prin&shy;ciple was laid down in the form of an under&shy;taking which is binding—for it was on that as&shy;sur&shy;ance that a Member of Par&shy;lia&shy;ment with&shy;drew an amend&shy;ment he had pro&shy;posed.</blockquote></font>
  
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}This under&shy;taking has not been im&shy;ple&shy;mented. Some au&shy;thor&shy;ities try to see that parents are genu&shy;inely rep&shy;res&shy;ented, some pay lip service to the prin&shy;ciple, some regard the prin&shy;ciple with sus&shy;pi&shy;cion. The bodies which ap&shy;point Founda&shy;tion Man&shy;agers of vol&shy;un&shy;tary schools often come into the last cat&shy;egory. Hun&shy;dreds of years of strife over elect&shy;oral rep&shy;res&shy;ent&shy;a&shy;tion have shown that there is only one way to achieve ad&shy;equate rep&shy;res&shy;ent&shy;a&shy;tion; that is for the people con&shy;cerned to elect their own rep&shy;res&shy;ent&shy;at&shy;ive. No nom&shy;in&shy;a&shy;tion from above is going {{p|286}}to work or to sat&shy;isfy the people who want to be rep&shy;res&shy;ented.</blockquote></font>
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}This under&shy;taking has not been im&shy;ple&shy;mented. Some au&shy;thor&shy;ities try to see that parents are genu&shy;inely rep&shy;res&shy;ented, some pay lip service to the prin&shy;ciple, some regard the prin&shy;ciple with sus&shy;pi&shy;cion. The bodies which ap&shy;point Founda&shy;tion Man&shy;agers of vol&shy;un&shy;tary schools often come into the last cat&shy;egory. Hun&shy;dreds of years of strife over elect&shy;oral rep&shy;res&shy;ent&shy;a&shy;tion have shown that there is only one way to achieve ad&shy;equate rep&shy;res&shy;ent&shy;a&shy;tion; that is for the people con&shy;cerned to elect their own rep&shy;res&shy;ent&shy;at&shy;ive. No nom&shy;in&shy;a&shy;tion from above is going {{p|286}}to work or to sat&shy;isfy the people who want to be rep&shy;res&shy;ented.</blockquote></font>
  
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}The gov&shy;ern&shy;ment under&shy;taking could be honoured very simply, without any change in the law, if the {{w|Min&shy;ister of Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion|Secretary_of_State_for_Education}} would ask local au&shy;thor&shy;ities to ap&shy;point one Man&shy;ager ''who had been elected at a meet&shy;ing of parents con&shy;vened by the head&shy;master''. The parents should have the right to elect one of them&shy;selves or any other person (other than those already dis&shy;qual&shy;ified—teach&shy;ers at the school, trades&shy;men sup&shy;ply&shy;ing the school, etc.). Local edu&shy;ca&shy;tion au&shy;thor&shy;ities ap&shy;point one, two or four Man&shy;agers ac&shy;cord&shy;ing to whether it is an {{w|Aided|Voluntary_aided_school}}, {{w|Con&shy;trolled|Voluntary_controlled_school}} or {{w|County|Community_school_(England_and_Wales)}} school. I am sug&shy;gesting in all cases that this elec&shy;tion pro&shy;ced&shy;ure be ap&shy;plied to the ap&shy;point&shy;ment of one {{w|LEA|Local_education_authority}} Man&shy;ager.</blockquote></font>
+
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}The gov&shy;ern&shy;ment under&shy;taking could be honoured very simply, without any change in the law, if the {{w|Min&shy;ister of Edu&shy;ca&shy;tion|Secretary_of_State_for_Education|Secretary of State for Education}} would ask local au&shy;thor&shy;ities to ap&shy;point one Man&shy;ager ''who had been elected at a meet&shy;ing of parents con&shy;vened by the head&shy;master''. The parents should have the right to elect one of them&shy;selves or any other person (other than those already dis&shy;qual&shy;ified—teach&shy;ers at the school, trades&shy;men sup&shy;ply&shy;ing the school, etc.). Local edu&shy;ca&shy;tion au&shy;thor&shy;ities ap&shy;point one, two or four Man&shy;agers ac&shy;cord&shy;ing to whether it is an {{w|Aided|Voluntary_aided_school|Voluntary aided school}}, {{w|Con&shy;trolled|Voluntary_controlled_school|Voluntary controlled school}} or {{w|County|Community_school_(England_and_Wales)|Community school}} school. I am sug&shy;gesting in all cases that this elec&shy;tion pro&shy;ced&shy;ure be ap&shy;plied to the ap&shy;point&shy;ment of one {{w|LEA|Local_education_authority|Local education authority}} Man&shy;ager.</blockquote></font>
  
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}It is some&shy;times said that School Man&shy;agers have no powers. At Aided schools they have very real powers, at all schools they have duties. Man&shy;aging bodies vary greatly in the ex&shy;tent to which they fulfil their duties, but in the most suc&shy;cess&shy;ful schools they per&shy;form a valu&shy;able service par&shy;tic&shy;u&shy;larly in the field of parent-school rela&shy;tion&shy;ships.</blockquote></font>
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}It is some&shy;times said that School Man&shy;agers have no powers. At Aided schools they have very real powers, at all schools they have duties. Man&shy;aging bodies vary greatly in the ex&shy;tent to which they fulfil their duties, but in the most suc&shy;cess&shy;ful schools they per&shy;form a valu&shy;able service par&shy;tic&shy;u&shy;larly in the field of parent-school rela&shy;tion&shy;ships.</blockquote></font>
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{{tab}}And how do teach&shy;ers react to all this? Many of course are de&shy;lighted to make con&shy;tact with the parents of their pupils and to feel that they have a shared con&shy;cern. Their only regret is that the parents whom they most need to meet are the very ones they never see at open-days, parent-teacher func&shy;tions and so on. Rela&shy;tions are closest in the in&shy;fant{{s|r}} school and seem to dwindle away later. {{qq|What hap&shy;pens then}} asks Jean Rintoul, {{qq|that this close parent-teacher rela&shy;tion&shy;ship should be broken as the child gets older until, in the later second&shy;ary years, it is worse than non-exist&shy;ent? Is the teacher to blame and, if the teacher is, will a brief talk with a parent at an ap&shy;pro&shy;pri&shy;ately-spaced {{q|surgery}} suf&shy;fice? The answer to that is in the answer to an&shy;other ques&shy;tion: {{q|Who are the parents who are going to at&shy;tend the sur&shy;gery?}} That{{s}} an easy ques&shy;tion and every teacher can answer it. They will be the same parents who at&shy;tend the parent-teacher as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tion meet&shy;ings, the school prize-givings, the school con&shy;cert or play; the same parents whose chil&shy;dren are readily iden&shy;ti&shy;fi&shy;able in every class because such chil&shy;dren ex&shy;hibit all the well-being and con&shy;fid&shy;ence that a priv&shy;ileged home provides.}} This is one of the prob&shy;lems of parent-teacher relations for which a solu&shy;tion has not been found.
 
