Essay #2- First Draft

Why do we need school? Why do we have to learn about so many different subjects in school? Will these subjects really be beneficial when we grow up to be whatever we are destined to be when we are older? Will it help us with our majors in college? But most of all, is that really the point of school? I can tell you right now, I do not remember what I learned in my 3rd grade history class, or my 5th grade science class, so what was really the point of it all? Was it all a complete waste of time for all of us, and maybe money for some of us who went to private schools? Was going to a school for a good portion of our lives just implemented so our parents could have some time to themselves for seven hours a day, five days a week? From the day we are born, education is in our future, no matter the quality or quantity, we are born with intentions set out for us to go to school and learn something, anything. An education that will hopefully have some sort of impact on us, even if it is just instilling good morals, nevertheless, does school automatically mean, educated?
In Gatto’s, “Against School,” he really opens up the floor for a questioning of something that I’m going to assume, most people don’t necessarily think to question. Gatto claims that the rigorous twelve years of school are not as important as we may think them to be, and I have mixed feelings about this.
On the one hand, I agree, is twelve years of the same old repetitive classes just at a different level too much? Have we already taken as much as we can get from those classes at a certain point? When does it become repetitive? When do we begin to memorize the necessary information to pass the class only using our short term memory, only to forget it all almost immediately after we have been tested on it? But on the other hand, I must say that I felt well prepared to move on to the next level of each grade. And as much as we were more concerned with when recess was or lunch, something must have stuck with us to a point that we feel it necessary to continue to send our children to the same educators that we were sent too.
Gatto uses history to back up his idea that “school” not education, may not be necessary, stating that if people like Thomas Jefferson, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, to name a few, did not attend what we know as school, yet still managed to impact us as they did, then why aren’t we expect to do the same? What he so quickly overlooks is the fact that this is the twenty-first century, where the little lady might not have a man to go out and bring home the bacon, she might not even have a husband at all. Not to mention that school also means much needed jobs! Teachers, counselors, principals, janitors, the list goes on; all are surviving from the paycheck they receive from these jobs. I dare to say it, maybe we don’t need school for our core education, that’s what college is for, but we do need school to get us into the routine of having a structured life. It puts on a schedule, and requires us to learn time management and prioritize.
Which brings me also to Gatto’s touching on the idea of, “being more flexible on time, texts and tests…” I’m sorry, but what?! These are just the beginning steps to teaching children about deadlines, punctuality, and good study habits. Do you think your boss is going to be flexible on when you show up to work, hoping that eventuality you will pick up on the idea of what time is appropriate? I highly doubt it. All of these things may not be a contribution of our actual education we receive in school, but they certainly come with the territory of getting an assignment, working on it in a timely manner and handing it to the teacher on the due date.
Gatto also references Alexander Inglis’s, “Principles of Secondary Education,” which list what he believes to be “the six basic functions” of modern schooling. They say things such as, “Schools are to establish fixed habits of reaction to authority,” and, “its intention is to make children as alike as possible. People who conform are predictable…” Although I can agree with schools forcing us to react to authority, why is this considered a bad thing? Would they really rather we grow up never respecting the figures that are only established to keep us from hurting others and/or ourselves? These “fixed habits” are implemented in the earliest stages when we are taught to stand in a straight line, not talk during class, and raise our hands to ask questions, but again I ask, what part of this is a bad thing? A school where none of these behaviors are applied would be in complete chaos at most hours of the day. So I say give me rules and let me respond to them. If I’m considered predictable because know how to respond to right and wrong behaviors, then I’m predictable.