#school milieu

An advocate of natural rights continues his/her presentation[1] …

As this blog makes its way through the natural rights view, currently reporting on its influence on civics education, the blog turns to the next aspect, schools’ sociological-economic bases. This aspect is part of the commonplace of curriculum development, the milieu of school settings.  The notion of commonplaces is the product of Joseph Schwab.[2]

         If one keeps in mind that the main benefits of following a natural rights perspective in the teaching of American government and civics is that one, students are made aware of their rights and, two, they are presented with a realistic view of the nation’s political system, certain advantages can be realized.  Such educating leads students to viably, as adults, compete in the political fray. As such, its use can be a positive force in the nation’s quest for equity.

         But the reality is that there are hitches with this quest.  Here is how a financial writer sees the state of variance among the various state systems in the US:

 For the majority of U.S. families, public education is the only option.  But the quality of public school systems varies widely from state to state and is often a question of funding.  Public elementary and secondary education money usually flows from three sources: the federal, state and local government. According to the U.S. Department of Education, states contribute nearly as much as local governments, while the federal government supplies the smallest share.  Some researchers have found that more resources – or taxes paid by residents – typically result in better school-system performance.[3]

 And this concern is not new.  Here is what David Berliner and Bruce Biddle reported in 1995:

Some Americans like to pretend that public education in this country is of one piece and that it provides equal opportunities for all … And yet, huge differences persist in the levels of support given to public schools in this country – differences that are far greater than those found in other advanced countries.  Funding levels are also closely tied to community affluence, which means that America’s wealthy suburbs have some of the world’s best schools, while appallingly bad schools appear in our urban ghettos.  Thus, instead of funding an educational system that provides equal opportunity[,] America operates a system of public education that discriminates against poor students because the schools they attend are badly underfunded.[4]

 With the instruction of these realities to American students, which would be derived from an honest implementation of the natural rights perspective, certain results are possible. That is, students who are from lower income environments can come to understand the politics that lead to their schools losing the “public education funding race.”

         The conditions of poorer schools are deteriorating and even an equalization of funding, at this time, will not lead to equal conditions.  While well-funded schools enjoy attractive and well-apportioned physical facilities with well trained teachers, small classes, and students who are being brought up in supportive environments, schools in the poorer areas of the nation exhibit quite different circumstances. These latter schools are often squalid, crowded, and riddled with crime and violence.

         Teachers in these schools are continually looking to find a way out of them as they have to deal with inordinate numbers of students who are impoverished and “at risk.”[5]  Equal funding would only stop the gap from further widening.  For true equality, huge investments in these poorer areas need to be spent in order for these schools to catch up.  And central to this problem area has been the reliance on property taxes to fund schools.

         An American University online site addresses this source of inequality.  It reports the following:

 The financing systems of public schools in the US ensure that community wealth disparities carry over into education. By relying largely on property taxes to fund schools, which can vary widely between wealthy and poor areas, districts create funding gaps from the word go. Affluent areas end up with well-funded schools and low-income areas end up with poorly funded schools. District sizes also distort funding levels. Predominantly white districts are typically smaller, yet still receive 23 billion more than districts that are predominantly  students of color, according to a recent EdBuild study. This results from the tendency to draw district lines around small affluent islands of well-funded schools within larger poorer areas that serve mostly students of color.[6]

           While teaching the natural rights perspective will not in itself do much to ameliorate the depressing conditions of the poorer schools, its message, if responsibly conveyed and heeded, is a positive one that can at least provide the information that could lead to understanding and, hopefully, to viable political effort by those so afflicted by the inequitable realities of poverty in America.

         In conjunction with other efforts, the use of the natural rights perspective could have a large positive impact on the conditions facing the nation’s poorer schools.  And this one factor – the economic inequality one finds among America’s school populations – proves to be a structurally imbedded factor that hinders those school systems in attaining their full potential.  And with that note, this blog will turn next to youth culture as the last topic this “judgment” of the natural rights influence on American education addresses.

[Note:  As regular and ongoing readers of this blog might know, this blogger takes a break every four hundred postings.  He did so after 400, 800, and now will do so after 1200 postings.  As of his counting, this posting is number 1199.  That leaves one more posting before the next break. He anticipates the break will last at least two months, maybe three.  He has other projects, e.g., finishing his preparation of the re-edited collection of the blog’s second hundred postings.  He looks forward to the break and of getting back from it to resume producing this blog’s postings.]

[1] This presentation continues with this posting.  The reader is informed that the claims made in this posting do not necessarily reflect the beliefs or knowledge of this blogger.  Instead, the posting is a representation of what an advocate of the natural rights view might present.  This is done to present a dialectic position of that construct.  This series of postings begins with “Judging Natural Rights View, I,” August 2, 2022.

[2] Joseph Schwab presents his conception of the commonplaces of curriculum development – they are subject matter, students, teachers, and milieu.  See William H. Schubert, Curriculum:  Perspective, Paradigm, and Possibility (New York, NY: MacMillan Publishing Company, 1986).

[3] Adam McCann, “States with the Best & Worst School Systems,” WalletHub (July 25, 2022), accessed October 26, 2022, https://wallethub.com/edu/e/states-with-the-best-schools/5335.

[4] David C. Berliner and Bruce J. Biddle, The Manufactured Crisis:  Myths, Fraud, and the Attack on America’s Public Schools (Reading, MA:  Addison-Wesley Company, Inc., 1995), 264.

[5] Ibid.

An advocate of natural rights continues his/her presentation[1] …

This posting continues a report on the expectation of schools that people share as an element of the commonplace, the milieu, in curriculum development.[2]  Central to this milieu in twenty-first century America is the importance these Americans ascribe to individualism which effectively sways the expectations they have of civics instruction.  

