Education’s Future: What Will Replace K-12 and College?

Hello Peter Grey,
Awesome article!
Yet, if we look at that absorbent ability, which is how we learn, and the same within each, we can realize that that ability absorbs the values/math of the most-exposed-to environment those first seven years- which creates the fundamental foundational blue print of the child. This is visible in how this works BOTH ways! A protege absorbs a greater, or more disciplined " intuition"/blueprint of the parent. Likewise, a feral child, absorbs the " math" or delineation as the utilization of the sensory skill into focusing on specific qualities in the environment by the physical body as that of the animal host of the child. This in itself shows the great capacity of who and what we are as physical living forms. The less defined intuition/blueprint the more tendency towards insecurity, as that less defined, or more general intuitive reflection of experience absorbed from those in one's environment, the greater the tendency towards insecurity, and protective behaviors. or coping mechanisms that can also become comfort zones- usually when we hang with one set of people who are similar- there by becoming a constant justification for lack. That can become so embedded, anything outside of what is a resonant state appears counter intuitive to how we are defining ourselves as what we are using from within to self direct!
THis is a misuse of a great skill, and is visible in our mis-use of imagination, because we have made looking ONLY at that intuitive resonance of experience larger than life, thereby losing our attention and focus on reality, manifest as having a hard time realizing practical movements- as getting things done with efficiency and effectiveness.
It is said that enlightenment is self responsibility. This would fit in with how we have used our bodies and informed them.
The problem we face today, is that the parents are themselves a product of the product, as a system that has shut down a great sensibility to realize self responsibility, and that is what is informing our children, even the best who by comparison in a very narrow perspective intuitive field of information, cannot see beyond this- we are as a consequence so removed from nature and from sensing this actual and real and physical world. The physical is where we can be responsible, where we practice the small to realize the big. It is just as musicians learn to become aware of their immediate bodies, and as that information is easily referenced in a split second from proper integration or practice of realizing form and function, to the greater movement around one, as the other instruments into the movement of the audience and the way the sound interacts with the qualities of the materials that compose the space; walls, fabrics etc. So great is our ability to sense! Yet, if that inner blue print is in lack, as limited infrastructure as one's intuition from those early years, change outside of referencing that, and fitting it into reality, can cause all manner of behaviors that are not of benefit to real self responsibility- that place we are most happy because we are employing real creativity and real critical thinking skill! Instead, we have, because of what we have practiced as a mis-use of the imagination, is a separation from respecting this living physical reality- so visible all around us. Realize, by some accounts, humans use more effort to breath than 50 years ago. And, even our wood from our trees has no where near the density of trees from 300 years ago. The very fabric of the physical is diminishing as a consequence of a mis use of who and what we are.
The only solution, is to rebuild. THis can be done with words, as they are the small, the detail, the structural means to build a focus back into being like that musician that must always reference the living reality around us. We can use technology to help us help ourselves, because the adults in this world are products of a system of separation from learning to consider all things, and the children, even in more educated households absorb a greater detail, yet that detail in itself is of a blueprint learned in separation from continual reference to the practical, causing choices that lack consideration of what is best, and the utilization of how this works. Sometimes, adults begin to see this, as they have lived their lives. It has a sense that something is out of whack, or out of synch.
We could say the very use of metaphor is already an indication that we are not describing what is real. The art of metaphor is huge in our society. The use of that math of what is here, is so askew, and as humans we are so absorbent, we absorb blueprints of picture shows that move unto themselves at the expense of the practical reality. THis is causing a disruption of the physical see in the breath and the substantiveness of the trees- they are struggling to survive. It is a mis-use of creation. We cannot be happy until we as humans become responsible for all things, meaning consider all things, just as a musician must in order to perform well and master their craft.
Words can redirect, reform, and build more effective intuitions/blueprints. because they are placeholders of information, that can be built in to have a direct relationship to the practical movements of the living reality. This will expedite a deconstruction and reconstruction of focus, back into respecting all things, to align mankind back into the means of happiness as real self responsibility.
A real pyramid is to build an intuition that references the reality, starting with the general and moving into the specific, to become insynch with real leverage as a well informed reflection of reality that is a fluid cross reference of how things practically move and interact. It is what is meant by making the leap into grace as closing the circle of awareness, as moving through the eye-of-the-needle. It is the gift parents are responsible for , as their child and to give to their child.
We must rebuild, as this state of separation has been generated for generations, causing personalities that are in friction with one another, all visible in a lack of real and effective communication.
As in all reading research, the weaker the vocabulary, the greater the tendency towards violence ( self and/or another). The greater the resistances or a more fluid ability to change. It is all visible in plain sight. There are rings of this layered resonantly within each of us, which is why the apple never falls far from the tree.
What is amazing is that it a able to be corrected, and/or prevented. It can be done with the most basic of things in every human being, as the very sounds we make. It is awesome to " play in tune" and to direct with a solution oriented mind set. This is what each parent really wants to be. And, it is a means of substantiating that child that is a gift of life.
We need only look to the media to realize the extent that words, as sounds, can manipulate and cause friction and conflict instead of real balance and more symbiotic relationships that interact in ways that expand awareness of and as how all of this works.
we can see the consequences of this, as we label the personalities of those around us, and yet, at the same time, see a potential underlying that outward expression in each and every being we encounter.
More self directed play, as interaction with the living reality, breeds greater self awareness and is a practice of and as a respect of the living reality around us.
We must also rebuild our words, to be aligned to this reality. We must defragment what is a scattered reference, visible in the overuse of metaphor, as a spaced out focus in a narrow reference of information, a resonant blueprint within that is being passed down,. as perpetually generated by the parents who are products of a system that by design separates us from our real capacity.
As has been said, within the Humpty Dumpty story, indicator, all the king's men, and all the king's horses cannot put us back together again, as get us back in synch with the living reality around us. And, we must realize our separation in order to ensure we never allow such again.
When we call things out by name, they no longer have power over us, because we understand them as become equal to them in seeing their form and function- here we need non longer use a metaphysical metaphor because we are focused and present, substantiating who and what we really are.
This perspective can scare many, as change can appear scary to a self definition one has used to define one's self with extended practice. It appears to be a disturbing shift, yet, as we know, greater self responsibility if greater self awareness where we become more happy. This is why, in all research in reading skills development, the greater the ability to spell, the greater the degree of self actualization. Why? Because we realize the math, the spells as words, the forms as personalities, the movements around us that are metaphysical and real. Personalities are like ripples, they can only effect us if we allow them- that ghost in the machine. it is all visible and in plain sight, we need only slow down and breath, and look. We can rebuild our focus, we can use words to do so. There are tools to expedite this. We must do this, because it is the way to stop causing more of our physical strength breathing, and it is a way to reverse the weakening of the trees in our living reality, because we need those trees in order to breath.
We must look to the very fabric of who and what we are in total. Our lives and those of our children depend on it.

