CRISIS IN OUR EDUCATION SYSTEM

WHITH ER

EDUCATION?

By CHARLES CARON
very day brings news of
fresh advances in science
and technology — new inven-
tions, improvements on yester-
day’s inventions. The frontiers
of science are being pushed
farther and farther on, but
man as a social being lags far
behind. This undeniable fact
is causing increasing concern
to more and more people, and
rightly so.
The fantastic scientific and

technological progress that is-

taking place should result in
j a tremendous

fing of
people,
what is actu-
ally happen-
mee Tne
nenace of
hermo - nuc-
. lear war
hangs over the world; mass
unemployment threatens and
educational standards and op-
portunities are woefully inad-
equate. In fact, a profound
crisis in our whole social fab-
ric.
* * *

This contradiction of our
society begs debate and solu-
tion, and one of its most acute
aspects can be seen in the edu-
cational field. It is being ex-
pressed in a variety of forms,
for example, in the movement
that has developed in British
Columbia led by no less a per-
son .than the president of
U.B.C., Dr. J. B. MacDonald.
A recent issue of UBYSSEY,
the University of B.C. paper,
carried a summary of the pre-
-sident’s views in which he
opened up the problem in edu-
cation to its full dimensions,

stating:
“In the realm of scientific
and technological changes,

and the effects of those forces
on every aspect of human life,
more has been accomplished
in the last half century than in
all previous human history.
As a measure of the pace of
change, it has been stated that
90% of all scientists who ever
lived are alive today. We are
witness to the act of a new
scientific revolution. Our
work, our play, our lives are
inevitably shaped by that rev-
olution, and if man is to sur-
vive as a species, and if we
are to prosper as a nation and
as individuals, we must strive
to understand the meaning of
the revolution as we plan for
the years ahead.”

Or again, in 1956, in a sym-
posium conducted by the Har-
vard Educational Society, U.S.
educator Axtelle made the
following contrast between so-
cialist and capitalist educa-
tion: :

“We discovered some start-
ling facts about Soviet com-
munism in both Russia and
China. They are a despotism

with a philosophy. They have
effected a profound cultural
transformation by means of
education. ,It was recently re-
ported in the Saturday Re-
view of Literature that in
1955 the U.S. produced 4,400
Ph.D’s, Russia 8,400. In 1955,
we produced 26,000 engin-
eers, Russia produced 63, 000.
“These observations may
appear irrelevant to the rela-

tions of the American philos-
ophy of education. However, I
would point out that these fig-
ures speak with great empha-
sis upon respective values of
education in Russia and the
United States.”

In the same symposium,
Sidney Hook, professor of
philosophy at New York Uni-
versity, remarked:

“Tt is almost comical to sug-
gest that we cannot as educa-
tors achieve sensible agree-
ment about educational aims
without first agreeing on one’s
theory of reality.”

% * *

At issue is not the question
of socialist versus capitalist
education, but the extension
of democracy in education for
all who qualify. -

Anti-democratie philosophi-
cal concepts are being ques-
tioned. For example, Dewey’s
The School and Society puts

forward the thesis that in a

great majority of human be-
ings the distinctly ‘“‘intellectu-
al” interest is not “dominant”,
that they tend to the “practi-
cal” impulse and disposition.

However, present realities
in this age of atomic energy,
interplanetary exploration
and wide _ application of
science to production can no

_ longer permit the majority of

humanity thus to be reduced
to robots.

Nevertheless, it would be
wrong to conclude that be-
cause of the very obviously
reactionary character of cer-
tain philosophical concepts of
education that they have been
discarded. On the contrary,
Dewey is still very much the
authority in educational
circles. His works, The Child

and the Curriculum and The
School and Society are still

standard reference material
at the University of British
Columbia.

* * *

In fact, considerable efforts
are being made to buttress the
status quo in education and
plans are under way to under-
mine even existing standards.
The most important recom-
mendation of the Royal Com-
mission headed by Dean
Chant and set up by the So-
cial Credit government was
the introduction of a junior
vocational ‘“‘stream”’ starting
at the Grade 7 level. The
Chant report proposed that
children be segregated from
this grade into what would
amount to ‘“‘success” or ‘‘fail-
ure”’ groups.

Under this system, the stan-
dard of providing a compre-
hensive basic education for a
period of 12 years would cease
and be replaced by a system
eatering to practicalism and
expediency. So far, this
“streaming” at the Grade 7
level has been successfully re-

sisted, largely through the ef-’

forts of the Parent Teachers’
Association and other organi-
zations, which recommended;

1. That there be no transfer
of pupils at the end of Grade
7 into a junior vocational
school until there had been a
full evaluation ‘of the child’s
performance in elementary
school and in Grade 7, and
until consultation with the
parents concerned.

#2. That the academic con-

tent of the curriculum in the
vocational schools be such
that the pupils might be trans-
ferred from them to the regu-
lar stream.

3. That if scholastic achieve-
ment becomes the standard of
pupil advancement, special
counsellors must be madc
available to all students in the
schools.

% a *

U.B.C. president MacDon-
ald, in a recent statement re-
ported in the Vancouver Sun,
said that half the students in
B.C. who make 70 percent or
better in their final exams do
not go on to University. Of
100 grade one students in B.C.
only nine go on to University
and only six graduate. Raising
standards, he said, wasn’t the
only answer. Rather, there
must be more incentive for
able students to go on to high-
er education. “Canada does
not cultivate its human re-
sources properly,’ he said.

One cannot help but ask
oneself: Is the policy on edu-
cation merely a bungling one
on the part of the authorities
or is it designed toward a cer-
tain objective? The answer is
provided by those who con-
trol the economic and political
life of Canada.

Dr. MacDonald speaks of
the abundance of natural re-
sources in Canada and the
role of education in their de-
velopment. Unfortunately,
those in control of Canada
and their representatives in
government have a different
aim. They have abandoned the
aims of Confederation and in-
dependent existence for Can-
ada. Our resources and our
whole existence is to buttress
the economy of the United
States.

* * *

Perhaps the most open ex-
pression of opposition to gov-
ernment policies on education
is the “Back Mac’? movement
which began as a_ protest
against fee increases at WBC:
made necessary by the Socred
government’s refusal to allo-
cate sufficient funds.

Despite valiant efforts to put

the lid on it, the movement
has since been extended to in-
clude demands for wide edu-
eational reforms. It includes
student representatives of var-
ious political beliefs, a major-
ity of the faculty and a con-
siderable section of the public.
The petition demanding more
money for UBC was widely
circulated, copies were sent to
a variety of organizations, in-
cluding the trade unions, and

some 250,000 signatures were

collected.

While the B.C. government _~

has made some commitments
in answer to the demands, in--
cluding the go-ahead for the

new colleges, it is quite clear

that they have no intention
of making any fundamental
change in their aims for edu-
cation.

Any progress will have to
come from the democratic
forces comprised of the edu-
cators, students and the pub-
lic. With them rests the task
of developing an alternative
educational program for Can-
ada, a program which will
mark a real extension of de-
mocracy.

i

at his stomach.

‘Land of the free,
Home of the brave’

The heroic struggle of
the Negroes in the

Southern U.S. told in
picture and So tgOne,

Birmingham policeman holds Negro youth as vicious dog rips

f

Pictures from the New York World Telegram.

Burck in the Chicago Sun-Times

“Do I really have to learn that
lil’ ol’ word?”