{{tab}}And how do teach&shy;ers react to all this? Many of course are de&shy;lighted to make con&shy;tact with the parents of their pupils and to feel that they have a shared con&shy;cern. Their only regret is that the parents whom they most need to meet are the very ones they never see at open-days, parent-teacher func&shy;tions and so on. Rela&shy;tions are closest in the in&shy;fant{{s|r}} school and seem to dwindle away later. {{qq|What hap&shy;pens then}} asks Jean Rintoul, {{qq|that this close parent-teacher rela&shy;tion&shy;ship should be broken as the child gets older until, in the later second&shy;ary years, it is worse than non-exist&shy;ent? Is the teacher to blame and, if the teacher is, will a brief talk with a parent at an ap&shy;pro&shy;pri&shy;ately-spaced {{q|surgery}} suf&shy;fice? The answer to that is in the answer to an&shy;other ques&shy;tion: {{q|Who are the parents who are going to at&shy;tend the sur&shy;gery?}} That{{s}} an easy ques&shy;tion and every teacher can answer it. They will be the same parents who at&shy;tend the parent-teacher as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tion meet&shy;ings, the school prize-givings, the school con&shy;cert or play; the same parents whose chil&shy;dren are readily iden&shy;ti&shy;fi&shy;able in every class because such chil&shy;dren ex&shy;hibit all the well-being and con&shy;fid&shy;ence that a priv&shy;ileged home provides.}} This is one of the prob&shy;lems of parent-teacher relations for which a solu&shy;tion has not been found.
  
{{tab}}There are teach&shy;ers too, who have a deep sus&shy;pi&shy;cion of par&shy;ental en&shy;croach&shy;ment on their func&shy;tions and their au&shy;to&shy;nomy. Their point of view was put with more-than-usual frank&shy;ness by Mr. G. B. Corrin in a letter to the {{w|''Times Edu&shy;ca&shy;tional Sup&shy;ple&shy;ment''|TES_(magazine)}} ({{popup|10/4/64|10 April 1964}}). Com&shy;ment&shy;ing on a pro&shy;posal by an {{popup|AASE|Association for the Advancement of State Education}} sec&shy;ret&shy;ary that time for even&shy;ing meet&shy;ings with parents should be written into the teach&shy;er{{s}} con&shy;di&shy;tions of service, Mr. Corrin asked:
+
{{tab}}There are teach&shy;ers too, who have a deep sus&shy;pi&shy;cion of par&shy;ental en&shy;croach&shy;ment on their func&shy;tions and their au&shy;to&shy;nomy. Their point of view was put with more-than-usual frank&shy;ness by Mr. G. B. Corrin in a letter to the {{w|''Times Edu&shy;ca&shy;tional Sup&shy;ple&shy;ment''|TES_(magazine)|TES (magazine)}} ({{popup|10/4/64|10 April 1964}}). Com&shy;ment&shy;ing on a pro&shy;posal by an {{popup|AASE|Association for the Advancement of State Education}} sec&shy;ret&shy;ary that time for even&shy;ing meet&shy;ings with parents should be written into the teach&shy;er{{s}} con&shy;di&shy;tions of service, Mr. Corrin asked:
  
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}When the child of one of these parents goes into hos&shy;pital for an oper&shy;a&shy;tion, do they demand a meet&shy;ing with the sur&shy;geon at a time con&shy;veni&shy;ent to them&shy;selves and then criti&shy;cise his methods? I con&shy;sider myself as highly trained and as ex&shy;peri&shy;enced in my work as any sur&shy;geon, and I resent this in&shy;tru&shy;sion by the ignor&shy;ant, who ap&shy;par&shy;ently have no faith in my abil&shy;ity to do the job for which I am paid. Parent-teacher as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions and such-like may be useful for raising money which the gov&shy;ern&shy;ment is too parsi&shy;mo&shy;ni&shy;ous to pro&shy;vide and ar&shy;ran&shy;ging so&shy;cial activ&shy;ities for those who have nothing better to do, but, in my ex&shy;peri&shy;ence they in no way benefit the edu&shy;ca&shy;tion of the chil&shy;dren and can become a posit&shy;ive {{p|287}}nuis&shy;ance because of their in&shy;abil&shy;ity to resist the temp&shy;ta&shy;tion to inter&shy;fere. Cer&shy;tainly, many parents are ignor&shy;ant about edu&shy;ca&shy;tion, but is it the teach&shy;er{{s|r}} busi&shy;ness to in&shy;struct them? If so, let classes be ar&shy;ranged and the teach&shy;ers re&shy;muner&shy;ated. But parents can&shy;not plead ignor&shy;ance and at the same time demand the right to inter&shy;fere with those who have been pro&shy;perly trained to carry out the edu&shy;ca&shy;tion of their chil&shy;dren.</blockquote></font>
 
<font size="2"><blockquote>{{tab}}When the child of one of these parents goes into hos&shy;pital for an oper&shy;a&shy;tion, do they demand a meet&shy;ing with the sur&shy;geon at a time con&shy;veni&shy;ent to them&shy;selves and then criti&shy;cise his methods? I con&shy;sider myself as highly trained and as ex&shy;peri&shy;enced in my work as any sur&shy;geon, and I resent this in&shy;tru&shy;sion by the ignor&shy;ant, who ap&shy;par&shy;ently have no faith in my abil&shy;ity to do the job for which I am paid. Parent-teacher as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions and such-like may be useful for raising money which the gov&shy;ern&shy;ment is too parsi&shy;mo&shy;ni&shy;ous to pro&shy;vide and ar&shy;ran&shy;ging so&shy;cial activ&shy;ities for those who have nothing better to do, but, in my ex&shy;peri&shy;ence they in no way benefit the edu&shy;ca&shy;tion of the chil&shy;dren and can become a posit&shy;ive {{p|287}}nuis&shy;ance because of their in&shy;abil&shy;ity to resist the temp&shy;ta&shy;tion to inter&shy;fere. Cer&shy;tainly, many parents are ignor&shy;ant about edu&shy;ca&shy;tion, but is it the teach&shy;er{{s|r}} busi&shy;ness to in&shy;struct them? If so, let classes be ar&shy;ranged and the teach&shy;ers re&shy;muner&shy;ated. But parents can&shy;not plead ignor&shy;ance and at the same time demand the right to inter&shy;fere with those who have been pro&shy;perly trained to carry out the edu&shy;ca&shy;tion of their chil&shy;dren.</blockquote></font>
  
{{tab}}Obvi&shy;ously the writer of this letter would be not only hostile, but deris&shy;ory about our view that the form of edu&shy;ca&shy;tional organ&shy;isa&shy;tion which we should see as our aim is one in which con&shy;trol of the schools is in the hands of as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions of parents and teach&shy;ers. For teach&shy;ers, as Sir {{w|Ronald Gould|Ronald_Gould_(trade_unionist)}} once put it, {{qq|neither love nor trust the parish pump.}} The vehe&shy;mence with which London teach&shy;ers op&shy;posed the in&shy;tended break-up of the {{w|LCC|London_County_Council}}{{s}} edu&shy;ca&shy;tion service shows how strongly they prefer the remote and im&shy;per&shy;sonal control of {{w|County Hall|County_Hall,_London}} to the near-at-hand inter&shy;fering bureau&shy;cracy of {{qq|the office}} which teach&shy;ers in many other parts of the country suf&shy;fer and resent. We can car&shy;tainly under&shy;stand, in view of the sheer number of bosses which the organ&shy;isa&shy;tion of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion has set over them, why they regard en&shy;croach&shy;ment by parents beyond a cer&shy;tain point and beyond cer&shy;tain topics, with sus&shy;pi&shy;cion. And when you see some of those self-con&shy;fid&shy;ent high-income con&shy;sum&shy;ers in some of the AASEs, who quite obvi&shy;ously regard the teach&shy;ers as their servants and not as their partners, you can see the point of this sus&shy;pi&shy;cion.
+
{{tab}}Obvi&shy;ously the writer of this letter would be not only hostile, but deris&shy;ory about our view that the form of edu&shy;ca&shy;tional organ&shy;isa&shy;tion which we should see as our aim is one in which con&shy;trol of the schools is in the hands of as&shy;so&shy;ci&shy;a&shy;tions of parents and teach&shy;ers. For teach&shy;ers, as Sir {{w|Ronald Gould|Ronald_Gould_(trade_unionist)}} once put it, {{qq|neither love nor trust the parish pump.}} The vehe&shy;mence with which London teach&shy;ers op&shy;posed the in&shy;tended break-up of the {{w|LCC|London_County_Council|London County Council}}{{s}} edu&shy;ca&shy;tion service shows how strongly they prefer the remote and im&shy;per&shy;sonal control of {{w|County Hall|County_Hall,_London|County Hall, London}} to the near-at-hand inter&shy;fering bureau&shy;cracy of {{qq|the office}} which teach&shy;ers in many other parts of the country suf&shy;fer and resent. We can car&shy;tainly under&shy;stand, in view of the sheer number of bosses which the organ&shy;isa&shy;tion of edu&shy;ca&shy;tion has set over them, why they regard en&shy;croach&shy;ment by parents beyond a cer&shy;tain point and beyond cer&shy;tain topics, with sus&shy;pi&shy;cion. And when you see some of those self-con&shy;fid&shy;ent high-income con&shy;sum&shy;ers in some of the AASEs, who quite obvi&shy;ously regard the teach&shy;ers as their servants and not as their partners, you can see the point of this sus&shy;pi&shy;cion.
  