A few unrelated questions

1) Are high scorers on the GRE logic just faking critical thinking?
2) College provides a great opportunity to be exposed to leading minds on various subjects. Can't we entice students to want that? Students who in earlier levels of education are truly self directed
3) Can't we reform the system to follow countries where education works
4) your proposals would jolt the economy with a shock and would require a broader social reform
5) Things might actually get worse given the law of unintended consequences, despite your noble goals

"Schools were once thought of as places where a society's knowledge and experience were passed on to the younger generation. But, about a hundred years ago, Professor John Dewey of Columbia University came up with a very different conception of education -- one that has spread through American schools of education, and even influenced education in countries overseas.

"John Dewey saw the role of the teacher, not as a transmitter of a society's culture to the young, but as an agent of change -- someone strategically placed, with an opportunity to condition students to want a different kind of society.

"A century later, we are seeing schools across America indoctrinating students to believe in all sorts of politically correct notions. The history that is taught in too many of our schools is a history that emphasizes everything that has gone bad, or can be made to look bad, in America -- and that gives little, if any, attention to the great achievements of this country.

"If you think that is an exaggeration, get a copy of "A People's History of the United States" by Howard Zinn and read it. As someone who used to read translations of official Communist newspapers in the days of the Soviet Union, I know that those papers' attempts to degrade the United States did not sink quite as low as Howard Zinn's book.

"That book has sold millions of copies, poisoning the minds of millions of students in schools and colleges against their own country. But this book is one of many things that enable teachers to think of themselves as "agents of change," without having the slightest accountability for whether that change turns out to be for the better or for the worse -- or, indeed, utterly catastrophic."

--Thomas Sowell

The State will never voluntarily surrender its power to indoctrinate children. It is not desirable to anyone in power to have children (and adults) willing and able to question authority.

