Reviews for Human interests in the curriculum

The average rating for Human interests in the curriculum based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2013-11-04 00:00:00 Ronald Omell It is easy for a critic of today's American public education system to quickly point to any number of its flaws. What Labaree does especially well in this book is to trace the development of public education in the U.S. back to the late nineteenth century, so that at least some of today's flaws make sense as components of yesterday's instructional design, or as side-effects of the development of public education. The development and expansion of the education system is important to understand, as it is considered here, through the lens of the market forces to which the system is subjected in this country. What we consider flaws today are better understood as well when we consider that education has always been pulled in different directions by its different-minded constituencies: taxpayers, employers, and educational consumers. Throughout the chapters we are reminded of the often-conflicting goals of education: democratic equality (producing responsible citizens), social efficiency (producing effective workers), and social mobility (moving to a more desirable social position). It is difficult to fault policy-makers, employers, administrators, teachers, parents, or students for flaws in American public education when we remember their conflicting motivations and desired outcomes of education. While the three goals of education have each taken their turn in the policy spotlight over the years, the social mobility goal has emerged as the most important over the past 100 years as a result of market forces and consumer demand, creating with it the "credentials race" that Labaree discusses. In their race to get ahead socially, consumers of education (students and parents) have placed less stress on learning for its use-value or for knowledge itself, and more emphasis on the exchange value of learning (to get a good job) and attaining credentials through grades, credits, and diplomas. In our struggle to ever improve our social status, we become obsessed with credentials to lead us to better jobs and higher societal positions. Treating education, a public service, as we would a private good in a market environment, creates (among other flaws) unnecessarily high numbers of graduates who are certified on paper but lack the knowledge and skills to succeed as employees, parents, and citizens. The overarching influence of the social mobility goal over the other two is a large part of the reason American public education has fallen so far behind that of other advanced countries. Labaree's style is very clear and easy and enjoyable to follow. While he sometimes repeats an example or research citation, it is helpful to illustrate different points using the same example (as he does with his case study of Central High School in Philadelphia). The only criticism I have is that there is no discussion of the reason for the low status of teaching as a profession, and why this status has remained low even as more men have joined the profession and teachers tend to stay in the profession for their entire careers. There is a chapter about the low status of teacher education and the reasons behind that, but the low respect for teaching itself is never really addressed. I would have liked to see a discussion of some possibilities for this trend and the political forces that have preserved it. Overall though, this book was a great introduction to the history of and motivations in American public education.

Review # 2 was written on 2007-02-02 00:00:00 Elesvan Flores Dense. Not exactly a pleasure to read, but provides an important and cohesive view of the forces underlying contemporary education's structure and neatly framing the a lot of the debate around education. Fifteen years on, this book still rings smart. And true.