 
{{tab}}Nor would it be wise to as&shy;sume that it is a ques&shy;tion of pro&shy;gres&shy;sive parents and re&shy;ac&shy;tion&shy;ary or time-serving teach&shy;ers. It is much more often the other way round, as every&shy;one who has tried in humble ways to intro&shy;duce pro&shy;gres&shy;sive methods into the schools has found. When Teddy O&rsquo;Neill was head&shy;master of {{w|Prestolee|Prestolee}} School in {{w|Lanca&shy;shire|Lancashire}} and set about trans&shy;form&shy;ing it, it was with the sup&shy;port of the local edu&shy;ca&shy;tion au&shy;thor&shy;ity and of the In&shy;spect&shy;orate, and against the hostil&shy;ity and abuse of local parents—and it took him years to win them over.
 
{{tab}}Nor would it be wise to as&shy;sume that it is a ques&shy;tion of pro&shy;gres&shy;sive parents and re&shy;ac&shy;tion&shy;ary or time-serving teach&shy;ers. It is much more often the other way round, as every&shy;one who has tried in humble ways to intro&shy;duce pro&shy;gres&shy;sive methods into the schools has found. When Teddy O&rsquo;Neill was head&shy;master of {{w|Prestolee|Prestolee}} School in {{w|Lanca&shy;shire|Lancashire}} and set about trans&shy;form&shy;ing it, it was with the sup&shy;port of the local edu&shy;ca&shy;tion au&shy;thor&shy;ity and of the In&shy;spect&shy;orate, and against the hostil&shy;ity and abuse of local parents—and it took him years to win them over.

Revision as of 02:21, 26 September 2021


275

Reflections on
parents, teachers
and schools

JOHN ELLERBY


What anarch­ists are after is per­sonal and so­cial auto­nomy—the idea that in­di­viduals and their organ­isa­tions should be self-reg­u­lat­ing auto­no­mous bodies. It is this which makes us ad­voc­ates of workers’ control in in­dus­try and which makes us en­thusi­astic about such ex­amples as we find of so­cial organ­isa­tions spring up from below, from people’s urge to sat­isfy their own needs, as op­posed to those which depend on a struc­ture of hier­archy, power and au­thor­ity in which one set of people give in­struc­tions and another set of people carry them out.

  The the­or­et­ical ap­pli­ca­tion of our ideas to the organ­isa­tion of edu­ca­tion is clear enough. The auto­nom­ous self-govern­ing school is the aim, and in view of the ob­vi­ous limits within which chil­dren may be said to govern them­selves, this means in prac­tice a school con­trolled by teach­ers by virtue of their func­tional re­spons­ibil­ity to chil­dren, and by parents because of their bio­lo­gical re­spons­ibil­ity for them. But the issue is more com­pli­ca­ted, for in both prim­it­ive and com­plex com­mun­it­ies it is recog­nised that all adults have a re­spons­ibil­ity towards chil­dren, which because of the vagar­ies and vicis­si­tudes of in­di­vidual parent­age, may have to be exer­cised on its behalf or on the child’s behalf. Once that is ad­mit­ted, we have of course ad­mit­ted that edu­ca­tion is the con­cern of the com­mun­ity. But what com­mun­ity? The state as in France, the local au­thor­ity as in the United States, or a mix­ture of the two as in Britain? And where does the re­spons­ibil­ity of the com­mun­ity begin and end?

  Should edu­ca­tion be com­puls­ory anyway? (And is the com­pul­sion to be ap­plied to the child or to the parent?) Bakunin saw the ques­tion dia­lect­ic­ally:

  The prin­ciple of au­thor­ity, in the edu­ca­tion of chil­dren, con­sti­tutes the natural point of de­par­ture; it is leg­itim­ate, neces­sary, when ap­plied to chil­dren of a tender age, whose intel­li­gence has not yet openly de­veloped itself. But as the de­velop­ment of every­thing, and con­sequently of edu­ca­tion, im­plies the gradual nega­tion of the point of de­par­ture, this prin­ciple must dimin­ish as fast as edu­ca­tion and in­struc­tion ad­vance, giving place to in­creas­ing liberty. All ra­tional edu­ca­tion is at bottom nothing but this pro­gres­sive im­mola­tion of au­thor­ity for the benefit of liberty, the final ob­ject of edu­ca­tion neces­sarily
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being the form­a­tion of free men full of re­spect and love for the liberty of others. There­fore the first day of the pupil’s life, if the school takes infants scarcely able as yet to stam­mer a few words, should be that of the great­est au­thor­ity and an almost entire ab­sence of liberty; but its last day should be that of the great­est liberty and the ab­solute aboli­tion of every vestige of the animal or divine prin­ciple of au­thor­ity.

  Eighty-five years later, Ethel Mannin in her utopian survey Bread and Roses took a more ab­solutely “liber­tarian” line:

  At this point you per­haps pro­test, “But if there is no com­pul­sion, what hap­pens if a child does not want to at­tend school of any kind, and the parents are not con­cerned to per­suade him?” It is quite simple. In that case the child does not at­tend any school. As he becomes adoles­cent he may wish to ac­quire some learn­ing. Or he may de­velop school-going friends and wish to at­tend school because they do. But if he doesn’t he is never­the­less learn­ing all the time, his natural child’s creat­ive­ness work­ing in happy alli­ance with his free­dom. No Utopian parent would think of using that moral coer­cion we call ‘per­sua­sion’. By the time he reaches adoles­cence the child grows tired of run­ning wild, and begins to ident­ify himself with grown-ups; he per­ceives the use­ful­ness of know­ing how to read and write and add, and there is prob­ably some special thing he wants to learn—such as how to drive a train or build a bridge or a house. It is all very much simpler than our pro­fes­sional edu­ca­tion­ists would have us believe.

  Some of us think it is not that simple. But the point is aca­demic, for in prac­tice the deci­sion is that of the parents. Nowadays it is only highly soph­ist­ic­ated and edu­ca­ted people who bother to argue about whether or not it is desir­able that chil­dren should learn the three Rs. The law in this country does not in fact re­quire parents to send their chil­dren to school; it im­poses an obli­ga­tion on them to see that their chil­dren while within the com­puls­ory age, are re­ceiv­ing “an ap­propri­ate edu­ca­tion”. The oc­ca­sional pro­secu­tions of re­calcit­rant parents usually reveal a degree of apathy, in­dif­fer­ence or parental in­com­pet­ence that hardly pro­vides a good case for the op­ponents of com­pul­sion, though they do some­times rope in highly con­scien­tious parents whose views on edu­ca­tion do not hap­pen to co­incide with those of the local au­thor­ity. (Mrs. Joy Baker’s ac­count of her long and in the end suc­cess­ful struggle with the au­thor­it­ies will be re­viewed in a coming issue of anarchy). Usually, apart from a few of the rich, with their gover­nesses and tutors, there are not many parents with the time or skill to teach their chil­dren at home, and of those who could, many must feel it unfair to de­prive their chil­dren of the pleasures and so­cial ex­peri­ence of be­long­ing to a com­mun­ity of their peers, or may cherish the right of parents to have the kids out of their way for some of the time—and the recip­rocal right of their children to be outside the parental at­mo­sphere.


