alt.education

"*Anarcissie*" wrote:
>> >Well, there is the larger question of what business the
>> >State has with children, such that children must be
>> >forced into some sort of institutional processing plant.
>>
>> Whatever business "we the people" of the various states, all of which
>> have set up educational systems (most of them in their respective
>> constitutions), decide.
>>
>> There are very few limits on state governments, provided that they
>> don't run afoul of the Bill of Rights.
>
>That's a big if.

It actually isn't that big. A state could in theory have a 100%
income tax, for example. It wouldn't make sense, but a state could
constitutionally do it.

>But anyway, I was interested in the contents of that iron vessel you propose,

I don't propose anything. I just recognize that it is floating, and
rather successfully.

>rather than the composition of its hull.
>
>What is it people want of education, not only of that
>education imposed on themselves and their children,
>but more interestingly of that imposed on others?

A wide variety of different things such that there probably is no full
consensus in any state, much less among the 50.

>Why can't bible-beaters and Satanists school their children at home in California?

It's apparently against the law.

>What's the problem?

It's apparently against the law.



>>
>> There is no particular evidence that this was the principal goal of
>> the Prussian system. Certainly it was a strong selling point in
>> fractured Germany that it could help do so, but the closest equivalent
>> to that in Mann's ideas was that schools could help in the
>> assimilation of immigrants who did not have the skills and culture of
>> people born here.
>>
>> >The form of school there was at least consistent with
>> >the aims of the Prussian ruling class. But the U.S.
>> >is a different country with supposedly different
>> >principles.
>>
>> And we ended up with a considerably different system. But every
>> advanced country has public education, and most countries, unlike the
>> US have a central education agency dictating policy to the whole
>> country. That is another way is which we are quite unlike the
>> Prussian system - school systems here are run by the states, and in
>> most states, the state power is delegated to local districts where
>> many of the most important policy decisions are made.
>
>So you seem to disagree with Wikipedia in
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horace_Mann
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prussian_education_system

It certainly isn't accurate, and it is obvious. From the latter
article:
Since Horace Mann died in 1859, he did not hear about the successes of
the Prussian system in the late 1800s.

First of all, Massachusetts had a public education system before 1852
- indeed from 1647. What was adopted in 1852 was compulsory
education, not "the Prussian education system", but the original
public education system was required to provide for all kids even if
there was no requirement that the kids attend.

If you look at the headline features of "the Prussian education
system" in that article, you will see that it was NOT adopted.
Lutheran influence - NO
Pietist influence - NO
The political motivations of the King of Prussia - Not relevant (no
king, no aristocracy)
Compulsory education - YES
Prussian General Land Law - Replaced local control with state control
NO
Institution of the final examination, Abitur - NO
Institution of teacher certification requirements - not in 1852 (Mann
started a state-funded Normal School for training teachers in 1839,
but it wasn't the first in the country, and they were already in use
in several countries, not just in Prussia. But required teacher
certification came decades after 1852.)

Second of all, Horace Mann's service as the Secretary of the
Massachusetts Board of Education had already ended in 1848, when Mann
resigned to take a vacant seat in Congress. His involvement in the
decision of 1852 was as a citizen of stature. He couldn't have been
"largely responsible" for that decision - he didn't even have a vote
in the legislature. ("We the people" decided, in other words).

>Maybe you should correct those articles.

I use Wikipedia on occasion; I don't write it.

lojbab