Nothing like expanding one’s job scope to… I don’t know… Director of Faculty Development… to wipe out blogging time! I am really going to try and get back on the wagon.
So I am watching a YouTube video from the Hunt Institute introducing the Common Core State Standards. Seemed like something a Director of Faculty Development would do while she eats her peanut butter and jelly sandwich. About 17 seconds in, I put down my PB & J at the line “…our students need better knowledge and tools to compete in the global economy…” And there it is folks, the commoditization of education. We no longer educate to create informed electorate, to create life-long learners, for the growth of humankind… we educate to compete. We educate to make more money than our neighbor. We have our commodity to create: men and women who compete in the global marketplace! I guess this is why mainline educational arguments surround improving test scores, value-add accountability matrixes for teachers and the predilection of social media forming the bullies of tomorrow. We can count those things! We can make more, do more, score more than our neighbors.
Silly me – I thought it was about cultivating God-given talents to live in the fullness of creation.