*   *   *


  Histor­ic­ally, in this country, the strug­gle to make edu­ca­tion free, com­puls­ory and uni­versal, and out of the ex­clus­ive con­trol of reli­gious organ­isa­tions, was long and bitter, and the op­po­si­tion to it came, not from liber­tarian ob­jectors, but from the up­hold­ers of priv­ilege and dogma, and from those (both parents and em­ploy­ers) who had an eco­nomic inter­est in the labour of chil­dren or a vested inter­est in ignor­ance. The very reason why it had to be made com­puls­ory ninety-four
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years ago was because chil­dren were an eco­nomic asset. Read­ers of chap­ters 8 and 12 of Marx’s Capital will not dis­sent from the as­ser­tion that the in­dus­trial re­volu­tion was made by the chil­dren of the poor. As late as 1935 Lord Halifax, as Pres­id­ent of the Board of Edu­ca­tion, op­pos­ing the pro­posal to raise the school leaving age from four­teen to fif­teen, de­clared that “public opinion would not toler­ate an un­con­di­tional raising of the age” and the Bradford tex­tile manu­fac­turers as­sured him that “there was work for little fingers there.”

  The no­tion that primary ecu­ca­tion should be free, com­puls­ory and uni­versal is very much older than the English Act of 1870. It grew up with the print­ing press and the rise of prot­est­ant­ism. The rich had been edu­cated by the Church and the sons of the rising bour­geoisie in the grammar schools of the Middle Ages. From the 16th century on arose a grad­ual demand that all should be taught. Martin Luther ap­pealed “To the Coun­cil­men of all Cities in Germany that they estab­lish and main­tain Christian Schools”, ob­serv­ing that the train­ing chil­dren get at home “at­tempts to make us wise through our ex­peri­ence” a task for which life itself is too short, and which could be ac­cel­er­ated by sys­tema­tic in­struc­tion by means of books. Com­puls­ory uni­versal edu­ca­tion was founded in Calvin­ist Geneva in 1536, and Calvin’s Scottish dis­ciple John Knox “planted a school as well as a kirk in every parish.” In puritan Mas­sachu­setts free com­puls­ory primary edu­ca­tion was intro­duced in 1647. The common school, writes Lewis Mumford in The Condi­tion of Man:

  … con­trary to popular belief, is no be­lated pro­duct of 19th century demo­cracy: I have pointed out that it played a neces­sary part in the ab­solu­tist-mech­an­ical form­ula. Friedrich Wilhelm I of Prussia, fol­lowing Luther’s pre­cept, made primary edu­ca­tion com­puls­ory in his realm in 1717, and foun­ded 1,700 schools to meet the needs of the poor. Two ordin­ances of Louis XIV in 1694 and 1698 and one of Louis XV in 1724 re­quired regular at­tend­ance at school. Even England, a strag­gler in such mat­ters, had hun­dreds of private char­ity schools, some of them foun­ded by the So­ci­ety for Pro­moting Chris­tian Know­ledge, which had been in­cor­por­ated in 1699. Vergerious, one of the earliest renais­sance school­masters, had thought edu­ca­tion an es­sen­tial func­tion of the State; and cen­tral­ised au­thor­ity was now be­lat­edly taking up the work that had been neg­lected with the wiping out of mu­ni­cipal free­dom in the greater part of Europe.

  All the ra­tion­al­ist philo­sophers of the 18th century thought about the prob­lems of edu­ca­tion, and of them, the two acutest edu­ca­tional think­ers ranged them­selves on op­pos­ite sides on the ques­tion of the organ­isa­tion of edu­ca­tion: Rousseau for the State, Godwin against it. Rousseau, whose Emile pos­tu­lates a com­pletely in­di­vidual edu­ca­tion (human so­ciety is ig­nored, the tutor’s entire life is de­voted to poor Emile), did never­the­less con­cern himself with the so­cial aspect, argu­ing, in his Dis­course on Polit­ical Eco­nomy (1755) for public edu­ca­tion “under regu­la­tions pre­scribed by the govern­ment”, for

  If chil­dren are brought up in com­mon in the bosom of equal­ity; if they are im­bued with the laws of the State and the pre­cepts of the General Will … we can­not doubt that they will cher­ish one another mu­tually as broth­ers … to become in time de­fenders and fath­ers of the country of which they will have been so long the chil­dren.

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  William Godwin, who, in his En­quirer at­tacks the con­cealed au­thor­it­ar­ian­ism of Rousseau’s edu­ca­tional theor­ies, criti­cises in his En­quiry Con­cern­ing Polit­ical Justice (1793), the idea of na­tional edu­ca­tion. He sum­mar­ises the argu­ments in favour, which are those of Rousseau, adding to them the ques­tion:

  If the edu­ca­tion of our youth be en­tirely con­fined to the pru­dence of their parents, or the ac­cid­ental be­ne­vol­ence of private in­di­viduals, will it not be a neces­sary con­se­quence, that some will be edu­cated to virtue, others to vice, and others again en­tirely neg­lected?

  Godwin’s answer is:

  The injur­ies that re­sult from a system of na­tional edu­ca­tion are, in the first place, that all public estab­lish­ments in­clude in them the idea of per­man­ence. They en­deavour, it may be, to se­cure and to dif­fuse what­ever of ad­vant­age to so­ciety is already known, but they forget that more re­mains to be known … But public edu­ca­tion has always ex­pended its en­er­gies in the sup­port of pre­jud­ice; it teaches its pupils not the fort­i­tude that shall bring every pro­pos­i­tion to the test of exam­ina­tion, but the art of vin­dic­at­ing such tenets as may chance to be previ­ously estab­lished … This feature runs through every spe­cies of public estab­lish­ment; and, even in the petty in­sti­tu­tion of Sunday schools, the chief les­sons that are taught are a super­sti­tious vener­a­tion for the Church of England, and to bow to every man in a hand­some coat … Refer them to read­ing, to con­ver­sa­tion, to medi­ta­tion, but teach them neither creeds nor cat­ech­isms, neither moral nor polit­ical …

  Secondly, the idea of na­tional edu­ca­tion is foun­ded in an in­at­ten­tion to the nature of mind. What­ever each man does for him­self is done well; what­ever his neigh­bours or his country under­take to do for him is done ill. It is our wisdom to in­cite men to act for them­selves, not to retain them in a state of per­petual pupil­lage. He that learns because he desires to learn will listen to the in­struc­tions he re­ceives and ap­pre­hend their mean­ing. He that teaches because he desires to teach will dis­charge his oc­cupa­tion with en­thusi­asm and energy. But the moment polit­ical in­sti­tu­tion under­takes to as­sign to every man his place, the func­tions of all will be dis­charged with supine­ness and in­dif­fer­ence …

  Thirdly, the pro­ject of a na­tional edu­ca­tion ought uni­formly to be dis­cour­aged on ac­count of its ob­vious al­li­ance with na­tional govern­ment. This is an al­li­ance of a more for­mid­able nature than the old and much con­tested al­li­ance of church and state. Before we put so power­ful a ma­chine under the direc­tion of so ambi­tious an agent, it be­hoves us to con­sider well what we do. Govern­ment will not fail to em­ploy it to strengthen its hands and per­pet­u­ate its in­sti­tu­tions … Their view as in­sti­gator of a system of edu­ca­tion will not fail to be ana­log­ous to their views in their polit­ical cap­acity: the data upon which their con­duct as states­men is vin­dic­ated will be the data upon which their in­sti­tu­tions are foun­ded. It is not true that our youth ought to be in­struc­ted to vener­ate the con­sti­tu­tion, however ex­cel­lent; they should be in­struc­ted to vener­ate truth … (Even) in the coun­tries where liberty chiefly pre­vails, it is reason­ably to be as­sumed that there are im­port­ant errors, and a na­tional edu­ca­tion has the most direct tend­ency to per­pet­u­ate those errors and to form all minds upon one model.

