Education: aftermath of affluence

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33516, 23 April 1974, Page 5

Education: aftermath of affluence

f The lack of interest shown b\ the •• general public in the present educational e seminars is not so much a symptoi of 3 disinterest as.of cynicism.

People have seen staggering 5 sums spent on education, and ’.heard or read so many millions of words on it, that they ■ : are suspicious of a few more I'Conferences in which, they t j feel. a lot of hot air will be! ( generated in terms that the: l average man does not under-: f i stand. - The unspoken question is: 'j“Are we. as taxpayers, get- : ting value for our monev?” ■ And if (his is regarded as jover-materialistic in some! quarters, the assertion that' i the piper can choose his own tunes if he is paid to per-i form may not go down sowell with the majority. In other words, if the public feels that education is! ; not delivering the goods, it! has a perfect right to say so,’ ,and to insist that educationalists justify—in understandable terms —what they -iare doing. l' Society reflected I It may be a cliche, but it. I is true that a society ham-: ■mers out the education system best suited to it. and always has done whatever the! country or period. To put it another way, an education system reflects the society it : exists in, and does not create it. Now, it is obvious to any-' i>ne who has lived through! J the fifties and sixties that the' changes in our society over the last ten years have been; far greater than in any previous 20 years. The dominatJing factor has been affluence, plus complexity caused by "the increasing pressure of -over-population. ‘ Affluence, as always, is ■: like a nuclear breeder—it I creates a desire for more of ■ jitself. Thus, the average New i ! Zealander has become more "! individual, less communal. : I more self-seeking and com- • petitive, less honest in : opinion. All is a result ofi . envy of the Jones family, : which in return is equally envious of its neighbours. A suspicion that affluence > is not a 100 per cent blessing : caused a political reaction in 1972. ironically underlining ; Mr Muldoon's wise remark that you cannot persuade people of the evils of. affluence until thev experi! lienee it. Ambition, jealousy I This individualism was reflected in the education system. teachers became ambitious in their search for promotion, schools became, jealous for status, and inevitably, the defects arising, from changes in society were glossed over. There was a : feeling that the way to

» succeed was to introduce a j complete change from old - methods and, consequently. ■ the search for new ideas be- ; came like the gold-fever: a zj speck of colour representing * a new idea led to a gold-rush. ■ j Many of the fields have -I petered out; in many cases. 'one suspects, the claims were : . salted, or to change the metaphor, many babies were ’! thrown out with the bath:j water. J I ,S. influence U Our growing estrangement -jfrom Britain and dependence, '■on American power caused a wholesale importation of new ’ideas from that country. Fea- ’ tures of American education Hearne — the overwhelming ’emphasis on co-education. ’ lack of uniforms, defiance of ’ authority, breadth rather than ' depth in education, objective 'testing, a lack of friendliness jin the classroom, and an as- . sen ion that everything was iperfectly all right when it "was prettv obviously not. j They have all been s<i ..strongly advocated that one Jean be a little cynical when we see that New Zealand I society, where care for the ! underdog has been such a feature, was prepared to borI row from one. where the doctrine of rugged individualism' Jis still dominant. Or are these: J things symptomatic of anv Jaffluent society, and not b<- ! cause of borrowing? We cannot tell. But a bitter remark was made lately that ■ to succeed in education "a • tparhpr find nut what

1 his article was wriiten for “The Press” b\ Mr \ . F. Wilkinson who has been a teacher at Christchurch Boys’ High School for the last 34 years. Mr Wilkinson is master in charge of sixth forms at the school. the Americans are chopping and introduce it here.” There are many advocates of the theory that we should; keep on changing to suit the times. Are times going io ! continue to change as thev have done in the last 10' years? It would have required a very efficient crystal ball to prophesy the conditions - I 1974 by a seer in 1964. So 1 what about 1984? To avoid an Orwellian re-j suit perhaps we had better I put the clock back a trifle or at least slow it down, as 1 Toynbee recommends. No-one seemed very upset when the oil crisis pointed to a return to pedestrianism.! so it might, be as well to put. a stop to experimentation and change, and instead throw out the anchor like a ship in a fog and wait till we i see more clearly which way we are going. At the same tune it would satisfy a desire by most practising teachers that they should be left alone for a while, so that they could as-: similate the new Ideas and settle down to some serious teachine.