Monday, May 11, 2009

What is the Purpose of Public Education in a Democracy?

It was very difficult for me to answer this question the first week of class without getting information from the readings for the week. I can now state without even looking at a text that the purpose of public education in a democracy is to help foster the mentality in everyone that we have to be inclusive citizens. My explanation for this is simple: There is no reason to discriminate or show hatred toward any individual that we come in contact with because we should be respectful to everyone. Our educational system is similar to any sales, management, or retail system, it is a dog-eat-dog world! This mentality has caused a lot of damage to the children who interact with these professionals. They learn an “exclusive” train of thought, which means that they learn how to categorize individuals and not interact with children who are not “similar” or in the same category.
Through my experiences in this course, I have realized that this mentality not only affects how children act in an educational setting but also how the educators interact. We cannot simply point fingers and state that a certain educator is not doing their job because we do not know the complete details or the “behind the scene” information. There are many educators who are treated in such a disrespectful manner by their authorities and then turn into the “I don’t care” professor who does not want anything to do with the children in the classroom. These educators are belittled at meetings or ignored when they have opinions on ways to improve the system. I have learned to view the educational as a full spectrum and not just through an ignorant and biased view point. I now believe that I will be a more efficient and successful educator because of my new definition of the purpose of public education in a democracy.

No comments:

Post a Comment