  Godwin’s argu­ments are worth quoting at this length, not only as the classic state­ment of an anarch­ist posi­tion on this issue, but because they have had such ample sub­se­quent just­ifi­ca­tion. On the other hand he does not really answer the ques­tion of how we can en­sure that every child can have free ac­cess to what­ever edu­ca­tional facil­it­ies will suit its in­di­vidual needs.

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  In practice, in this country today people who want to try an anarch­ist ap­proach to edu­ca­tion have two pos­sible courses of action: to work in the private sector—in­de­pend­ent schools of one kind or an­other, a minor­ity of which are pro­gres­sive, or to work in the normal school system and try to in­flu­ence it in a “pro­gres­sive” direc­tion. These two courses are by no means mu­tu­ally ex­clus­ive, and there is plenty of evid­ence of the in­flu­ence of the former on the latter.

  It is sur­pris­ing, and cer­tainly sad­den­ing, con­sider­ing the number of people in­ter­ested in “pro­gres­sive” schools, how few of them there are and how they seldom in­spire other people to start them. For ex­ample, the pub­lica­tion of Summer­hill a com­pil­a­tion of the writ­ings of A. S. Neill brought about a great deal of in­ter­est in his school and his ideas in America; there was an embar­ras­sing pro­ces­sion of over­seas vis­it­ors to Neill’s little school in Suffolk, but how few of the ad­mirers and vis­it­ors set about start­ing more schools on similar lines. A few did: one of the con­trib­u­tions in this issue of anarchy comes from people who are trying to.

  Why shouldn’t the parents of a group of babies in the same age-group get together and plan a school for them well in ad­vance, so as to ac­cum­ul­ate the funds re­quired before they are needed? They could as several groups of parents do, run their own nurs­ery school when their chil­dren reach the ap­pro­pri­ate age and then de­velop from the primary stage onward. The wealthy who are also in­tent on edu­ca­ting their chil­dren in in­de­pend­ent schools, have found a vari­ety of ways for fin­ancing them by way of Deeds and Coven­ant, en­dow­ment pol­icies and so on. (John Vaizey es­tim­ates that at present some­thing like £60 mil­lion a year is spent on school fees and £15-£20 mil­lion of this is found by tax-avoid­ance).

  Many of us on the other hand, are more con­cerned with changing the ordin­ary primary and second­ary schools which the vast ma­jor­ity of chil­dren at­tend, changing the teach­ing methods and changing parental and so­cial at­ti­tudes. Some will simply say that this can­not be done—this would be the view of the second­ary modern school-teacher who con­trib­utes an honest ac­count of his prob­lems else­where in this issue. But others will say that it would be fool­ish not to try to take ad­vant­age of the present wave of in­ter­est in edu­ca­tion and in the state of the schools.

  The anarch­ist, seek­ing func­tional, as op­posed to polit­ical, answers to so­cial needs, and con­trast­ing the so­cial prin­ciple with the polit­ical prin­ciple, sees in the state’s con­trol of edu­ca­tion a usurp­a­tion of a so­cial func­tion. (His­tor­ic­ally of course, the Edu­ca­tion Act of 1870 didn’t “usurp” any­body’s func­tion, but if you ac­cept the con­cep­tion of an in­verse rela­tion­ship between the state and so­ciety—the strength of one re­sult­ing from the weak­ness of the other—you can see how the so­cial organ­isa­tion of popular edu­ca­tion was, so to speak, at­rophied in ad­vance, by its polit­ical organ­isa­tion. That this has not been the dis­aster—though some would say it has—that anarch­ist think­ers like
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Godwin pre­dic­ted, has been due to the local dif­fu­sion of con­trol, the di­ver­gent aims of teach­ers and the re­sili­ence of chil­dren).

  Func­tion­ally, the ad­min­istra­tion of the school is the con­cern of parents and teach­ers, and if we really seek a so­ciety of auto­nom­ous free as­so­ci­a­tions we must see such bodies as parent-teacher as­so­ci­a­tions as the kind of organ­isa­tion whose even­tual and “natural” func­tion is to take over the schools from the Ministry, the County Coun­cils, the Dir­ect­ors, In­spect­ors, Managers and Gov­ern­ors who, in a so­ciety domi­nated by the polit­ical prin­ciple are in­evit­ably their con­trol­lers. I don’t know whether schools so ad­min­istered would be any better or any wrose than they are at present, but I do believe that a “self-regula­ting” so­ciety would run its schools that way. Among in­de­pend­ent schools in this country which ex­em­plify this kind of organ­isa­tion, there used to be Burgess Hill School (de­scribed by one of the parents in this issue of anarchy) which was owned by a Friendly So­ciety of parents and teach­ers and there still is King Alfred School, governed by a so­ciety of people in­ter­ested in modern edu­ca­tional methods and “ad­min­istered by an ad­vis­ory coun­cil of pupils and staff”. I have not heard of any parent-teacher as­so­ci­a­tions in the ordin­ary school system which aspire to such func­tions, though with the de­velop­ment of a vari­ety of organ­isa­tions in the last few years con­cerned with in­ter­est­ing parents in edu­ca­tion, one can imagine the mem­bers re­flect­ing after a time on whether their own in­tense “par­ti­cip­a­tion” had not rendered the usual com­plic­ated and ex­pens­ive bureau­cracy of school ad­min­istra­tion super­flu­ous.

  The men­tion of parent-teacher as­so­ci­a­tions—in theory an epitome of the kind of so­cial organ­isa­tion which anarch­ists en­vis­age—re­minds us of their greater de­velop­ment in America, and the fact that this has not had ex­actly the re­sults that we as anarch­ists would find de­sir­able. In his book On Being Human, writing about the school as “a most im­port­ant agency in the teach­ing of the art and sci­ence of human rela­tions”, the an­thro­po­lo­gist and bio­lo­gist Ashley Montagu de­clares:

  We must shift the em­phasis from the three Rs to the fourth R, human rela­tions, and place it first, fore­most, and always in that order of im­port­ance as the prin­cipal reason for the ex­ist­ence of the school. It must be clearly under­stood, once and for all time, that human rela­tions are the most im­port­ant of all rela­tions. Upon this under­stand­ing must be based all our edu­ca­tional poli­cies … Our teach­ers must, there­fore, be spe­cially quali­fied to teach human rela­tions …

