Ending education

I have spent the past nine weeks examining various aspects of our education system. I have looked at its history, its ideology, the impact of religion and race, the issue of life and sex education and the psychological ideas that should inform these topics, teacher training, and the pressing concern of school discipline. In each piece, I have tried to identify key shortcomings and to suggest solutions. The series did not come out exactly as I intended. This is more often the case than not: the writing process is itself revelatory. When I began, I didn’t intend to write more than six parts. Yet, ending now so (many of you readers will be happy to know) I can return to mocking the powers-that-be, I realise I could continue on this topic almost indefinitely. Education, like crime, is an issue which relates to every aspect of our lives. So the ten parts of this series — which will be available as one essay on my website by next month — have turned out to be merely an outline.

I’d originally aimed to write pieces which emphasised practical pedagogy and which were theoretically rigorous. But with every theme I kept bouncing my head on philosophical concerns. And I realised that, in a very real sense, it is a lack of philosophical coherence which explains why pedagogical measures have failed to bring about meaningful change in our education system. Well-intentioned reforms do not make any real impact primarily because the people in authority are ideologically effete. The typical attitude was most recently expressed by retired UWI lecturer Professor John Spence, who often writes on education issues in another newspaper. “I do not believe in a revolutionary approach,” he says. “But I do believe that by sensible and appropriate interventions, revolutionary changes can result.”  Spence fails to realise that, given the failings of the system, any sensible and appropriate interventions must by definition be revolutionary.

I had also not intended to be overly critical of the educational authorities: indeed, I made it my business to identify those persons whose ideas I think are worth attending to. But, as I wrote, it occurred to me that I was saying harsh things — about the Education Ministry and the Teaching Service Commission and UWI and TTUTA — that the education experts and practitioners may well have agreed with but which, for reasons of practical politics, they would never say out loud. Me, I am immensely impolitic and I don’t have a PhD, so I doubt anybody with the power to change things is going to pay any attention to what I’ve written here. But my primary duty is to the readers, and in any case a writer, whose job it is to synthesise ideas from a variety of sources and express them vigorously, can only hope to plant seeds that, even if it takes a generation or two, eventually bear fruit. So, living in hope, I will conclude this series by listing some of the additional ideas which I think need to be implemented.

* First and foremost: never blame students for the deficiencies of the system. Always blame the adults, from teachers to school supervisors to technocrats right up to the Education Minister.

* Do a survey to find out what students’ wants are. Such a survey will most likely find the following: young people want to be taught social skills, especially about romance and etiquette, how to fix things, self-defence, and how to find a job. Subject-wise, they probably will want more arts teaching, such as drama and drawing and music.

* Implement Servol’s Adolescent Development Programme in all secondary schools.

* The norms taught in school must deliberately contravene certain norms of the wider society. In science subjects, teachers must emphasise the need for logical analysis, scepticism, and proof. In humanities subjects, teachers must show the impact of history, geography, culture, and economics on the human personality.

* Large schools breed bad behaviour. The student body must be broken into manageable groups, no bigger than 150 persons, through a house system or other means.

* Do not re-introduce corporal punishment. Each school should set up a discipline council made up of teachers, parents, and students.

*Make teacher training mandatory.

* The same teacher should teach the same class from Standards One through Five. The same teacher should teach most subjects to the same class from Forms One to Three; if this can’t be implemented, students should have the same Form Teacher for these years.

* In all schools if possible, but definitely in problem schools if not, all teachers should have an aide present in the classroom.

* Implement a substitute teacher system, so no class is ever without supervision.

* Introduce formal programmes to help slow learners.

* Teaching methods must recognise innate differences between boys and girls. Most boys are innately less verbal and more visual and action-oriented than girls. Girls prefer to work in cooperative groups; boys are motivated by working in groups in competition with other groups.

* Boys must be encouraged to read, through the use of popular literature and by exposing them to masculine mentors who like reading.

* Girls must be encouraged in maths and science, preferably by working in all-female classes for these subjects.

* Sex education must start when kids are still in primary school, before their hormones kick in.

These are just some of the basic reforms which I believe must be implemented if we want to create an effective education system, which can also catalyse social change. But the most basic and crucial reform is for all the players, but especially the teachers, to adopt a different philosophical approach: one based on rational and humanistic principles. Otherwise, all our talk about change and progress is mere posturing. And, with that, I done teach.

E-mail: kbaldeosingh@hotmail.com
Website: www.caribscape.com/baldeosingh