In a sense, I agree with Howard..many things that you have mentioned in this article and he in his question sounds like Nordic & Icelandic countries'. My only fear well..as a parent would be age-mixed learning? Me not being their? There's already an issue of pedophilia in this country & things that a teenager is exposed to that can bring danger to an adolescent..Many of the scholastic examples you mention sound's like hands off learning..EYES-OFF learning..and even if not..I can't trust anyone around my child just because of their prestige, their level-of education or their warm smile as has been proven time & time again.

"I think with this system we will have far fewer unhappy doctors, lawyers, business executives, and so on than we do now "

I think you also probably won't have any accountants, tax inspectors, lavatory cleaners or rent enforcement officers.

For students who are interested in vocational education (especially the kinesthetic learners who are so poorly served in our educational system), publically funded vocational ed should be available. We should be producing our own construction workers, cooks, etc. instead of importing them.
Personally, I think that corporate interests have deliberately made K-12 education even less student-directed than it had been by imposing mandatory testing, etc. The intent was not to enable students but to destroy the teachers' unions. Just my opinion.
I don't think Student-Directed Learning will work for many kids. Many parents aren't interested in doing their part. It will work for some but not all.

I got a bachelor's degree from a public university. I don't use it for work because I went into corporate finance. There is no theory behind what I do. It is all based on trial and error and what other financial professionals have written about their own experiences. However, I don't regret taking six years to get that degree. Community college and then state university was where I made the friends that I still have and formed my own philosophical and political opinions. Higher education isn't just for your career. It also makes you into a more well-rounded person if you do it right.

Fascinating article Dr. Gray, however I believe you left out some important discussion points.

How did public schools become the way they are today?

Why is public school curricula structured around standardized learning experience and test data acquisition?

Are teachers coerced into radical behaviorist pedagogies for a reason?

Will the state discredit teachers and their schools if classrooms and grade level cohorts don't meet target scores on standardized tests?

How do politicians and corporations influence school experience for children?

Might school districts be able to re-design for democratic education once they have the autonomy and funding to do so?

Thanks again for a fascinating read!

Clyde Gaw

Those college alternative programs that are based around apprenticeship are already gaining in popularity, through they mainly focus on business and entrepreneurial positions. I am thinking of Praxis, Uncollege, some "gap year" programs intended to either prepare the student for a career or for college. As those programs succeed and gain in popularity, perhaps more will spring up and more colleges will start offering similar programs.

Good one Peter, For the sake of all of those damaged by this CAFO school system, whose graduates should be graded on their choice for president, I hope your optimistic plan grows. I'm still trying to safely donate this 175 acre farm, 3 mi. from the center of Winona, a beautiful island city on the Ms. River. Because it is protected from development by the Mn. Land Trust, incase at 86, I haven't found a worthy institution or non-profit partner before the party is over, it will become some rich sob's locked gate, show off estate. The City and County don't want it, That I want them to accept and promote the 3 acre natural burial cemetery, which could easily include the 35 acre hay field that it is part of, which at a mere $1,000 donation per grave comes to $1 million per acre, plus the free advertising of making Winona the most environmentally friendly of cities--but that takes political courage that is rare, as in changing schools. I haven't heard from WSU yet, who is removing some homes adjoining campus, for a $27 million "Ed Village", which will only house some pre-school and ed. majors. WSU just completed 2 pedestrian tunnels under 2 rail road tracks that separate the campus from their football field and proposed field house. I crossed that track 8,000 times, starting when 6, going and coming from school, never having eaten a meal in school. To be hit by a train, one either has to be stoned, stupid, suicidal or a student., so what would such a creative institution of learning do with this farm???
However, just 1.2 mi. down the road is Mn. State College Southeast, which was a Vo-Tech. They are still mostly a 2 yr. tech school, but now have added steps toward a 4 yr. degree at WSU. Some staff and an administrator have visited the farm and are bringing the pres. this week. They are very interested. I've had my own and other unschoolers here, but in rural areas, where we have what I believe is the essential open, topographically diverse acres, we lack parents who are able to trust self directed learning. After 12 yrs. of the most intensive indoctrination, the medium being the message and the medium is the ever present teacher/guard relationship, no matter how much she smiles So I forwarded Peter's love note to them today to see if they choke, in that so few, whose livelihoods are dependent on the system, care to question it. There is endless "constructive exercise" to be done on this small farm, We raise hogs, fed 100% on waste food, mostly from WSU, which can be legally done in Mn., but not Wi., Ia.or the Dakota's. The U of Mn. a Land Grant Institution that promotes ag and along with Monsanto has helped poison life, is now composting their tons of food waste, which is better than land filling; however, they could make the best use of their tons of waste food, by raising hogs or chickens on it and composting the manure, but that must be beneath the institutions dignity. All pork, beef, chickens, honey and produce raised on this farm must be sold at the farm, as is done at Gale Woods Farm, part of Hennepin County Government. Have any of you experienced programs where students participate in a more self sufficient life style, so that if they find that those years of following the teachers directions for a diploma doesn't guarantee employment, anymore than blindly following a presidents direction to fight a perceived enemy guarantees life, that it isn't beneath their dignity to become more self sufficient, even if it means raising some hogs on food waste, that we have been paid to pick up for 18 years. If Mn. State College Southeast accepts the natural burial cemetery, then we can get serious. Thanks for listening.

