One thing that also needs to be clear is that the interests of nations are tied to the interests of elites. So when I talk about national mythologies I'm really talking about the mythologies that supported the status quo of that elite. Which is the main reason that US education (and Western education in general) was built around the process of seperating out an elite from the masses and justifying that separation. The process was finally accepted due to a combination of legal force, enclosure of credentials foro economic success, and the promise of a merit-based path to raise one's children into the elite. It also promised equality, and unity - which is in basic conflict to its divisive goals. We're seeing that today.
All of its promises were based on the imagined justifications of elites as to why it was righteous to enforce compliance from the masses. The narratives were never based on objective truths or a desire to give more agency to non-elites, but on self-righteous fictions.
I have been gathering courage to write about this for years now - not about Paglayan's research in particular, which I haven't gotten to yet, (I'm expecting it to support my understanding rather than change it)- but about the real role of compulsory schooling in our international global order. It's been frustrating to see so much written about the way schools have failed - how they're anachronistic in our technologically advanced era, about project based learning vs. rote learning, about the influence of teacher's unions, about the need for evidence-based practices, about too much standardization, or the wrong standards, or the coddling of students, or the wrong modes of discipline, etc., etc .. Most narratives about education touch small truths but completely miss the more essential truth: Compulsory schooling wasn't created to serve the needs of its students, it was created to solidify the nation. Compulsory schooling is a characteristic of nation states. It's main purpose is to embed the national mythology that a nation's identity and culture are built on in order to validate the authority wielded by that nation's government. This is why compulsory schooling only gets fully realized when national cohesion is threatened by major disruption, either internal or external.
I know this is a clumsy simplification, which is why I want to write about it in much more depth. We can't improve an institution if we fail to understand its actual purpose. Once we do understand, we may decide this particular institution isn't what we need at all.
One thing that also needs to be clear is that the interests of nations are tied to the interests of elites. So when I talk about national mythologies I'm really talking about the mythologies that supported the status quo of that elite. Which is the main reason that US education (and Western education in general) was built around the process of seperating out an elite from the masses and justifying that separation. The process was finally accepted due to a combination of legal force, enclosure of credentials foro economic success, and the promise of a merit-based path to raise one's children into the elite. It also promised equality, and unity - which is in basic conflict to its divisive goals. We're seeing that today.
All of its promises were based on the imagined justifications of elites as to why it was righteous to enforce compliance from the masses. The narratives were never based on objective truths or a desire to give more agency to non-elites, but on self-righteous fictions.
I have been gathering courage to write about this for years now - not about Paglayan's research in particular, which I haven't gotten to yet, (I'm expecting it to support my understanding rather than change it)- but about the real role of compulsory schooling in our international global order. It's been frustrating to see so much written about the way schools have failed - how they're anachronistic in our technologically advanced era, about project based learning vs. rote learning, about the influence of teacher's unions, about the need for evidence-based practices, about too much standardization, or the wrong standards, or the coddling of students, or the wrong modes of discipline, etc., etc .. Most narratives about education touch small truths but completely miss the more essential truth: Compulsory schooling wasn't created to serve the needs of its students, it was created to solidify the nation. Compulsory schooling is a characteristic of nation states. It's main purpose is to embed the national mythology that a nation's identity and culture are built on in order to validate the authority wielded by that nation's government. This is why compulsory schooling only gets fully realized when national cohesion is threatened by major disruption, either internal or external.
I know this is a clumsy simplification, which is why I want to write about it in much more depth. We can't improve an institution if we fail to understand its actual purpose. Once we do understand, we may decide this particular institution isn't what we need at all.
Stephanie, I think you are absolutely right. I myself stand accused of trying to address the small problems and ways schools have failed.
I strongly recommend that you check out Paglayan's research, especially this book.
We really do take compulsory schooling for granted as a given necessity, but her work shows that the motives were quite subversive.