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September 2, 2009

Bad Student Writing? Not So Fast!

Laurie Fendrich:

It would be good for the blood pressure of everyone involved in criticizing education--state legislators, education policy professionals, professors, school administrators, parents--to take a deep breath. Put aside the statistics, the studies, the anecdotes, and take a look at the big picture.

Here's what Edith Hamilton had to say about education, in The Echo of Greece (1957), one of her many trenchant books on the subject of the ancient Greeks:

"If people feel that things are going from bad to worse and look at the new generation to see if they can be trusted to take charge among such dangers, they invariably conclude that they cannot and that these irresponsible young people have not been trained properly. Then the cry goes up, 'What is wrong with our education?' and many answers are always forthcoming."

Note the droll and ironic, "and many answers are always forthcoming." Perhaps studying people who lived so long ago--people who invented the very idea of education as a route to genuine freedom, and understood freedom to be worthwhile only when coupled with self-control--gave Hamilton one of those calm, stoical uber-minds that comprehends competing pronouncements about education never to be more than opinion.

Posted by Jim Zellmer at September 2, 2009 1:16 AM
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