Education and Community

I said it in Boxing Day, and I'll start again with it here. If there is one notion that underpins my self-sufficiency project, it is this:

There's an awful lot of important and useful stuff I didn't learn when I was growing up.

In writing that, I was thinking about the fact that my education - an excellent one - focused on advanced academics at the expense of practical knowledge. I never took a class in which I was asked to build anything, or plumb anything, or sew anything, or change my oil, or cook anything, or learn how to organize my finances. All of which are skills that people in our culture will require at some point or other. I believe that the rationale was that, as a college-bound, future white-collar worker, I would be paying other people to do those things for me.

Now, a couple of decades out of high school, I see that focusing on academics at the expense of other lessons hasn't been in my best interest. And I'm setting out to fill in those holes.

This post isn't about me, however. It is about the next generation, and it starts with this truth:

Focusing on academics at the expense of other realms of knowledge does not produce well-rounded adults.
..........

Here is another truth: Money is tight.
..........

Last night there was a school board meeting at our local school (which provides education for kids from Kindergarten through the eighth grade). The purpose was to start a discussion about which programs are targeted for "increased efficiency" so that our supervisory union (sort of a district) can cut 1.59% from its budget as (sort-of) required by Challenges for Change.

It's not quite required. It's apparently voluntary with the the not-so-gently implied subtext that, if we don't comply voluntarily, sterner measures will be taken.

Just like dinner time at our house.

In any event, Challenges for Change specifies that savings will be generated by making government more efficient, not by decreasing the services that are offered.

There are a lot of adjectives that I want to be able to apply to the education my children receive: excellent; well-rounded; challenging; enjoyable; useful.

I'm not so sure that "efficient" is one of them.

For me, "efficient" conjures up images of Big Macs and factory farming. Of a one-size-fits-all approach. Imagine how efficient our school system could be if all the children it served needed the exact same resources! If they being raised and taught so that they can step into roles as interchangeable cogs in a machine!

But they aren't.

They are kids. And they will grow up to be adults who need to be able to step into all the varied roles that our world requires.
..........

But, money is tight. So we need to use it more wisely. More efficiently.
..........

The principal - whose shoes I wouldn't want to be in right now - identified several programs that could be made more efficient without decreasing services. A feat that will be accomplished by eliminating some positions entirely, stretching the remaining staff tighter to cover the absolute necessities, and then eliminating what can't be covered.

Areas that will take the hit: nursing, health, and physical education (where p.e. teachers will pick up some of the health classes); guidance and therapy; music; and para-educators.

None of these programs will be eliminated entirely. There will still be music. There will still be a nurse. There will simply be fewer people to staff these programs.

Services will not be diminished.

Reduction without diminishing.

After they pull that off, I'll wait anxiously for them to pull a bunny out of a top hat.
..........

What is the goal of education?

Our most recent President Bush once observed, "Rarely is the question asked: Is our children learning?"

I disagree. I think that is all too often the only question that is being asked. Children take tests. And we see test results. And schools are rated accordingly.

We aren't just raising children to take tests, though. Or, at least, we shouldn't be. We should be raising kids to step into their roles as members of our future communities.

You know what communities need? Communities need to be healthy. They need music and theater, and drama projects that they work on as a group. They need therapy for individuals and families who are struggling with emotional issues which - left unaddressed - might boil up into larger problems. They need as many people around as possible to pitch in and help with one-on-one attention so that no one falls behind.

We shouldn't only ask if our children are learning. We should ask if they are being given the time, tools, and attention they need to become full members of the community in which we want to live.

Not just my children. Or your children. Not just the ones we love.

Every child.

Even if you don't agree with their parents. If you think their parents are shiftless and lazy and should just get a job. Each and every child in America today will be a part of the larger community in which you live tomorrow.

What kind of place do you want it to be?
..........

A woman said to me, regarding the cuts, something to the effect of, "I'm glad we home school. This won't impact us."

I disagree.

Unless you are planning to never let your children - or the adults they become - interact within an extended community beyond your home, or your private school, what happens in the public education system will impact them.

