Topics Education

Question What should be the purpose of an education system as a whole? By this I mean particularly the direction given to it by its national curriculum. Is it to produce the next generation of plumbers and bank tellers, in effect to ensure that society continues to be productive? Or is it to develop society as a whole, to raise the average level of intelligence and enlightenment within it and, at the heights, push back the boundaries of human understanding? Because it seems to me that whilst these two aims are not mutually exclusive, only the former is being carried out within the UK. Joe H.

Accepted:
August 7, 2006

Comments

Didn't I just respond to another of your questions on a related subject? I think so...

I think the best answer to this question is "all of the above, and a great deal more." As I said, a great deal is asked of public education--constructively, it is suppose to advance knowledge and also to provide society with a better work force, as you suggest; negatively, it is supposed to fend off certain social ills we know to be associated with ignorance and lack of education. These various goals are often incommensurable and we seem to have no very secure ways of figuring out to everyone's satisfaction why we shouldn't be allocating our money and efforts in very different ways than we are now.

I do not live or teach in the UK, but it strikes me as very harsh indeed for you to say that the system of education there is not helping to advance knowledge and to expand the boundaries of human understanding. In travels there, and in interactions with my British colleagues, I find no reason to think that the UK is only educating drones to serve the economy! Gimme a break!