Dick Gallien
22501 East Burns Valley Road
Winona MN 55987
The Winona Farm

Prison bars do the confining, allowing the prisoner a mental freedom not possible in schools, where an endless barrage of assignments, lectures, questions and tests, serve the same purpose, under the guise of education, while distracting as efficiently as the cracking of whips, keeping the imprisoned from discovering and pursuing their passions, or noticing that there are no real bars------and by the time they might realize the purpose of their confinement, it is too late.

Hogs are intelligent, inquisitive, energetic animals. Most are raised in confinement, for ease of control and assurance of a mild, bland, uniform product. Confinement guarantees bullying and boredom. To reduce bullying, their tails and testicles are cut off/out. To distract them from boredom and their imprisonment, they are given a bowling ball, to push around.

Humans are intelligent, inquisitive, energetic animals. Most are raised in confinement, for ease of control and assurance of a mild, bland, uniform product. Confinement guarantees bullying and boredom. To reduce bullying, signs are posted, warning that bullying is not nice and Ritalin is administered. To distract them from boredom and their imprisonment, a few play games in stadiums, before thousands of fanatics, pumped by cheerleaders and marching bands.

I believe there is no substitute for participation, yet 95% of those who play school sports or band instruments, will never play a game or blow a note after graduation, but instead will become loyal fans, primed for a lifetime of viewing and consuming. If each individual could hear what their vocal chords contribute to the adrenalin fueled roar of a football crowd, they would probably be embarrassed. If heard in public,cheering alone, they'd probably be taken to a loony bin. The human voice, is the only true life time instrument, compared with a tuba, etc. yet few of us have ever sung alone or made 2 or 4 part harmony. With most of their natural curiosities dead, they troop off to college for more of the same, except they are stacked in rabbit hutches (dorms) isolated from the general public. Imagine being at Ohio State, the Twin Towers, each 24 floors of students, "all available" or as any farm boy would quickly realize, that half of them are open heifers and there's a big football game tonight.

We can assume that most of the students in the 2 yr. college down the road were not in the top of their classes or had well to do parents. Some would compare their school experience to being lapped in track day after day, for 12 years, or being endlessly punched in the gut. Even if some distinguished prof's like Peter, tried to explain to them that the system's purpose is to control the masses it's the same system that allowed an Austrian school drop out to lead the most well schooled Germans over the cliff; the same system that allowed our supposedly well schooled nation to elect what has us hovering on the edge of unimaginable horror, that the system is rigged, you aren't as stupid as the system has made you believe. But they wouldn't hear Peter, for one doesn't shake off such a total indoctrination. It is as deeply in grained as the peck order in cattle who are confined in a limited area. When I asked my bright, attractive neighbor classmate, why she and her husband raised their family in St. Paul, she said Winona was too cliquish adding that since you don't actually live in town or work in Winona, you would not understand. I worked in a number of experimental sch. programs in the 60's, including the first Mn. Outward Bound and Co. Outward Bound, which was an effort to change young people's faith in themselves, in a 28 day outdoor course. The City of Winona just hired a full time outdoor recreation person an effort to encourage people to canoe, rock climb and do things outdoors, other than be fans. Hopefully this farm can be a place where self directed people are doing environmentally interesting things. Please shout, with any suggestions. Thanks Dick

Do you agree with a Universal Basic Income? I think it would work well with the second stage of your ideal education system because people would be free to explore potential careers without the pressure to do work they don't enjoy in order to survive.

Also in an earlier comment you wrote that unpleasant jobs should have shorter hours and pay more. Companies wouuld be forced to shorten hours and increase pay if a Universal Basic Income existed because people would have the leverage of being able to simply not do that job if they didn't want to.