  But the kind of thing that hap­pens when this point of view filters into the school system is dis­cussed by David Riesman in his “Thoughts on Teach­ers and Schools”. The teach­ing func­tion, he ob­serves, “has been ex­tended to in­clude train­ing in group co-opera­tion, manners, the arts, and self-under­stand­ing, as well as large residues of the tradi­tional cur­ricu­lum”. For Human Rela­tions has in fact already become a class­room sub­ject, but some­how not in Montagu’s sense. “The school is im­plica­ted and em­broiled”, says Riesman, “in the changing forms
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of America’s pre­oc­cu­pa­tion with suc­cess—the patina of suc­cess now being de­fined by such terms as ‘group co-opera­tion’, ‘self-under­stand­ing’, ‘per­sonal ad­just­ment’ and ‘get­ting along with people’.” The pro­gres­sive edu­ca­tion move­ment, spread­ing in a dis­torted fashion through the state school systems, has, he feels, dove­tailed with the “mind­less prag­mat­ism and voca­tion­al­ism” which the schools ab­sorb from their so­cial sur­round­ings, from parents, super­vis­ors, tax­payers and the vari­ety of pres­sure groups, great and small which sur­round the American school boards. Mean­while the teach­ers lead lives of harried des­per­a­tion fight­ing a “losing battle in de­fence of the tradi­tional intel­lec­tual values”. And he evolves, on the ana­logy of Keynes­ian eco­nomics a counter-cyc­lical theory of edu­ca­tion. Just as Keynes re­com­mended spend­ing in times of de­pres­sion, so Riesman re­com­mends that “teach­ers, in se­lect­ing among the ex­pecta­tions held out to them, have some modest op­por­tun­ities to op­pose life in its moment­ary ex­cesses”. He wants “to en­courage some of them to give up trying to be psy­chi­at­rists, mothers and moral­ists, to give up making cit­izens, demo­crats, and toler­ant chil­dren. Could they not be per­suaded to con­cen­trate more than many now feel justi­fied in doing, on their roles as teach­ers of spe­cific sub­jects? This is, after all, a job no one else is as­signed or trained to do.”

  Montagu writes that “A so­ciety such as ours, in which human rela­tions are sub­merged in the eco­nomic system, can rescue itself only by sub­merging its eco­nomy in the matrix of human rela­tions … And this is the task that the schools must assist in under­taking, no less that the rescue of man from his de­basing en­slave­ment to the prin­ciples and prac­tices of an aquis­it­ive so­ciety”. But how does the at­tempt work out? We may gain a clue from the book Crestwood Heights: A North American Suburb by Seeley, Sim and Loosley. Crest­wood Heights is built around its modern, well-equipped and en­light­ened schools. It is par­ticu­larly “child-ori­ented” and the Crest­wood Heights parents “ap­pear to have ac­cepted nearly all the values which the human­ists, the liber­als, and the psy­chi­atric­ally ori­ented speak­ers and writers have ad­voc­ated over the last fifty years.” All the right ad­ject­ives are used. “In the city”, writes William J. Newman, “com­peti­tion is open, ac­know­ledged, and brutal; in the suburb toler­a­tion, per­mis­sive­ness, and in­di­vidual choice are the rule. The child is brought up as an auto­no­mous spon­tan­eous in­di­vidual: thus the open glass school. The suburb will pro­vide the arena in which the family and espe­cially the chil­dren can emerge as ‘free’ and ‘re­spons­ible’, ready to take their place in the world.” But the well-meaning parents of Crest­wood Heights are pur­su­ing for their chil­dren two contra­dict­ory goals, “suc­cess” and “psy­cho­logical matur­ity”. The authors ob­serve that:

  The child must be free in ac­cord­ance with demo­cratic ideo­logy; but he must, by no means, become free to the point of re­noun­cing either the ma­terial suc­cess goals or the en­gin­eered co-opera­tion in­tegral to the ad­equate func­tion­ing of an in­dus­trial civil­isa­tion.

And Newman com­ments:

  But it is not only the func­tion­ing of an in­dus­trial civil­isa­tion which pro­vides the drive behind the over­master­ing of in­di­vidual choice; it is the urge to go from status to status, for one gener­a­tion to achieve in the eyes of their peers what the other could not, which is the mot­ive force of Amer­ican life in the suburb. The child ‘is forced into the posi­tion of having to choose those means which will as­sure his ul­ti­mate en­trance into an ap­pro­pri­ate adult oc­cu­pa­tional status’. Since it is a choice made on the sly through an omni­present cul­ture, the child ‘sees no au­thor­ity figures against which to rebel, should he feel the desire to do so … The child has there­fore, only one re­course—to turn his at­tacks against himself.’ A pleas­ant so­ciety this, a new so­ciety, in which free­dom is in­sti­tu­tion­alised, where choice is dic­tated.

  So this “free and pro­gres­sive” edu­ca­tion becomes, with the best of in­ten­tions, no better than Rousseau’s system which Godwin de­scribed as “a puppet-show ex­hib­i­tion, of which the master holds the wires, and the scholar is never to suspect in what man­ner they are moved.”

  Ashley Montagu, in another book, The Direc­tion of Human De­velop­ment writes of the coming together of parents and teach­ers in the com­ple­ment­ary task of de­velop­ing the poten­tial­it­ies of the child:

  The parents would con­trib­ute what the teach­ers ought to know, and the teach­ers would con­trib­ute what the parents ought to know, for the be­ne­fit of the child as well as for the be­ne­fit of all con­cerned. The teach­ing the child re­ceives at home and the teach­ing it re­ceives at school must be joined and uni­fied. The teach­ing of the ele­ment­ary skills of read­ing, writing and arith­metic is im­port­ant, but not nearly as im­port­ant as the most im­port­ant of all skills—human rela­tions.

  But David Riesman again, in his book In­di­vidu­al­ism Re­con­sidered makes this ob­serva­tion on the chil­dren of Crest­wood Heights:

  Their parents want to know how they have fared at school: they are con­stantly com­par­ing them, judging them in school apti­tude, popu­lar­ity, what part they have in the school play; are the boys sissies? the girls too fat? All the school anxi­et­ies are trans­ferred to the home and vice versa, partly because the parents, col­lege gradu­ates mostly, are intel­ligent and con­cerned with edu­ca­tion. After school there are music les­sons, skating les­sons, riding les­sons, with mother as chauf­feur and sched­uler. In the evening, the chil­dren go to a dance at school for which the parents have groomed them, while the parents go to a Parent-Teacher As­so­ci­a­tion meet­ing for which the chil­dren, di­rectly or in­di­rectly, have groomed them, where they are ad­dressed by a psy­chi­atrist who ad­vises them to be warm and re­laxed in handling their chil­dren! They go home and eagerly and warmly ask their re­turn­ing chil­dren to tell them every­thing that hap­pened at the dance, making it clear by their manner that they are soph­ist­ic­ated and can­not be easily shocked. As Pro­fes­sor Seeley de­scribes matters, the school in this com­mun­ity oper­ates a “gigan­tic fac­tory for the pro­duc­tion of rela­tion­ships”.

  This really fright­en­ing de­scrip­tion pulls us up with a jerk. Ac­cus­tomed to think of parent-teacher co-opera­tion as a Good Thing, we seldom con­sider its pos­sibil­it­ies as a tender trap, a well-inten­tioned con­spir­acy against the child. For where home and school are two separ­ate worlds a child un­happy at home might find a means of escape in the dif­fer­ent life of a school, and a child who is miser­able at school might find con­sola­tion in the atmo­sphere of home. But if home and school are “joined and united”, all avenues of escape are closed. After
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all, how many chil­dren of your ac­quaint­ance enjoy dis­cus­sing their school life with their parents or their home life with their teach­ers? Is not the plur­ality of en­viron­ment one of the child’s means of de­fend­ing itself against the paying omni­po­tence of the adult world?


