The Culture of Education

Matthew K. Tabor and Lynn both have posts up reviewing Two Million Minutes: A Global Examination, a documentary following the lives of a male and female high school senior in the U.S., China and India. Here is the trailer, which seems to paint a pretty bleak picture of the future for the U.S.

For my own daughters, I hope they are more serious about their studies than the two American students were portrayed to be. However, I don't want them to be forced to spend all their spare time studying. For me, the question is whether academic excellence requires a single-minded devotion to book studies every waking hour of the day. I'd think most homeschoolers would say no. After all, one of the advantages of homeschooling is that we can cover more in less time, leaving our children free to pursue interests that may incidentally include learning, such as playing with LEGO building blocks, playing chess, sewing, or planting a garden. Homeschoolers see more to life than books, even though we value our children's education. If the Scientist does follow through with her plan of being a vet, taking horseback riding lessons or volunteering at a shelter may be seen as working towards her career.

From what I have read, American high schools do not always do a good job of challenging the best and brightest, and may give in too often to parental pressure to give out good grades at the expense of actual hard work and studies. There's anecdotal evidence that more students are entering college not prepared to do college work. However, as Lynn points out, for Americans, high school is not the be-all-end-all of our future. I completely disagree that high school is a measure of our economic future, or at least not the only measure. As long as Americans keep freedom and liberty, our future can be whatever we are willing to work for.