My main concern in what you've said would that the "publicly-funded learning centers" of which you speak not become factory-style schools by a different name. Thus, we'd have to insure that attendance were not mandatory (like the current K-12 compulsion) or even promoted via social pressure (i.e., the way so many parents feel they "have to" send their children away from home for "preschool" even though doing so is not mandated by law). Your vision can work IF the "learning centers" were wholly optional and IF those of us who would choose to eschew them would not find our children disadvantaged. In other words, if we could assure that attendance at "learning centers" could be viewed in the same vein as, say, attending a museum or visiting a zoo, rather than as the place where all kids "have to" be in order to be deemed "acceptable," it might work. I am not convinced, though, that such an endeavor can co-exist with public funding in the realm of education...because legislators always demand "accountability" for the use of public funds, and I have a hard time seeing how they'd let go of their stranglehold on what happens in (and who attends) learning centers.

The other problem is K-12 teachers. I am a recovering classroom teacher myself - spent nine years in that system - and I saw how they spent all their time and effort justifying their existence and "professionalism" in order to scream about their "need" for higher wages. They claim that their "years of higher education" and training warrants respect that starts with "state certification" (and a concurrent disdain for highly capable educators who do not have that certification/rubberstamp). I cannot see them giving up their self-vaunted position easily, either individually or collectively (via their unions). However, the learning centers will not work if those who facilitate kids' learning there (as opposed to standing up and lecturing, school-style) are required to be "certified teachers." So maybe the whole thing gets rolling with the dismantling first of "schools of education" in colleges. They are the least necessary department on any college campus, in my opinion, and until "educators" realize that they're ridiculous, I don't see a way off the gerbil wheel...

My Question is how would this model be applicable for poor countries like Nepal. One might think that being poor and not having much of a system allows one to make rapid changes and adopt whatever seems to be best right now (considering expenses), but Nepal is still pretty backward. I remember as a kid being slapped, beaten on the palm with a stick and being shamed and having to do squats in front of everyone in class (as punishment).

If I were to be someone who after some years wanted to help the poor in Nepal, how would I go about implementing what you just mentioned?

Feedback would be valuable.

Thank you.

Freedom is not a novel concept. The Enlightenment and various social, political, economic, philosophical, and scientific developments led eventually over many decades to the increasing popularization in western cultures of freedom for more and more categories of people, or to all people, with the exception of lawbreakers who were found guilty of violent acts and children who have been judged to be immature and in need of adult control and management.

Freedom is not a fad or a great innovation that spontaneously or automatically spreads like wildfire because it is so inherently wonderful and beneficial to all. There is a constant tension between those who truly value freedom for more people or for all people, and those who have a strong inclination to restrict it for certain others. More than a few people see freedom for ordinary people as a great danger and as temptation that will inevitably be their downfall or be abused in some manner.

There are always pressures from many quarters to deny liberty and freedom to certain categories or to at least severely limit it in particular circumstances and to deny it to children or other captives and vulnerable groups. There is, and will always be, a continuing struggle for freedom. It takes real concerted effort and dedication to keep the idea and the reality of freedom alive in all places for all people.

If you poll groups of high school students and teens or recent graduates with the right questions, you are likely to find a high percentage who believe that they should be given much more liberty in deciding their own needs, capabilities, and rights to self-determination. They normally chafe under the control of strict parents, teachers, other authority figures or social norms.

However, should you drill down and ask more detailed questions about the ability of people generally, or about younger children, or about their peers to handle unrestricted freedom in most circumstances, I would be quite surprised if they didn’t lean quite heavily as a group towards a fairly strong belief in social and other controls over the population overall and particularly over young children. Paternalism runs deep. Fear of anarchy is nearly ubiquitous.

Children are bombarded from a very early age with both subtle and overt messages about the needs of all young people and of most members of society to have outside influences and external authorities to establish and maintain rules, restrictions, laws, standards, and “guidance” to channel their behavior and impulses and to place clear and rigid limits on their degree of freedom. While we “liberals” and those with an orientation toward maximum self-determination are averse to external control and authoritarian domination as a principle, even some of us typically make some significant exceptions. But we are in the minority when push comes to shove.