*   *   *


  In this country the pioneer of parent-teacher co-opera­tion was the Home and School Com­mit­tee of the New Edu­ca­tion Fel­low­ship. An­other body, the Na­tional Fed­er­a­tion of Parent-Teacher As­so­ci­a­tions was founded in 1956, link­ing together many exist­ing bodies. Some of these as­so­ci­a­tions have sprung up in a neg­at­ive way to resist, and in some cases suc­cess­fully avert “closing-down” orders for schools. In the case of one in­de­pend­ent school in London (St. Paul’s Junior School, Hammer­smith) due to be closed down because the exist­ing build­ing could not eco­nom­ically be kept in repair while the trust­ees could not find the money for a new build­ing, the parents suc­cess­fully raised loans for it, an­noun­cing that they “would ac­cept finan­cial and edu­ca­tional re­spons­ibil­ity for a new school”. Other as­so­ci­a­tions con­nected with both primary and second­ary schools have pro­vided their schools with swim­ming baths, or have seen their func­tion in im­prov­ing the school’s equip­ment—pro­viding such equip­ment as record-players, film-pro­jec­tors, stage-light­ing and so on. On the pit­falls and pos­sibil­ities of this kind of organ­isa­tion, the staff at one school re­ported that:

  … the pro­gress of several chil­dren in arith­metic was being im­peded by well-inten­tioned ef­forts to help them at home. At a series of even­ing meet­ings, the staff worked through spe­ci­men arith­metic papers with the fath­ers and moth­ers, ex­plain­ing the par­tic­u­lar methods in use at the school. Simil­arly, the head­mis­tress of a village school intro­duced italic hand­writ­ing, a move which ap­peared to per­turb some parents. As a result of dis­cus­sion several moth­ers became inter­ested and asked her to ar­range even­ing classes so that they might learn it for them­selves.

  Formal as­so­ci­a­tion between parents and teach­ers does face certain dif­fi­culties, on occa­sion it may pro­vide a hunting-ground for the com­mit­tee-minded man or woman, and a trap for the ex­cel­lent teacher who may be less adept at com­mit­tee work. Another cri­ti­cism is that it does not ne­ces­sarily bring in the type of parent with whom con­tact is most needed: for ex­ample those whose chil­dren pre­sent par­ticu­larly dif­ficult prob­lems, per­haps because of their home back­ground.


*   *   *


  Another of the dif­fi­culties fre­quently met in the rela­tions of parents and teach­ers is the narrow con­cern dis­played so fre­quently by the anxious middle-class parents in little Johnny’s 11-plus or GCE pro­spects, to the ex­clu­sion of an interest in the class or the school or the age-group as a whole. The at­ti­tude may be under­stand­able, but it is never­the­less prim­itive to those who see as one of the pleas­ures of parent­hood an en­large­ment of sym­pathy and con­cern from one’s own bio­lo­gical off­spring to chil­dren in general. Two other more recent de­velop­ments in edu­ca­tional organ­isa­tions may help to bring about this wider view which is cer­tainly a pre­requis­ite for the parent-teacher control of edu­ca­tion which we see as an eventual aim.

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  The first of these is ACE, the Advis­ory Centre for Edu­ca­tion founded in 1960. This is an­other brain-child of Michael Young who started the Insti­tute of Commun­ity Studies and the Con­sum­ers’ As­so­ci­a­tion, and just as the latter organ­isa­tion and its journal Which seeks to im­prove the qual­ity of our con­sump­tion of goods and ser­vices, so ACE and its journal Where? (sub­scrip­tion £1 a year) seeks to give the same kind of in­depend­ent, un­biased as­sess­ment and ad­vice for the con­sum­ers of edu­ca­tion. The con­sumer ap­proach with its im­plied philo­sophy of “he who pays the piper calls the tune” could be the vehicle of a narrow phil­istin­ism, but in prac­tice it is sound and sens­ible. Michael Young returns to the theme in the annual report of the Con­sum­ers’ As­so­ci­a­tion, pub­lished last month. The at­ti­tude of re­gard­ing parents as intrud­ers in the schools is ruin­ous to good edu­ca­tion, he de­clares, “How can parents take an in­ter­est if they are barely al­lowed inside the schools? The sooner parents play a part in our schools, the sooner will the money be found for their im­prove­ment.” In fact, ACE, as readers of Where? will agree, is an in­valu­able medium for closing the gap between parents and teachers.

  The second of these new trends is the spring­ing-up of As­so­ci­a­tions for the Ad­vance­ment of State Edu­ca­tion. This move­ment again began in Cambridge in 1960, when a group of parents tried to hurry along im­prove­ments to a Newnham primary school. They found that the poor con­di­tions were more wide­spread than they had real­ised and that re­stric­tions in edu­ca­tional ex­pend­i­ture pre­vented any­thing from being done. From the ori­ginal pres­sure group, others sprang up in dif­fer­ent parts of the country and today there are bout 90 such as­so­ci­a­tions with a total of 10,000 members feder­ated in CASE, the Con­feder­a­tion of As­so­ci­a­tions for the Ad­vance­ment of State Edu­ca­tion, which has been con­duct­ing na­tional en­quiries on a vari­ety of edu­ca­tional topics. Un­doubt­edly this move­ment—co-exist­ing, not com­peting, with Parent-Teacher As­so­ci­a­tions—has helped to widen people’s field of con­cern from one child in one school, to the schools of the city or county and of the country.

  Before get­ting too ex­cited about this trend of course, we should at­tend an as­so­ci­a­tion meet­ing, to dis­cover, once again, the solidly middle-class at­tend­ance and the dis­con­cert­ingly vo­ca­tional at­ti­tudes to edu­ca­tion ex­pressed from the floor. However, what better forum could there be for the edu­ca­tion of parents? And is it in­con­ceiv­able that some, without adopt­ing an at­ti­tude of patron­age or su­peri­or­ity, could de­vote them­selves to bring­ing others in?

  Cer­tainly the phrase “Ad­vance­ment of State Edu­ca­tion” is un­for­tunate from our point of view (and is an in­dica­tion of the middle-class ori­gins of this move­ment since it is people who normally think in terms of private edu­ca­tion who most fre­quently refer to the “council” schools as “state” schools). Con­tinual use of the phrase in The Observer led to a pro­test recently from Mr. Terence Kelly who wrote:

  I am sorry to see refer­ences to State edu­ca­tion in your columns from time

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to time. In less happy lands the Min­is­ter of Edu­ca­tion (or of Public In­struc­tions) de­term­ines what is taught in every school. In this country the State—thank God—does not own or run a single school. Those which are not in­de­pend­ent of direct grant are main­tained by local edu­ca­tion au­thor­ities, who, with their vari­ous sub-com­mit­tees and divi­sional ex­ec­ut­ives on which teach­ers are rep­res­ented, run an edu­ca­tion system which is the envy of the world.

  I under­stand that there are even so­ciet­ies for the ad­vance­ment of State edu­ca­tion. Do these good people know what they are asking for? Do they really want a State system on the Com­mun­ist or Fascist model?

  In case anyone should think this is an idle quibble on words, I ask you to con­sider, Sir, what the view of your readers would be if you began refer­ring to the State police.

  It is not an idle quibble from an­other point of view: because we tend to be hyp­not­ised by the idea of an edu­ca­tional mono­lith we take far too little ad­vant­age of the local auto­nomy that does exist, nor of that degree of auto­nomy (dif­fer­ing widely from place to place) which in­div­idual head teach­ers have, or could demand. In­formed local pres­sure from parents and teach­ers is a weapon which we have hardly learned to exer­cise.


