Educational Wellness Seems Lost in North American Society, But We Can Get It Back!

The personal philosophy of education, of the members of any society, is not something to be taken lightly.  Do you have an opinion about how the public education system should work?  Fifteen years ago, I was employed in a public, suburban high school that served grades 8 to 12 and as a result of that employment; I formed a very definite personal philosophy of education.

My belief is that the education system is failing and the parents, who depend on it the most, have become so disempowered, that it would take a major change in how people think about educational wellness to make any real change. The writing has been on the wall since the 1950s that things are not working that well.

Good stress management skills are learned very young in life.  Because the public education system, most often, meets children, at the tender age of five or six, it has the best chance possible to teach young people, the life skills needed to function as well-balanced adults.  Unfortunately, the school experience is often so negative and destructive that children today really don’t stand any chance.  It’s time for real change.

Just like every other institution in society, the public education system served a valuable function at a particular time in history, but that philosophy of education is no longer serving our society. It has to change! We now know that educating groups of kids all at the same age in massive groups of 30 or more per class just doesn’t cut it. Something has to change!

This model came into use after WW2 when the population grew dramatically in a short amount of time. Schools had to make big adjustments to accommodate the increased numbers of students and it wasn’t long before children became little more than numbers in a cookie cutter education system. The system began to weaken and even though the system was being stretched thinner and thinner, the system still wasn't interested in hearing your personal philosophy of education.

In the elementary classes, children still stayed with one teacher for the better part of each day but at the secondary level, the children were moved from class to class each hour like cattle on a cattle drive. Learning systems began to fail, drop out rates increased, violence and destructive behavior began to increase and today schools are some of the most dangerous places to send kids.

Educational experts tried all kinds of things to fix the problem and when school-based solutions didn’t help, schools began dictating to parents how to raise their children. They began offering sex education; death education; and they began forcing families to put their, so called, ADD/ADHD children on Ritalin. Not only was your personal philosophy of education unimportant but now your parenting philosophy was being challenged as well.

When you attended high school, did you have a mandatory reading list, like I did? Two books that I had to read were “Lord of the Flies” by William Golding and “1984” by George Orwell. The first book explained the dire consequences of allowing a large group of same age, same gender children to be in charge of their own destiny. For those who have not read the book, a very negative result happens.

The second book talks about a society in which there is far too much governmental interference and control and once again the result is less than pretty. Golding and Orwell are considered to be two very important authors, but we have heeded none of their advice. The personal philosophy of education of the average parent is considered to be quite irrelevant by the public education system.

Unfortunately, the system will never change for the better until parents stand up and demand change. Parents DO have standards and they need to raise the bar and demand that schools meet those standards. Parents cannot and should not be replaced as the stewards of educational wellness in a society. It is far too important to leave it in the control of the government and unions. The public education system has to be about the kids and until parents stand up and begin to fight, children will continue to be lost in the system.