Conservatives most often err on the side of caution and restraint. That is certainly reasonable and in many instances even they may nevertheless recognize the benefits of autonomy for children in certain situations and environments. Unfortunately, the authentic thinking conservatives who exercise rationality have nearly all been superseded by reactionary individuals whose fear, apprehension, and bias against human nature cause them to strongly favor authoritarian leadership and blind obedience for the masses. They have a greatly perverted conception of conservatism. This is, more than anything else, the logical consequence of twelve years spent in authoritarian schools being reminded incessantly of their natural need for monitoring and close supervision along multiple dimensions as humans lacking civilization in some measure.

Compulsory attendance laws presume certain unproven facts and a certain disagreeable reality. The facile hope that the world (otherwise known as reality) will change because an application of freedom has been re-discovered anew and implemented “successfully” in a handful of locations is not just naïve; it is suicidal. The erroneous presumptions flowing from these laws are set in stone when they are obeyed and allowed to go unchallenged in any significant, overt, or effective manner. The expectation that these laws will become moot or anachronistic as a result of increasing awareness and the acceptance of scientific research or anecdotal reports is to ignore the underlying basis for the creation of the laws.

A suitable metaphor for what educators, reformers, and un-schoolers propose is difficult to find. If I have a painful burn on my left hand, would I place my right hand in ice and wait patiently for relief? Will making the proliferation of guns and gun violence be reduced by making it easier for people to buy guns and praying for the dead? Will a national epidemic of diabetes and obesity be meaningfully ameliorated by gently informing the public through public service ads that too much sugar is bad for them, while continuing to subsidize sugar production and allowing a barrage of TV ads heavily pushing sugary cereals to small children on the weekend cartoon shows? Will crime, homelessness, family disintegration, and poverty be reduced by lowering tax rates for the wealthy and multinational corporations and increasing taxes on working people? Have we all become Republicans?

An authoritarian bureaucracy mandated by unconstitutional laws is known to be the one crucial problem. Research is a weak balm that alleviates our own symptoms but doesn’t effect any cure. How is sitting on our hands, holding conferences, hunkering down in safe places with a handful of students, and proselytizing going to resolve that problem? How many centuries will it take for the tide to turn and for the undoing of powerful unconscious programming?

When Humpty-Trumpty repeats some dubious statement or theory over and over, those of us who took Psy 101 or those who know anything at all about human behavior should recognize that he is most probably trying (futilely) to convince himself of something that he wants to believe or needs quite desperately to believe, despite having a profound sense on some level that the proposition lacks veracity. He may even believe the lie, but probably knows better on some level. Rationalization serves a purpose for the person doing the rationalizing, which is to maintain one’s beliefs or conceptualizations, or in other words, to avoid the discomfort of cognitive dissonance.

I counted six specific instances, in addition to one whole restatement paragraph from this post which repeat and reinforce a general belief in the inevitability of a rosy projection for the future, which is counter-intuitive, to say the least. But, who actually needs to be convinced? Is it the reader, or might it be the author? I apologize for the comparison to the pathetic Mr. Trump. However the dynamic is basically the same – a case is made and repeated many times primarily to reassure the person promoting the idea of its accuracy, despite a lack of solid logic or reasons to expect the dream to become reality.

The essential idea is to dismantle deeply entrenched non-systems of human conduct and established ways of behaving and structuring relationships including social, economic, indoctrinational, and institutional relationships and hierarchies, which have developed over centuries. Persuasion, examples, and good PR or word of mouth are the ostensible motivators leading to changed minds and hearts.

When we speak of systems, i.e., “our coercive educational system”, we are framing the reality of patterns of organization and interaction, which are systematic in a broad sense, but which are not typically completely rational or systematized according to coherent or specific well-understood principles and designs. They combine longstanding tradition, mythology, unscientific theory, wishful thinking, and simple mistaken attribution. You can’t change what you can’t identify, see, or touch. Also, the same error is made in the post; those are school systems, they are by no stretch of the imagination educational systems.

It is worth asking, if the missionaries of tolerance, love, peace, reason, freedom, sanity, playfulness, science, and equality have had so few converts over the last century and longer, why should one expect them to transform our institutions and our habits with regard to schooling and education now, or anytime soon? And, if not soon, when? Or, why do we abandon today’s victims as if they were just collateral damage?

If, by some miracle the images and convictions held by a majority of people changed to reflect a preference for free schools or no schools, what is the likelihood that there would be no powerful pushback from the forces of intolerance and more rigid or controlling and demanding methods of instruction and indoctrination? If a way of life or a way of thinking is threatened, the usual response is to undermine the efforts of those who pose the threat. To date, the efforts of un-schoolers aren’t even perceived as a threat!