*   *   *


  Are there ways in which parents can push further into the de­cision-making bodies on edu­ca­tion? The ori­ginal Cambridge As­so­ci­a­tion for the Ad­vance­ment of State Edu­ca­tion put up two members as in­depend­ent can­did­ates for the county council elec­tions. One was elected and is now on the edu­ca­tion com­mit­tee. This is hardly a pro­cedure which fits into an anarch­ist ap­proach to the prob­lem, although one of our fre­quent con­trib­ut­ors, Paul Goodman is proud to be a School Board member in New York. But what about parents as school gov­ernors or school man­agers? (Readers inter­ested will find an article on what their func­tions are and how they are ap­pointed in Where? No. 10). Dis­cus­sing parent-teacher rela­tions in a letter to the New States­man in March this year, Mr. John McCann made an inter­est­ing point which most of us never knew and which should pro­vide useful am­muni­tion in argu­ments with local au­thor­ities: that back in 1944 the gov­ern­ment gave a pledge that parents would be properly rep­res­ented on the man­aging bodies of the schools at­tended by their chil­dren. Mr. McCann says:

  At the Com­mit­tee stage of the 1944 Edu­ca­tion Act the gov­ern­ment gave an under­taking to see that parents would be pro­perly rep­res­ented on the man­aging bodies of primary schools. It was stated that they were not to be “drawn from a dif­fer­ent so­cial stratum from that in which the pupils of the schools are found, but that some, at least, of the Man­agers will be people who live the daily life of the village or town, who are in close as­so­ci­a­tion with the parents, and can make the wishes of the parents known to the Man­agers and to the teach­ers.” This ad­mir­able prin­ciple was laid down in the form of an under­taking which is binding—for it was on that as­sur­ance that a Member of Par­lia­ment with­drew an amend­ment he had pro­posed.

  This under­taking has not been im­ple­mented. Some au­thor­ities try to see that parents are genu­inely rep­res­ented, some pay lip service to the prin­ciple, some regard the prin­ciple with sus­pi­cion. The bodies which ap­point Founda­tion Man­agers of vol­un­tary schools often come into the last cat­egory. Hun­dreds of years of strife over elect­oral rep­res­ent­a­tion have shown that there is only one way to achieve ad­equate rep­res­ent­a­tion; that is for the people con­cerned to elect their own rep­res­ent­at­ive. No nom­in­a­tion from above is going

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to work or to sat­isfy the people who want to be rep­res­ented.

  The gov­ern­ment under­taking could be honoured very simply, without any change in the law, if the Min­ister of Edu­ca­tion would ask local au­thor­ities to ap­point one Man­ager who had been elected at a meet­ing of parents con­vened by the head­master. The parents should have the right to elect one of them­selves or any other person (other than those already dis­qual­ified—teach­ers at the school, trades­men sup­ply­ing the school, etc.). Local edu­ca­tion au­thor­ities ap­point one, two or four Man­agers ac­cord­ing to whether it is an Aided, Con­trolled or County school. I am sug­gesting in all cases that this elec­tion pro­ced­ure be ap­plied to the ap­point­ment of one LEA Man­ager.

  It is some­times said that School Man­agers have no powers. At Aided schools they have very real powers, at all schools they have duties. Man­aging bodies vary greatly in the ex­tent to which they fulfil their duties, but in the most suc­cess­ful schools they per­form a valu­able service par­tic­u­larly in the field of parent-school rela­tion­ships.


*   *   *


  And how do teach­ers react to all this? Many of course are de­lighted to make con­tact with the parents of their pupils and to feel that they have a shared con­cern. Their only regret is that the parents whom they most need to meet are the very ones they never see at open-days, parent-teacher func­tions and so on. Rela­tions are closest in the in­fants’ school and seem to dwindle away later. “What hap­pens then” asks Jean Rintoul, “that this close parent-teacher rela­tion­ship should be broken as the child gets older until, in the later second­ary years, it is worse than non-exist­ent? Is the teacher to blame and, if the teacher is, will a brief talk with a parent at an ap­pro­pri­ately-spaced ‘surgery’ suf­fice? The answer to that is in the answer to an­other ques­tion: ‘Who are the parents who are going to at­tend the sur­gery?’ That’s an easy ques­tion and every teacher can answer it. They will be the same parents who at­tend the parent-teacher as­so­ci­a­tion meet­ings, the school prize-givings, the school con­cert or play; the same parents whose chil­dren are readily iden­ti­fi­able in every class because such chil­dren ex­hibit all the well-being and con­fid­ence that a priv­ileged home provides.” This is one of the prob­lems of parent-teacher relations for which a solu­tion has not been found.

  There are teach­ers too, who have a deep sus­pi­cion of par­ental en­croach­ment on their func­tions and their au­to­nomy. Their point of view was put with more-than-usual frank­ness by Mr. G. B. Corrin in a letter to the Times Edu­ca­tional Sup­ple­ment (10/4/64). Com­ment­ing on a pro­posal by an AASE sec­ret­ary that time for even­ing meet­ings with parents should be written into the teach­er’s con­di­tions of service, Mr. Corrin asked:

  When the child of one of these parents goes into hos­pital for an oper­a­tion, do they demand a meet­ing with the sur­geon at a time con­veni­ent to them­selves and then criti­cise his methods? I con­sider myself as highly trained and as ex­peri­enced in my work as any sur­geon, and I resent this in­tru­sion by the ignor­ant, who ap­par­ently have no faith in my abil­ity to do the job for which I am paid. Parent-teacher as­so­ci­a­tions and such-like may be useful for raising money which the gov­ern­ment is too parsi­mo­ni­ous to pro­vide and ar­ran­ging so­cial activ­ities for those who have nothing better to do, but, in my ex­peri­ence they in no way benefit the edu­ca­tion of the chil­dren and can become a posit­ive

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nuis­ance because of their in­abil­ity to resist the temp­ta­tion to inter­fere. Cer­tainly, many parents are ignor­ant about edu­ca­tion, but is it the teach­ers’ busi­ness to in­struct them? If so, let classes be ar­ranged and the teach­ers re­muner­ated. But parents can­not plead ignor­ance and at the same time demand the right to inter­fere with those who have been pro­perly trained to carry out the edu­ca­tion of their chil­dren.

  Obvi­ously the writer of this letter would be not only hostile, but deris­ory about our view that the form of edu­ca­tional organ­isa­tion which we should see as our aim is one in which con­trol of the schools is in the hands of as­so­ci­a­tions of parents and teach­ers. For teach­ers, as Sir Ronald Gould once put it, “neither love nor trust the parish pump.” The vehe­mence with which London teach­ers op­posed the in­tended break-up of the LCC’s edu­ca­tion service shows how strongly they prefer the remote and im­per­sonal control of County Hall to the near-at-hand inter­fering bureau­cracy of “the office” which teach­ers in many other parts of the country suf­fer and resent. We can car­tainly under­stand, in view of the sheer number of bosses which the organ­isa­tion of edu­ca­tion has set over them, why they regard en­croach­ment by parents beyond a cer­tain point and beyond cer­tain topics, with sus­pi­cion. And when you see some of those self-con­fid­ent high-income con­sum­ers in some of the AASEs, who quite obvi­ously regard the teach­ers as their servants and not as their partners, you can see the point of this sus­pi­cion.

  Nor would it be wise to as­sume that it is a ques­tion of pro­gres­sive parents and re­ac­tion­ary or time-serving teach­ers. It is much more often the other way round, as every­one who has tried in humble ways to intro­duce pro­gres­sive methods into the schools has found. When Teddy O’Neill was head­master of Prestolee School in Lanca­shire and set about trans­form­ing it, it was with the sup­port of the local edu­ca­tion au­thor­ity and of the In­spect­orate, and against the hostil­ity and abuse of local parents—and it took him years to win them over.


*   *   *


  In look­ing for the roots in our ex­isting so­ciety for a dif­fer­ent kind of organ­isa­tion, we have found pit­falls and dangers every­where—for chil­dren, for parents and for teach­ers. This is not sur­pris­ing, for our so­ciety is riddled with these prob­lems of status and hier­archy, and the con­cept of so­cial organ­isa­tion which most of our fellow-cit­izens under­stand, is one in which one lot of people order an­other lot of people around. But some­how, some­where we have to de­velop the germs of a non-au­thor­it­arian method of co-oper­ative so­cial organ­isa­tion. Where better to make the at­tempt than in the schools?