Education Is Not Just About the Numbers

With a serious debate ratcheting up in Harrisburg about the future of state education funding, I've found myself thinking a lot about what's really important in education recently.

Now, I don't have any children, so I can only use my own school and life experiences as a guide, along with what I've observed over the years, covering various different school districts.

The first thing I've noticed is that it's pretty obvious education spending at the state level lately is more of a political football game than actually about the successful education of our children, most of the time.

The people doing the debating and deciding right now are not really at the mercy of or part of the public system they legislate. Most make enough money that if need be, they send their children to private school.

That's part of the debate about the voucher system, of course. If everyone, or at least some people, , they can be used against tuition in private schools.

It's all very well and good if you want to send your kid somewhere else, another entirely if you want your neighbors and, indirectly, the public school students in the district, to pay for it.

Still, there's a good reason that a lot of parents want to have their kids educated privately, and that is the quality of education a good school provides.

Public schools have had a ton of pressure put on them in the past couple of decades. No Child Left Behind more or less left every child behind, in this reporter's humble opinion.

Vast resources that could have been spent on actually educating kids instead went to testing, and collecting and reporting data, a lot of which went to private, for-profit companies, and was used to punish various schools, some of which were troubled to begin with, others which weren't really “failing” to begin with. The Red Queen in Alice in Wonderland probably would have decreed a law that made more sense.

What is the real difference between a public and a quality private education these days? It's not just the wealth of the facilities, though that can't hurt.

Secular private schools offer quality, well-rounded education. Critical thought is a key component, and rote recitation is discouraged. Logic and reason are emphasized.

Subjects whose public school funding has been cut repeatedly, such as instructional music, are well-supported in private schools, and the programs are never in danger of ceasing to exist.

Music, in particular learning the basics of playing an instrument and reading music, has been proven to have beneficial effects on mental development that last far after the student leaves school, whether they continue playing or not.

Critical thought, logic and reason are all keys to being able to continue to learn, not to mention enjoying the process.

Overemphasis of testing and making teachers 'teach to the test' takes valuable time away from imparting these skills.

On the other hand, we need to start with the idea that critical thought, logic and reason need to be put back into the curriculum in the first place.

While its true that especially in the past decade NCLB put extra stress on teaching time and resources, critical thought, logic and reason have been all but lost from public education in general for a much longer time.

Children first come to school full of enthusiasm and eager to learn. Before they hit a heavily structured environment, discovering something new was a wonder, every time.

But when they hit school, the first thing we do is squelch that enthusiasm. Sure, order in the classroom is important, but look at some of the messages we send our kids.

Small children have just recently gained control over their bodily functions. What's one of the first things we make kids in school do? Ask to use the bathroom, one of the most basic needs of humanity.

Okay, again, I understand the need to know where the kids are and keep order in class. But do think of what the message is here.

Wouldn't it be better to instill the idea of personal responsibility instead? Sure, they're little, but so is the matter we're talking about. It would be good practice and set the stage for bigger things later.

Public schools often reprimand children for talking out of turn, even when they have actually made a breakthrough or important personal discovery. Children in the classroom technically need permission to even speak. “Raising your hand” and/or observing hard and fast rules and protocols are often emphasized over the idea of teaching reasoned response.

I can't repeat enough, I DO understand the importance of keeping order in the classroom. I've not taught in public schools, but in another lifetime, I taught fencing, mostly to children. With up to 20 youngsters armed with swords surrounding you, believe me, I understand the importance of keeping order.

But I also understand that hand-raising, ubiquitous as it might be, is not the only way to keep order in the classroom, and very likely isn't the best.

Due to the fact that while I was demonstrating I was wearing a protective mask with the class arrayed around, sometimes even behind me, acknowledging questions by raising of hands wasn't really practical. My students generally ranged in age from about 7 to 16, often in one class.

I decided early that questions would be asked by conversation, just like my adult classes. That is, if you have a question, just ask it. The only rule was that you had to wait until no one else was speaking.

I rarely had to enforce anything. The classes, about 500 students in nine years, respected the autonomy they were given and were happy to police themselves.

Everybody participated too, since the shy kids never had to worry about being singled out (unless they didn't participate) by being 'called on.' They blended in, and ended up a lot less shy in the process, interestingly enough.

We also got a lot more done and a lot of time was saved, since there wasn't a ritual of “teacher, may I?” every other sentence.

I never had a problem with gaining my students' respect either. With most superfluous protocol swept out of the way, they listened intently in class. They knew that anything I had to say was actually something they needed to know.

Children are naturally programmed to grow into the spaces we give them and up to the expectations we set for them. When we, parents, teachers and the community, make it clear that we expect our children to live up to high expectations and actually set the stage for it early on, that's when we will see a real difference in our educational system.

While the basics will always be important, it's not some test score that determines the success of a school or its students. It's how prepared they are for life and what kind of successful adults they can be.

Reading and writing are important communication skills; math is intrinsic to making sure we can calculate. These 'three Rs' are building blocks for nearly every other discipline, it's true, but without critical thought, logic and the ability to make good personal decisions, none of those things are going to matter very much. Or even happen.

It will never be that all students are equally academically gifted, but everyone can live up to their potential, given the opportunity to develop into who they can best become and being encouraged to do so.

Learning is not about conformity, it's about setting our young people on a path to successful, happy, productive adulthoods and the advance of our society as a whole.

Teaching our children that learning is about the death of discovery, that it's more important to sit down and shut up, and that test scores are everything will never achieve these ends, no matter how much or how little money we throw at the problem.