The cat will die in the bag before it scratches its way out. Why haven’t I given up yet? I can’t answer that.

This vision of a future of education sounds very substantiated. I would like to add a few points from my own experience:
1. I can completely identify with your analysis of college students today: after 5 years in college, I have to admit to having tried to get through with as little effort as possible. This is due to the experience that my own questions and values are not wanted. Rather, I am to coercively learn what someone has decided is important. As a result, I feel drained of my own interest, and my only goal left is to get through as soon as possible, in order to finally get a degree. Fortunately, I will not be indebted, since I live in Germany, where university is tuition-free. However, I am aware that university could be a great resource, and I have utmost respect for a lot of my professors. I simply do not have the energy to pursue meaningful, self-directed education inside of college, because I am too occupied with meeting requirements and deadlines. Thus, this is a great waste of money, regardless of whether the taxpayer or myself are paying for it. I might add that I do not blame these flaws on the state paying for education - U.S. schools are no more innovative in that regard, they are only more expensive.

2. The vocational training you mention is very common here in Germany, and is very successful in many ways. Especially crafts and industry jobs are tied to good training. But there are some problems. For one, even here they are not as valued as college education, even if they might lead to a better paid job.
Secondly, job experience means nothing here without vocational training, so it is required even to get a job that doesn't need three years of training, e.g. working as a supermarket cashier. This leads to students being used as cheap labor, forced to work three years with low pay. Besides their work on the job they have some schooling, which could be useful for gaining some theoretical knowledge. However, it is no different from our other coercive forms of schooling, with all the problems coming with it.

Therefore, university and vocational training are no different from high school in the essential critical points that you make in your texts, besides tha=e fact that we get to "choose" a field we are interested in.

The predictions are definitely correct. The only problem is how fast the death of school prisons may take. There are dozens of smart people who cannot imagine schooling done differently than via teaching. They believe that self-learning leads to nowhere and that students are too lazy. It is hard to crack that shell. We need more great students from homeschooling and unschooling environments. Such changes take generations. Perhaps social media will speed it up?

I like your ideas--we do need people with vision. However, as one of those blighted teachers in a K-12 institution, I not only understand the failings which you are referring to, but also see a level of idealism in this article that reflects, perhaps, your own privileged status. The kind of education you are dreaming of is as dead to the child from an abused family as the current system is. In my experience, any child who is genuinely loved and supported from home--monetary wealth has nothing to do with it--can thrive in a well-grounded K-12 public school. Any child who has suffered neglect or abuse of any kind, cannot thrive or be taught in school until the basic need of being loved is filled. I've seen this pattern for nearly the nearly 17 years I've worked in the K-12 system.

The educational system is only as healthy as society is, and the educational system is a reflection of society. This very unwelcome fact is part of the reason why it's not being successfully addressed. These problems are extremely complicated, and require much more help than, say, more credentials from teachers, more money from the government, and least of all, more regulation, i.e., "Little Timmy will be reading at grade level by grade three, or else we (the Federal/State government) will hold them back."

Sadly, the ship is sinking, and we're plugging all the wrong holes. I do not pretend to have the answer. I've only seen the problem close up. Thank you for your ideas, though; we certainly do need to move in a new direction, and we cannot do that without forums like this.

Dear Ms. Dixon,
Your insight is badly needed and you state your beliefs extremely well. I have to say that your characterizations of “aristocratic” and “a reflection of privileged status” echo my own observations. However, I am compelled to object to a couple of your assumptions.
While it is true that children who are accorded respect, dignity, and a loving relationship at home or in school generally thrive in terms of social adjustment; the sort of learning that is judged to be beneficial and essential by certain adults or “experts”; mental health indices, and even physical health generally, those things should not be considered to be education and they do not signal an adequate capability to “think critically” or operate as a fully autonomous individual.
One of the most consequential errors that people make is to conflate school attendance, good behavior, and school success (passing tests, getting gold stars and “good” grades, staying out of trouble, and being able to deal with complex or sophisticated material) with education. Education is not even in the eye of the beholder; it is in the eye of the person possessing it. Education is ineffable. It can’t be measured or ascertained from external observation, although its absence is often all too apparent.
The ship has already sunk for millions of people alive and yet to be born under this pathological paradigm. Plugging holes or offering mere alternatives for those fortunate few is utter nonsense. The ship that we (most of us who lack privilege or good fortune) are stuck on exists and persists because of the attendance requirement. The laws mandate a monolithic institution in which selected people have immense power and tenacity, the staff and others can only function by controlling behavior and thought and by following (or pretending to follow) the indoctrinating curriculum, which involves politically correct responses and predigested “knowledge”, and students passively wait in their boxes for their rewards.
The alternatives that remove kids from traditional schools are great for those who will make sacrifices or those who don't have to give anything up to provide freedom and a rich environment. In many cases they compensate for a difficult home situation. However, they will never be more than tokens and exceptions to the general rule.
Talking and communicating ideas is therapeutic and satisfying for participants. But, talk is cheap and recycling even genius schemes and methodologies among a small proportion of the total population means that the ship remains on the bottom of a deep ocean. Until there is action that begins to move us away from compulsory attendance in authoritarian bureaucracies, we will be living groundhog day over and over, endlessly. You have great potential. You may very well figure it out and be willing to take a stab at real change. Start with asking why paternalistic people should be delivering education according to their interpretations and cultural and other values, and why children should be denied constitutional and civil rights because of their age or status.