It will impact all of us.

We cannot pick and choose the individuals in our world whose choices and actions will be the ones that effect us the most. So, please, let's all choose to do the best job we can to make sure that every child has the support, and resources, and nurturing, and creative outlets, and therapy, and food that they need to become the community members that we want and need them to be.

Starving them of these things might be more efficient. It might be cheaper now. But the long-term costs, the externalized costs - as with factory farming or a world of processed Big Macs - will be greater in the end.
.........

But there's no money. Times are tight. Something has to be cut.

Under the plan presented last night, the children still have some music classes. There is still a nurse if someone throws up or gets hurt. Hopefully the children who need therapy will find some other programs and not fall through the cracks.

I hope they don't fall through the cracks.

We were reminded again and again that our district - our school - actually already had more of these things than are standard in our state. That we should be willing to do with less.

Maybe if the people who have to make these difficult decisions were reading this, they would toss the tough calls back to me. "You make the cuts. You find the 1.59% and get rid of it."

I don't know. I don't know what program I would cut from a school.

I don't have the answers. I'm not alleging that I do.

We don't know what program will inspire one child in our community to greatness. It could be academics. Or sports. Or the chance to sing a song in a musical.

We also don't know what absence will be the crack that leads to tragedy. The lack of available nursing care at a crucial moment. Or a teacher's aide who can take the extra time to work with a child who is falling behind. Or a therapist who is available to connect a child with the counseling that they need.

What is the possible toll of all that efficiency?
..........

Money is tight.

It is a reality for families. For our town. For our state. For our country.

I don't have the answers.

But I want to say this: Our public schools are the garden in which we grow the individuals who will sustain our future communities. Our future country.

To restrict what they need - to be efficient with their education - is to starve our future.

It isn't simply a question for our town - for our school board. We should ask our administrators to be as creative as possible, but we can't lay the onus of these cuts at their feet. Just as it is difficult - sometimes impossible - for individuals to behave in ways that differ from the dictates of our larger culture, it is hard for schools to operate outside the dictates of districts, states, and our federal government.

Rarely is the question asked: Are America's children learning the skills they need to become a community?

Maybe we should start asking that question.
..........

There's an awful lot of important and useful stuff I didn't learn when I was growing up.

I didn't learn to sew. But I'll be okay in the end.

What won't today's children learn? What happens if what they don't learn - what they don't receive from their education - impacts all of us?

The Whether Girl.

There are a lot of people who don't believe in global warming.

I haven't met a lot of people who don't believe in global warming up here in Vermont. People who have lived up here for a long time all recount how much warmer the winters are these days than they were a decade or two ago. The ground doesn't freeze solid like it used to, the spring thaw comes earlier and earlier, fruit trees set buds way too soon and a freeze kills them off, or apple picking comes a month or two early.

There is a lot of talk about this type of change around here.

I think some of it has to do with the fact that they actually have apple trees here. And maple trees. And veggie gardens they've been tending for years. And they view these enterprises as more than a hobby. I have never in my life been surrounded by so many people who are at least tangentially involved in food production. It connects people to their individual environment much more closely than happens when apples are things that come from the store and are purchased without knowing if they were grown in Washington or Argentina.

But, for all that awareness, I don't personally know if what they are seeing is the result of Global Climate Change (writ large) or shifting weather patterns.

Don't get me wrong, I believe our global climate is getting warmer.

I don't think there is a way you can pump as much carbon dioxide into the atmosphere as humans have over the past three centuries and assert that it won't have an impact. But is the fact that March in Vermont now includes some warm, balmy days a result of global warming? I don't know. A sunny day in March just isn't reliable evidence either way.

At some level, it's just a nice day in March.

I believe there is a difference between what can be observed on a day-to-day basis - the things that occur at the level of a state or region and one person's notice - and global, long-term events. I'm not sure that I believe that global warming is something that is visible within the scope of human observation and recollection. You need ice cores and long-term pollen samples to really see what is happening. Not the Farmer's Almanac.

