Ok, so I wasn’t planning on spending a good chunk of my morning reading what for me at least is a pretty heady argument for edcuational change, but I happened upon this one sentence that REALLY resonated, and off I went:
Today, however, intense pressures for change now come directly from technology and the economy and not ideology or educational reformist ideas, with an expanding global economy and novel technologies demanding innovative skills, competencies, literacies, and practices.
That’s what I’ve been thinking about too, the idea that these technologies will in and of themselves demand a rethinking of the current educational system, which, if left unchanged, will simply become obviously irrelevant to the ways of learning and working in the connected, “authorship society” we’re entering.
If that turns out to be true, I suggest we fasten our seatbelts immediately…
I highly suggest you carve out an hour or so to read Douglas Kellner’s most interesting ideas.
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Two things right off the top: 1. Thanks for the link to his website; it gives a very good indication of his biases and assumptions.
2. on page ’11′ he says reformers will be challenged as to “whether education will be restructured to promote democracy and human needs, or … serve the needs of business and the global economy.”
Why is this a dichotomy? In a truly democratic (and dare I say capitalist) world, businesses and the global economy exist to serve human needs. Still reading…
UPDATE 2/24: I’m about halfway through.
I’m not seeing much that’s new here, Will.
So far it seems to be more a political screed than a vision for the future. He spends a lot of time rehashing radical reformist ideas from the 1970′s, and repeatedly states or implies that the true, highest purpose of education is to inculcate revolutionaries who will rise up and subvert the opressive hegemonic elites of the dominant industrial culture.
He makes a couple of good points, such as the fact that mainstream media enculturates subliminally, and that merely installing computers and network connections will not solve social problems – solid pedagogy is also required. (Oddly, in a footnote he then praises the Clinton administration for installing PCs and net connections and castigates the current administration for focusing on demonstrable pedagocical methods.)
But this isn’t really new.
What may be really radical is the new Papal apostolic letter, “The Rapid Development”.
The Vatican groks blogging – who’d'a thunk it?
Well
If technology isn’t itself an ideology, the discours over technology produce, form an ideology.
And when you construct the skills, competencies, literacies and practice adequate for novel technologies or global economy, nobody is pure and comes without is ideology.
The history of technology in school is plentfull of necessity for changes and intense pressures. As Larry Cuban has shown this discurses are made in conjonction of educational reformists and liberal economists.
Actually, in the global world economy, the intense pressure for changes come from the O.E.C.D (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) which isn’t neutral concerning ideology.
(Sorry for my english)