If you haven't guessed from my nom de plume, I'm a teacher. Specifically, I teach people how to become teachers. I love what I do, even when I hate it.
The semester started three weeks ago and I am have spent the last three weeks thinking about class, reading kos, thinking about class, reading more kos, teaching class... So the cycle goes. This time I thought I would combine the thinking and kos together. I'd like to share with you some of what I've been thinking, and turn the question over to you:
What type of citizen do we need?
Jump, if you feel like it.
One of the great things about teaching two courses with the same theme is a really great thing. The two courses, Public Purposes of Education, and Democracy and Schooling both let me focus on the hard question: Why do we educate? Ok, so the courses give me the chance to focus more on the philosophical and theoretical sides of education, but I also really try to push students to think about what this means in every day life.
A big part of my answer is to prepare people to be active citizens (in every sense of the word). Given that a standard definition of citizenship is a person who has full membership rights in a given nation state, I immediately have to stop because the notion of citizenship is changing. Many of the civil rights struggles I see today apply far beyond the institution of the nation state. In this sense, they could be deemed human rights. But if schools educate people to be citizens, then where do all the people who don't qualify for citizenship go? I ask that sarcastically, of course (I did actually ask that question once. I thought my students' heads were going to explode).
Struggles over the definition of citizen and citizenship aside, I then have to ask, What type of citizen? One who always follows the rules? One who gets a job and isn't a burden on society? One who tries to change society for the better (however THAT is defined)?
For me, when I work with my students, the real fun begins--seriously. We have to dig into what they believe makes someone a good citizen. They usually quick agree that a good citizen is a good American. OK, so some of my students are much more complex in their thinking, but what would be the fun of sharing with you my thought process and teaching if I talked about that.
And so we begin. Some people say that schools provide the citizens that society needs to remain static (unchanging). That's what some theorists call a functionalist perspective (Feinberg and Soltis, 2009). The problem with this perspective is that it presents itself as being completely neutral.
On the other hand, one could say schools produce the citizens that society needs but say that this is problematic. Take the statement, Urban schools churn out people who can't read and write (a common belief for many, though an inaccurate one) because there aren't enough jobs to go around. Schools serve to ensure there will always be an underclass, a middle class, and an elite, because schools make sure to reproduce that society. It's where meritocracy comes face to face with its own myth. Theorists frequently refer to this as conflict theory, or reproduction theory (Hughes, Sharrock & Martin, 2003; Giroux, 2001). Schools make sure there are always those who have and those who don't.
Clearly, teachers and administrators, don't walk into school on a Monday morning and say, "Ohhhh, let me see how I can oppress/privilege this kid today?" It's the whole bag: the system, the institution, the community, US Society. At this point, my students are usually wondering why they are still thinking of becoming teachers. And sometimes, I feel the same way, and wonder why I keep coming back each semester.
Let me be clear, I believe that too many schools serve to reproduce the community it serves. It's systemic. You can't separate the school from the community. You have to change both, simultaneously. Suddenly providing schools that have been underfunded for 75 years an influx in cash, is not going to enable those schools to make it up in 5 years. On the other hand, if a wealthier community has to cut the school budget (for whatever reason), there is wealth within the community to make up the short-fall. So, where schools need to change requires an entire shift in thinking and behaving. And you have to have a critical mass to really effect long-term change. But, I don't say that to students.
At no point in time do I say to my students that they should change society to reflect my world view. I tell them that they have to decide what their vision of society is and make their own decisions. One of my class rules is be skeptical, asks questions, take risks. It takes them a while to get out of the habit of trying to figure me out (next week is guess Dr. Edubabbler's politics--it's a laugh-riot. Most of them walk out understanding that politics are much more complicated than democrat and republican. But it still takes them a while to swallow this. When they do, we can finally get to the real work. Sometimes I sweat blood.
Ouch, that sounds so much harsher than it really is. It's what teachers do. But, students find they have to change, and it's not always a pretty process. Change is hard, and it requires a very different type of citizen than the ones schools currently are preparing for society. In this case the citizens must be taught to question, gather evidence, make decisions, and actively engage in one's local and wider community. Citizens do not work for change for the sake of change. They do it because they have identified something which concerns them, and they work to change it. It could be as simple as starting a block emergency contact list (Hey, xxx, it's yyy from down the street. Can you keep an eye out for zzz. I am going to be a few minutes late and don't want her/him waiting in the rain. You can? Great.).
Here, a group of neighbors may have gotten to know one another and worked together to solve simple problems-- a kid coming home from school, a package being delivered, bringing a neighbor's do home when it gets out. Sounds like you just need to go around and introduce yourselves. How many of you know more than one neighbor? I know every person on my block. We may not remember each other's names, but we help each other out. When my almost-husband was rushed to the hospital, neighbors from all over the block came over. They offered to take the garbage out, go food shopping for me, let the dogs out, water the gardens. But this has come about because we came together a few years ago when a neighbor died. None of us wanted to be in that situation.
Students generally feel comfortable at this level because it speaks to the idea that all politics are local. But when I ask them to go bigger, they get really cynical, and I think rightly so. After all, I am challenging them to not be the citizens their schools (for the most part) prepared them to be.
Again, as I contemplate all of this, I remind them that they are studying to be teachers, and what they do is really important. I remind them that they never, ever, want to be the teacher a child remembers because of an act of neglect or cruelty. This is both personal and collective. Teachers can do great harm or great things.
But teachers can't and shouldn't work alone, and this speaks to engaging in a type of citizenship that requires changing schools, which requires changing how we educate citizens...
About here, my head explodes. So for those of you who are still here, this is where I get caught up.
I say to my students, Let's say we actually change the learning experiences of our students so that they are thinkers, doers, and citizens who don't let others make the decisions for them. This is what some theorists mean when they work to transform society. Of course what makes this dangerous is the question, Transform what into...?
So what do you think?