Sometimes you get lucky enough to find a book you last read years ago. This week I revisited a few books I read back in college that profoundly affected my life and how I see the world, primarily through an education lens. In 1995 I was an English Major at East Carolina University. I graduated that year with a degree in creative writing and a minor in history. I took my talents to Southern Illinois University – Carbondale, and that fall, I took a class on the history of education, and in the class, we read The End of Education. It was released in September and was “hot off the press” I immersed myself in the book and developed an educational philosophy.
The central thesis from Postman was that education in its modern form betrays the enduring legacy of what education is for. While he acknowledges the utility of education in developing skills needed for vocation, he was concerned that we would take these outcomes too far. In his view, education aimed to create a more helpful society where social ecologies merge to reduce inequities and societal ills. However, he saw an education system built on competition and social class. The way we taught, the exams we delivered, and the separation of students by race and social class created a tiered education system that had societal and economic consequences. Postman worried that if we maintained an education system built on labor needs and outcomes and not on holistic education, the wealthy would continue to build wealth, and the middle and lower classes would struggle to keep up. My primary thought years later is he would have been appalled at the recent supreme court decision on affirmative action. Postman advocated for creating educational systems where integration was embraced and a sign of strength.
He would have also been excited to see the work done on ending legacy admissions policies, but this would have confused him a bit because it came on the heels of the “Students for Fair Admissions” decision. Legacy admissions have been getting much attention recently as data show how these admission decisions are far more likely to benefit wealthy and connected students than affirmative action ever helped black and brown students. So I guess there is a balance there. In the coming years, Legacy Admissions will be challenged in court, and many colleges have already started modifying the practice to reduce its impact. But legacy admissions may have a more profound effect when considering the current war on college. We have extended the idea that college is really for those who can afford it or come from families who benefit most from attendance. The rest of society is better served by vocational training regardless of their educational and career goals.
As I explored Postman and his work, I wanted to refer to one of his critical works, Amusing Ourselves to Death. In this book, he uses the backdrop of Huxley’s Brave New World. His central theme is society allows itself to sink into the endorphin-inducing rush of being charmed by a Sun Bear who looks like a human or the excitement of an American Ninja Warrior. Not that these pieces of entertainment are not valuable at some level, but there must be a balance. Like education, short-term gains and delights should not be the core focus. However, over time the ideas outlined in Amusing Ourselves to Death have seemingly come true. Even our politics and business decisions are tinged by a need to entertain. When news agencies like MSNBC and Fox News choose formats that play to a “base,” and when we watch the Trump arraignment not for information but for enjoyment, we have become what Postman feared most—no need to create an Orwellian future when we can Netflix society into compliance. I fear we are doing the same thing to education. Creating a system that only has specific outcomes and not for the overall education of society. And that is something we should fear, just as Postman warned us.
Considering Outloud 