Clockwork Students

In an editorial in this morning's Dallas Morning News, columnist William McKenzie sets out his ideas on how to improve education in the U.S. He begins with a nod towards President Obama's "Race to the Top" education plan. In particular, Mckenzie takes hold of the "parental engagement" role in that race. Parents, says Mckenzie enthusiastically, are the "new educational frontier."

"Lets deal first with why going after parents makes sense" McKenzie writes ominously. The reason we must go after parents is because parents will not come to us. McKenzie then sets out to make his case. Not just any case, but a thoroughly modern and scientific one. Anything less will not do.

McKenzie first notes that "A significant body of research shows students whose parents pay serious attention to their classwork end up with larger horizons than peers whose parents don't open the world to them." It is difficult to know what to do with this statement. Children whose parents are interested and involve themselves in their education and homework do better in school than their peers whose parents don't. There is nothing new here. Children whose parents involve themselves in their activities in general tend to be better adjusted and more content. It is as if, after years of statistical, pedagogical, economic, psychological, methodological, racial, ethnic, gender, and class studies and evaluations, parents have once again been added to the calculation: and it is a calculation. Studies, numbers, reports, and evaluations all point to the remarkable conclusion that parents have a large impact on their children's education. While it has long been suspected that parents play an influential role in their child's development, we finally have the numbers to prove it.

McKenzie's editorial is at times a tedious and tiresome exercise of belaboring the obvious. We are informed that by reading to children and getting them ready for school in the morning parents increase their children's chances of getting into college. It is also a pointless exercise because parents who do not read to their children or get them ready for school are unlikely to read the editorial page of the Dallas Morning News. Unless, of course, McKenzie is not writing to those parents but is instead writing to the rest of us in order to encourage us to take action. And by take action, he means find someway to encourage or compel those neglectful parents to change their ways. He cites Heather Weiss, director of the Family Research Project at Harvard University's Graduate School of Education who states that "what families do is one of the strongest predictors of a child's success." A fair enough observation. But Weiss doesn't stop there. She adds ominously that "the difficulty is how to translate that understanding into interventions that move the needle." By intervening to "move the needle" Wiess no doubt means change how parents raise their children. By "translate" we can infer that what she means is how we can bring that change about.

What this comes down to is a discussion over how best to change the way parents raise their children. It is one thing to discuss how best to raise children. It is quite another to discuss how we can change the way people raise their children. According to modern, scientific standards, many parents are doing an inadequate job raising their children. There is no way to change this without somehow getting between the parent and the child. The growth of "parenting programs" developed to address the perceived inadequacy of parents is disturbing on a number of levels. Perhaps none are so disturbing as the "Cradle to career" program advocated by Weiss.

The "Cradle to Career" program would be a "breakthrough" that would change the way children are raised in the U.S. The program would entail parents working in tandem with schools to raise their children. Indeed, part of a school principle's task would require him or her to assess how well that child was being "parented." Parenting that resulted in increased school performance would be "good" parenting and reflect positively on those principals in those districts where it occurred. Poor school performance would infer poor parenting and, we can assume, in a poor evaluation. Principals would be motivated to monitor how well children in their school were being "parented' and to intervene where that "parenting" was deemed to be inadequate.

In a chilling statement, McKenzie writes that "Districts that do parenting well make parental engagement part of the principal's annual review." Districts do not "do parenting." Only parents do "parenting." I am not even quite sure what "parenting" means. I do not think McKenzie or Weiss have given it much thought beyond the ability to equip children to perform tasks determined to be valuable or important by society. But to hold school districts and principals accountable for how well parents are raising their children is to give them a stake in how that child is being raised. That would be an intolerable intrusion into family life. Schools teach children. They should not raise them.

Raising children is one of the most private and personal activities that can be imagined. Some people raise "good" children. Some people raise "bad" children. "Good" parents can raise "bad" children and "bad" parents can raise "good children." Raising children is not a science. It is an art. Yet, again and again, from Obama to Weiss, to McKenzie, it is treated as a science. In ancient Greece, where the subject was first brought up, art was distinguished from science in that art required wisdom and virtue where science only required knowledge and skill. Science could be taught. Art could only be achieved. Good students cannot be produced any more than good children can be produced.

All of the laws, regulations, and codes in the world cannot create a good parent, a good student, or even a good person. To claim otherwise is hubris of the highest order. There is an arrogance on the part of those who think the world can be remade if only the the right laws can be crafted and the right policies adopted. Whether one goes after teachers, students, parents, textbooks, or curriculum, education will remain a subjective and elusive affair. It always has been subjective and imprecise and it always will be. This is because education involves people. People write text books and devise lesson plans. People read text books (or don't read them). People teach and people learn.

All of the planning and statistical analyses in the world will not result in a good education. Only good teachers and good students will result in good education. But we no longer recognize good as a standard. There are only goals and efficacy in achieving those goals. Education has become a system of clockwork teachers teaching clockwork students. The failure of the educational "system" is interpreted by people like McKenzie and Weiss as the result of flaws such as inadequate parenting or poor organization and curriculum by the schools. Those flaws can be rectified through incentives, adjustments, and programs to compensate for the unpredictable human factor in the system.

Too many beleive that, sooner or later, if we work hard enough we will finally get the bugs out of the educational system and at last get to where every student receives a good education and goes on to a fulfilling and productive career. And that is what getting an education is all about: getting a good job and being productive. Once that is achieved, we can move on to the next great challenge, whatever that may be.

To anyone who might wonder why it is society's or the government's business in the first place how parents raise their children, or how well a child does in school, it is because their business is no longer their business. Through economic casuistry, there is no such thing as personal business anymore. Everything that in any way touches upon the community or the economy is society's business. And society's business is the government's business. Government cannot be expected to stand idly by while parents raise ineffective children.

You cannot force parents to care about their child's education. You may be able to bribe or coerce schools to achieve goals and meet standards. You can even bribe and coerce parents to work with schools to achieve those goals and standards. But no amount of bribery or coercion can compel care. And, without care, all you are left with is coercion and bribery. That is no way to raise a child or run a school.

Education is not a commodity or a product. It cannot be produced or delivered. It is an activity that must be engaged in. To compel people to participate in education is like compelling people to play the piano. You might be able to teach them the notes and how to read music. You can teach them technique. But you cannot make them want to do it and you certainly can't make them any good at it: especially if they don't care or do not want to be good at it. They may be able to read music and reproduce what is written, but that is only technique. It is not education in any meaningful sense. You can teach kids to read and write. You can teach kids to remember what they read and repeat it. But you cannot make them want to read and write nor can you make them understand what they have read. Even parents can't do that. At some point, people enter the equation.

Education is a means to an end, it is not an end in itself. If the end is not desired, the means will be of little interest. Despite the best efforts of statisticians, social scientists, politicians, and teachers, some people will learn and others won't. It is human nature. All the methodology and science in the world cannot change human nature. That is what drives liberals crazy and gives humanity hope.

Parents are the new frontier writes McKenzie. Other frontiers await. New correlations will be found. New causalities will be deduced. New tools will be developed. We are on the verge of a brave new world.