Well, I've had more time to look at the linked article. Interesting subject, though I have to say I found the arguments poorly reasoned and ridiculously loaded with tendentious assertions. I have limited detailed knowledge of the history of American education through the course of the 20th century, but what I do know of this, and similar models in other countries, makes many of the assertions of this article seem ludicrous. These a priori findings are often declared without regard to factual evidence – sometimes even despite internal contradictions in the material under discussion – and even where there is some evidence adduced, little attempt is made to quantify and qualify the value of the source. Some sentences are so packed with assumptions that even without digging into the detail of conflicting points of view a critical reader can see the poverty of analysis on display.
Having said that, I certainly understand that education has always been a battle-ground of conflicting views of how we want to mould future generations within our societies. I just can’t accept as credible the proposition that all American education is governed by “an oligarchy” and that this junta is enthralled by a Machiavellian desire to appease the narrow interests of a few major capitalists, in contrast to some unspecified golden age of pedagogy that celebrated a living breathing democratic republic.
