Using his thirty years of experience as evidence, John Taylor Gatto concludes in his article “Against School” that our school system is failing our children and that we are not reaching our full potential as citizens. He says that today’s children are completely bored with their schooling because it is too easy, too irrelevant and that “they wanted to be doing something real, not just sitting around.” He says that by being flexible about how our children learn would give then a better chance of actually becoming engaged in the work because it will be more about the learning than just getting a grade for the class. After fighting with why we haven’t been able to reform education in a positive way, he realizes the fact that “its not because they are doing something wrong but because they are doing something right.” Basically he says that we are purposefully dumbing down our kids so that they make good citizens that abide by the rules. In this way they can categorize people in to what jobs and social roles that they will play in life. This also means that it is near impossible to get out of our role in society. As George Carlin Said “Its called the American Dream, because you have to be asleep to believe it.” In other words the system is controlled, and by dumbing down our schools, it is hoped that we do not realize this. By categorizing us, the government is hoping that “it is unlikely that the ignorant mass of mankind, separated in childhood, would ever re-integrate into a dangerous whole.” What Gatto is saying here is that the government is using our schooling system to keep us in line so as not to question our authority. They basically don’t want something like the crisis in Egypt occurring where citizens finally get fed up with how their country is being run and do something about it.
Of course dumbing down society also has another benefit which is also mentioned in Gatto’s article. Gatto states that school “encouraged them (students) not to think at all. And that left them sitting ducks for another great invention of the modern era, marketing.” If stripped of intelligence and artistic value, people have no moral compass of which to abide by, so they blindly give in to marketing campaigns that target peoples insecurities and they listen to media outlets for their information instead of processing their own thoughts. This is partially beneficial to the categorizing method mentioned before, but it also gives a very big boost to our economy because now people have the belief that they need things because marketing campaigns tell them so. If people were educated properly to think for themselves they would realize that as Donald Horban
said “Not wanting something is as good as possessing it.” The essence of Horban statement here is that we need to not rely our happiness on our possessions like marketing wants us to, but instead find happiness in smaller more unique things in life.
All of what Gatto says in this article is painstakingly true; but I already knew that in a sense. The thing that has run me into an intellectual brick wall is how can we possibly change any of this from continuing when it has such powerful momentum already put behind it and too many people in high places continuing to encourage it further? In reality I don’t think that Gatto ever gives a straight answer to this. He gives us helpful ways to realize when its happening and how to avoid it on a personal level, but he gives a very muddled thought on how we can make the change on a societal level. At one point he applauds home-schoolers and says that we should let men and women “manage themselves.” On the other hand he also talks about “being more flexible about time and tests” which leads me to believe he may want to only reform and not just get rid of our educational system all together. In either case though, even if we did want to change this system, why would the government which implemented schooling as a tool to diminish though want to ever produce laws that could damage what they have been trying to achieve? While it is good to understand what is happening to us, we can do little more than just acknowledge it, because there is little hope that anything will change. Think about it. How many years have we heard now that education needs to be reformed. Now think of how many times any legislation has passed that has actually massively improved our situation? I hoped that perhaps Mr. Gatto would have a godsend answer to our educational crisis, but for now I will have to just be content with knowing that there is people out there that feel the same way I do.
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