The truth is that each of us is unique. How is it then that our schools are not designed around the needs of individuals? They are designed following a false belief that one-size-fits-all. They were designed that way to standardize and control workers who do not question authority and serve like obedient robots.
In our present system all students are expected to have specific skills by their chronical age and grade in school. As an example, by age ten if it is determined that a child does not read with a predetermined competency he is held back, rejected, labeled, and tracked into groups with lower expectations designed for students who are only fit for unskilled labor. In those groups it is believed that menial work is anything that requires physical sweat. Their superiors—those who perpetuate the system—look down on those who use their hands and mind. That is why skilled carpenters and plumbers are not respected or compensated the same as white-collar workers. That is why we have systems that favor compliant, passive-adaptive human beings. That is why the student is shamed, the teacher is accused of failing to adequately prepare the students, and the school is often labeled as inferior.
The educational systems still in place were designed more than a hundred and fifty years ago. They were created by people who did not believe in freeing the inner powers of individuals. Nor did they believe in the power of curious, creative, challenging, and competent individuals who collaborate and work together to solve problems.
Let’s say you are a parent of a third-grader who has been shamed because she is developing as an individual in many ways that are not identified by age-related measurements. Large numbers of students are being humiliated because they did not score well on a test of grade level competency. You know there is nothing wrong with your daughter and that she has potential as a great artist, thinker, and leader. And you also know that she will have to fight to reverse the messages playing in her head that she is somehow flawed.
The industrial age model still dominates the thinking of educators and those who believe schools must create complicit workers and compliant citizens. The system damages human beings and may deprive our species of our future.
I have advocated for schools that prepare students for their future and not our past. It is now more than obvious that we must unbind our thinking from these antiquated past practices.
If you are a parent, a teacher, or anyone concerned about developing the unique individuality of each human so that their energy and intelligence enhances our species, help free others so they can lead and participate and collaborate in the age of Machine Intelligence.
The past is not prologue for the future of our species.