Best Way
About a month ago I went and voted in our primary election. I couldn't help thinking about the economists' argument that voting is a waste of time as the chance that your vote will make a difference is close to zero. I also remembered recently hearing a guy expressing his opinion that people shouldn't complain about the government if they didn't bother to vote. While large groups being motivated to vote can certainly make a difference, the economists' opinion seemed a lot more logical to me than this other guy's.An oft cited purpose of public education is to enculturate our youth into our democracy, but what does that really mean? To teach them to love America and not be a terrorist? What is the best way to participate in a democracy? Obey the laws? Pay taxes? What is the best way to have your voice heard?
Other than voting, people go to rallies, start/sign petitions, go to city council/school board meetings, write blogs, or maybe even run for office. But do any of these activities really get you anywhere? I guess if you get elected they do. People at rallies usually appear silly. Petitions do sometimes succeed at getting measures on the ballot. You might occasionally be successful at swaying a council/board member, but probably not often.
I guess I'm wondering if someone doesn't participate in these things, does that make them a bad citizen? Does our country suffer in any tangible way?
I'm not sure what I think, so I guess I'll just keep paying my taxes.
Comments
http://www.schoolchoices.org/roo/fried1.htm
This follows pretty closely (if it isn’t the exact same) as the chapter on education from Capitalism and Freedom. Here's what he says about the purpose of public education:
"A stable and democratic society is impossible without widespread acceptance of some common set of values and without a minimum degree of literacy and knowledge on the part of most citizens. Education contributes to both. In consequence, the gain from the education of a child accrues not only to the child or to his parents but to other members of the society; the education of my child contributes to other people's welfare by promoting a stable and democratic society. Yet it is not feasible to identify the particular individuals (or families) benefited or the money value of the benefit and so to charge for the services rendered. There is therefore a significant "neighborhood effect."
It's a good starting point for analysis, but to be honest, I'm not so sure that your child's inability to read imposes that much of an externality on me, even in a democracy. I guess you have to read in order to be able to vote.
I'm also not exactly sure whether I think public school should be teaching values. I still believe in American exceptionalism and I believe that some form of classically liberal democracy is the best form of government. But I’m not sure most educators feel that way.
99 percent of people agree the holocaust was evil. Can a teacher teach about the holocaust without teaching that it was wrong? But then what about same sex marriage—probably a thinning majority thinks it is morally wrong—should we teach that too? This is another great thing about school choice: it breaks the bond between government and curriculum and we can let parents and teachers make these decisions and extricate government as much as possible.
I think that many teachers would still hold at least a muted a belief in American exceptionalism, though the number is likely dwindling.
On one hand, if school choice is in the form of charter schools, then the government still has about as much control over curriculum as in a traditional public school. On the other hand, until the government has an enforcer in every classroom, the teacher ultimately controls the curriculum.
One confusing thing...did you mean educating students about the value of democracy, how to participate in it, etc. or did you mean teaching students values in a democratic sense according to a majority view (almost everyone believes the holocaust was evil, so I'll teach it that way, etc.)?
-Theresa
Like teaching any sorts of values. We all agree democracy is good. But recently I've become interested public choice theory, which says that collective decision making is generally a much worse process than individual decision making. Thus, you're better off minimizing the number of things government does. The underlying critique is one of the voting process's inability to accurately reflect preferences, which ultimately is a critique of democracy itself.
So which value do we teach? The greatness of democracy or the failings? The limited greatness?
I guess we could just say that whatever the majority says goes as far as controversial curriculum is concerned. We'll get some schools that teach intelligent design, and some schools that ignore it. Some that teach homosexual relationships are immoral and some that teach discriminating against homosexuals by denying them the right to marry is immoral.
But of course the majority isn't always correct, either.
This is, I think, a similar conundrum to what journalists face. Do we report the truth as we see it? Do we reports both sides of a controversial issue? Does that mean that I have to present the Holocaust denier's point of view every time I run a story about the holocaust?
Seems to me there are no good answers on these questions. But if CNN puts on a bunch of holocaust deniers, I can change the channel. It would be nice to have the same option for education.