Economics and the Educational Imagination<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The etymlogy of education (educere) describes education as a form of\u00a0"drawing out." The history of pedagogy reveals a dramatic shift in how this\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/voxnova\/2010\/05\/19\/economics-and-the-educational-imagination\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Economics and the Educational Imagination\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The etymlogy of education (educere) describes education as a form of\u00a0"drawing out." 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{"id":13065,"date":"2010-05-19T12:00:23","date_gmt":"2010-05-19T17:00:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/voxnova\/?p=13065"},"modified":"2017-04-26T11:28:18","modified_gmt":"2017-04-26T16:28:18","slug":"economics-and-the-educational-imagination","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/voxnova\/2010\/05\/19\/economics-and-the-educational-imagination\/","title":{"rendered":"Economics and the Educational Imagination"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

[Previous posts: I.\u00a0Economics and the Vocational\u00a0Imagination<\/a>;\u00a0II. Economics and the Political\u00a0Imagination<\/a>]<\/p>\n

The etymlogy of education (educere<\/em>) describes education as a form of\u00a0\u201cdrawing out.\u201d The history of pedagogy reveals a dramatic shift in how this drawing-out happens. While schooling has existed in many different forms throughout human history, the past two centuries\u00a0reveal a vastly different vision of schooling: compulsory schooling.<\/p>\n

This is a complicated evolution that has beautiful and ugly aspects. Nonetheless, what is remarkable about the rise of modern schools is how they have monpolized the educational imagination\u2014the imaginary\u00a0of the \u201chow\u201d and \u201cwhat\u201d to draw-out of the human person. This educational imaginary, in turn, has itself become captured by macro and micro economics.<\/p>\n

In its macro form, schooling has become a tool of nation-states to promote self-interest. Among these self-interests, economic self-interest prevails. This is why we emphasize particualr subjects (like reading, math, and science) at the national level, why we have a curriculum of the head with very little left for the heart\u2014and\u00a0nothing for the soul.<\/p>\n

In its micro form, schooling has become a pathway to responsible jobs that offer purely economic goods. In fact, many of these jobs are toxic for persons, but their pay-grade makes them even more desirable than others that might enrich\u00a0a person\u2019s\u00a0life and the lives of others.<\/p>\n

The very idea of \u201clearning\u201d\u00a0as an end of\u00a0pedagogy\u00a0ignores the person who is constituted by the knowledge selected for the curriculum.\u00a0 That is to say this: education has lost its form as a way of becoming and has given way to a way of merely getting informed, all for the sake of getting access to money and capital.<\/p>\n

Here, again, we see the inversion of values that has disfigured our \u201clife-ways\u201d into \u201cmoney-ways.\u201d Economics drives the engine of modern-day schooling and, since so few recognize the difference between schooling and education, has also captured the near-total imagination of educational possibility, the possibility of what education might be in the first place.<\/p>\n

Need a good example? Consider this: Nowadays, teacher-education\u2014the entryway to aquiring certification to teach in a public school\u2014has progressively removed the need for teachers to major in their field of expertise and consists of teaching \u201cmethods\u201d for instruction with no attention to the meaning and history of education or schooling. Here is an even better one: It has become \u201ccommon sense\u201d that you get an education by going to school; and you go to school to get something\u2014and that \u201csomething\u201d is a career.<\/p>\n

By the way: Middlesex University has recently closed its philosophy department<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"