Not Without Guilt 2 (A Working Title)

I continue below with thoughts on the divisions within our nation. It is best considered as a continuation of the post linked in the first line of the body. It also is incomplete -- merely a beginning at looking at the divisions within the United States.

Education is obviously one of the issues that must be considered when we look again at the CNN example of the destroyed repossessed homes. But again, we must dig into the question of what we mean by education. This brings up the moral and cultural issues that are at the heart of our divided nation. We must seek to bridge the gap between at least two radically different ways of viewing the world.

So, where to begin? I think first we must look at different ways in which individuals are “educated.”

When we speak of education, the most common frame of reference is the public school system. It is the body to which we have consigned our children in the expectation that they will be provided with a basic set of skills which will allow them to not only function properly within society but which will allow them to succeed. But, then, I’m looking at education from my frame of reference which differs from some other group’s point-of-view.

If we look at a poor single mother who is trying to raise children, provide an income and basically just survive on her own, she may not see school so much as a place where her offspring can obtain a basic set of skills as she sees it as a babysitter. Perhaps she sees it merely as a place to keep those children out of her hair while she lies in a drugged stupor. Perhaps – well, there are thousands of “perhaps” that could encompass only a portion of the potential scenarios. But, what is a key here is that we first realize that the public schools are being asked to function in a role for which they were not designed. They should not be babysitters. They were designed to function as a place of learning for those who are motivated to learn – either through the threat of punishment from a parent who wanted the situation of their children to be improved from their own, or because the child truly desired to learn and improve his own situation. That is often not what we have today.

So, we see that the public schools as a source of education is a barely functioning entity today because it is tasked with goals for which it was not designed and is inadequately prepared. That leaves us with other forms of education.

The greatest source of education is a mentor. Most often, a mentor – especially for young children – is a parent who seeks to create a desire for learning and a sense of purpose for that desire. What happens to that portion of the learning process when both parents are working sixty hour weeks because they want to “get ahead” in life? What happens when the child is reared in a single-parent home in which survival takes precedence over special attentions to the needs of the child? What happens when the influences of our friends and neighbors seek to degrade the desire for success by replacing it with a desire for disruption or excess? What happens when the family is disconnected in such a way that “extended” family members are merely a phone number or address in a book and not a vital part of life? Grandparents can sometimes fill the role of a mentor when the circumstances cause an inability on the part of the parents. The disintegration of the family is a factor in the failure of our children to obtain an education that will lead them to function well in society.

...perhaps to be continued.