Dr. Gray,
I like your vision of a world in which college education becomes more individualized and self-directed.
Yet I have to wonder when you say that there is growing evidence that there is relatively little learning going on there now during the college years (paraphrased).
I suppose I could believe this in the field of Journalism, for I keep waiting for an interviewer to respond to DT with "Is there a statement there?"
Yet in various technological fields the rate of innovation continues at a pace that even I, a fan of the scientific mode of thought at least, find somewhat disturbing. Intelligent robots were interesting and entertaining when I encountered them in science fiction in my youth; but I never dreamed that I might live to see the reality. Recently I heard that geneticists had succeeded in inserting a piece of genetic code into a bacterium that had no business being in any lifeforms on Earth ever. They did it just to see if they could do it.
I use these examples to show that I'm not exactly intending to pat the Colleges on the back for the good job they've been doing; I'm more inclined to think these are two examples of science gone awry. Still, in order to be able to do these things, you really have to know what you're doing, in terms of learning science and technology anyway. Where else could they be learning this if not at colleges and universities?

Dr. Grey,
I continue to really enjoy your work. Wondering about SEL.

I've seen people push data showing increased interpersonal and coping skills (RULER, Mindful Schools, etc.). Our Head of School at the private school I work at paints schooling as an essential part of becoming a good person (mainly because of the SEL program our kids receive in the curriculum). I assume you see SEL programs as a waist of time and something that would be acquired much better in a free environment (please correct me on that if I'm over simplifying your stance).

So what would you tell someone who pointed to the data and tried to explain this is an example of where adult intervention is good for kids?

Interesting article and as a retired homeschool teacher I have read a lot of similar articles. I think the ideas are good. I don't think the ideas will fly in modern western culture because the school system is a giant free child care system. 90% of people do not want that messed with.

Much as I love the idea of apprenticeship programs, I wonder what you see as the role of liberal arts. How do they fit into the program?

My question is similar to the above poster about the missing liberal arts piece. Is it really desirable to find an interest at an early age and then go on to pursue it singularly via apprenticeships, etc? There is that saying about how educated people know something about everything and everything about something. I guess I still have that bias about what I think education should be. I'm not sorry I took a poetry class in college even though my main interest was biology, for example. I also worked in a research lab at my college in a work/study position which seems just as good as an apprenticeship to me.

I enjoyed reading this article. However there are some aspects of learning not taken into account. The first is that some learning is hard and not enjoyable. The rewards are not immediate, but will be discovered by the student later on, maybe years afterwards. In this respect - and in a very limited fashion - I believe that discipline has a value. I think there is a tremendous value in learning to face obligations that are not necessary pleasing or playful. I discovered the beauty of maths much later than school years, and I am quite certain I would have never discovered it if I hadn't been somehow forcefully exposed to it. Same with piano playing. It was hard for me. Of course one could say I didn't have good teachers. But my feeling is that I was not very much into it, and I am very grateful for having acquired the tools because somebody thought it was important. I think children need different degrees of guidance, and that some things must be learned even if they are not fun.

We agree with the author that there should be a trial run for all occupations such as apprenticeships before choosing to go to school for that career.
We disagree with eliminating K-12 and a necessity because its general knowledge and high schoolers can receive scholarships that will benefit them when choosing to go school.
We agree with the author but we also think that there are some circumstances where you can be successful with out any higher education.