In any event, this post isn't about climate or weather. It's about elections and government. So I should get on to those.

As happens every two years, there was a major election this week. Not as major as the ones that happen every four years. But major. Some people won, some lost, majorities and minorities shifted in state and national legislating bodies and now things will, allegedly, be different.

Maybe they will be different. Maybe not.

When I look at politics, I feel like the stuff that I can observe is often a lot of sound and fury. A lot of yelling and posturing. Filibusters and mud-flinging and accusations.

The kind of stuff that I just tune out. Like the weather.

I'm not saying that I want to tune out our governmental process, or the trajectory of American history. It's just... I have a hard time staying focused when what I see is all the bluster.

And that's the way in which it all reminds me of climate change and weather. I feel like the elections that come and go every two years are like the freak storm events. Oh, you know it's going to snow come winter... But who would have thought that last year Maryland would have had more snow than Vermont? Freaky! Exciting! Something to shout about! Let's make prognostications about how this does or doesn't mean something regarding global climate!

I can't say with any accuracy if those five(?) feet of snow that fell on Silver Spring last year were harbingers of rising temperatures (because higher temperatures means more evaporation and more moisture in the air means more potential for precipitation, and greater temperature differences means that the atmosphere will work more quickly to redistribute the energy which, yes, can mean more snow - even though snow isn't usually equated with warmth).

I also can't say with any authority whether the recent elections will cause any real change in American government. Although I'll bet that there will still be shouting, and rhetoric, and gridlock. You know, the politics. That'll still be there. Just like there will still be tornadoes and blizzards.

And, let me tell you, all of that excites me about as much as a root canal.

So, maybe in the same way that a lot of people don't believe in global warming, I don't know that the evidence indicates that our government is headed towards Hell in a handbasket.

I am sure that American society has changed over the past two-plus centuries. How could it not? If you plucked one of the founding fathers out of his timestream and plopped him down in modern America it would blow his fucking mind.

And then he'd tweet about it! "@const. cong. Tea Party success 50/50 #tinyurl http://blah, blah, blah."

(Yeah. I don't get twitter.)

But we've still got the basic documents of governance to guide us. And we use them! They're great.

It is obvious that American society and culture have changed, as demonstrated by the blown mind of the time-dislocated founding father. But the cultural changes aren't, in and of themselves, a sign that our system of government has really altered. One hundred and fifty years ago, most of the people in America of African ancestry were slaves. A decade later, they were formally given the right to vote. There has been a massive social shift since and it has brought us to a moment where our society has elected a president of African heritage. Whatever your feelings about that president, that is a ton of cultural change. Our society is markedly different than it was before the Civil War.

And not just in that one way.

The process of American government by which Obama was elected, though... Has our governmental system changed substantively over that time?

Like climate change, it isn't something that I personally can get a hold on. I'm smarter than any of the people I've ever seen on Jay Leno's "Jaywalking" segment, but - like a lot of Americans - my hold on the actual facts of government and history is spotty in areas.

And, unlike some bloggers, I'm not going to even pretend like I've cornered the market on facts.

The data is overlain with such a depth of cultural change in all areas - massive shifts in technology, economics, social issues, agriculture, and warfare. There is no control group here. There is no way to just observe the changes in government without all the rest.

Which makes it hard for me to tell if the people telling about our changing government, about how we are in danger of loosing it all, are really on to something. Or not.

People on all sides of the political spectrum make ominous prognostications about the direction our government is heading. Usually it's downward, to either the left or the right.

I have no data with which to debate them. Maybe we are driving it off into the ditch. But sometimes I feel like so much time is spent expending energy in the hoopla - the typhoons of scandal, dust-ups comparing politicians to Nazis, and deluges of mocked-up outrage, that it is hard to get a real intellectual grasp on the health of our governmental climate. Or which direction it might be heading.

A storm blew past us this last Tuesday. I can see the bands on the Woolly Bear caterpillar and prognosticate that another, bigger storm is coming two years from now.

But, honestly, I can't say if the coming storm - or the one we just weathered - is evidence of larger changes or not.