Anil Ananthaswamy comments on how individualism stacks up against other concerns.  This researcher writes,

 There’s actually a lot of agreement on the things that are considered to be most essential such as respecting America’s political institutions and laws and believing in individualism.  There’s also considerable agreement on things that are considered less essential, such as the language one speaks, or whether someone was born in the US or has European ancestry.[3]

 Seymour M. Lipset provides an extensive study of this American character trait.  He writes that Americans are exceptionally supportive of individualism and anti-statism.  Using comparative data, he demonstrates how, compared to the other modern industrial nations, the US ranks lower in taxes in such state-sponsored programs as welfare.[4]  More recent studies continue to support these claims.[5]

In short, Americans are highly suspicious of governmental efforts to solve maladies and prefer private-for-profit approaches to dealing with communal concerns.  Even public schools, some would argue, should shift to private-school arrangements.[6]  In turn, these biases are not isolated but are associated with many other views and concerns.

For example, Americans have a very pragmatic view of education.  Some have called this pragmatism as being anti-intellectual. Americans are wary of schools attempting to introduce academic subject matter that they – the public – do not understand.  This was exemplified all the way back to the nation’s reaction to Sputnik in the late 1950s and 1960s and the reforms that ensued which were unintelligible to the public in general.  Those reforms enjoyed a short longevity and were mostly dismissed within a decade.[7]

Americans believe education should be purposeful, for the most part, toward practical career goals.  While this has resulted in different approaches used in schools over this century, a consistent antagonism toward highly academic bias has pervaded American campuses. Robert Maranto and Jonathan Wai share an interesting overview of American education.  In their abstract introducing their study, they write,

 Rooted in early 20th century progressivism and scientific management, Educational Leadership theory envisions professionally run schools as “Taylorist” factories with teaching and leadership largely standardized, prioritizing compliance over cognitive ability among educators. Further, the roots of modern education theory do not see the intelligence of students as largely malleable. Hence, prioritizing intelligence is viewed as elitist.[8]

           The natural rights perspective matches closely to this seemingly consistent desire of the American public.  For one, it treats government as a neutral institution.  This blends with the anti-statist position of most Americans. While the systems approach recognizes the necessity of some government presence, it does not advocate any particular form for that presence nor for it to be extensive.

         It leaves those types of decisions to the political interplay of the American public through the expression of demands and supports, mostly voting behavior.  The instructional approach it favors does address from whence existing political pressures originate, but it does so in order for the student to gather explanations of the conditions that exist without projecting political biases for policy alternatives.

         The natural rights perspective, with its reliance on political systems, is a fairly straightforward construct avoiding difficult incursions into philosophic arguments of political theory.  The natural rights perspective most closely meets the expectations of American parents, i.e., that it should teach their youngsters what constitutes the government structure and give them a straightforward explanation of why the government is organized the way it is.

         In doing so, it definitely avoids such messaging as was associated with federalist notions of communal, cooperative, and collaborative aims or goals that government should pursue.  In its stead, one finds language that describes – and to a certain extent promotes – a transactional national stage in which the various parties go about competing for political favor from either government or other private parties.

         This completes this blog’s review of Americans’ expectations of their schools’ civics instruction.  Still to be covered are schools’ economic base and youth culture.  With that, this blog will complete its report on the commonplaces of curriculum development as seen through the “eyes” of the natural rights construct.

[Note:  As regular and ongoing readers of this blog might know, this blogger takes a break every four hundred postings.  He did so after 400, 800, and now will do so after 1200 postings.  As of his counting, this posting is number 1198.  That leaves two more postings before the next break. He anticipates the break will last, at least, two months, maybe three.  He has other projects, e.g., finishing his preparation of the re-edited collection of the blog’s second hundred postings.  He looks forward to the break and getting back from it to resume producing this blog’s postings.]

[1] This presentation continues with this posting.  The reader is informed that the claims made in this posting do not necessarily reflect the beliefs or knowledge of this blogger.  Instead, the posting is a representation of what an advocate of the natural rights view might present.  This is done to present a dialectic position of that construct.  This series of postings begins with “Judging Natural Rights View, I,” August 2, 2022.

[2] Joseph Schwab presents his conception of the commonplaces of curriculum development – they are subject matter, students, teachers, and milieu.  See William H. Schubert, Curriculum:  Perspective, Paradigm, and Possibility (New York, NY: MacMillan Publishing Company, 1986).

[3] Anil Ananthaswamy, “American Individualism and Our Collective Crisis,” Knowable Magazine, December 1, 2020, accessed October 23, 2022, https://knowablemagazine.org/article/society/2020/american-individualism-and-our-collective-crisis.

[4] Seymour M. Lipset, American Exceptionalism:  A Double-Edged Sword (New York, NY: W. W. Norton and Company, 1996).

[5] See for example, “How Do US Taxes Compare Internationally?,” Briefing Book, The Tax Policy Center, 2018, accessed October 23, 2022, https://www.taxpolicycenter.org/briefing-book/how-do-us-taxes-compare-internationally AND Robert Rector, “Poverty and the Social Welfare State in the United States and Other Nations,” The Heritage Foundation, September 16, 2015, accessed October 23, 2022, https://www.heritage.org/welfare/report/poverty-and-the-social-welfare-state-the-united-states-and-other-nations#:~:text=As%20a%20share%20of%20GDP,5%5D%20Ibid.%2C%20p..

[6] For example, see “Top Benefits of Private School vs. Public School,” Hotchkiss (n.d.), accessed October 23, 2022, https://www.hotchkiss.org/top-benefits-of-private-school.

[7] For a short, but interesting, history, see Dave Roos, “How the Cold War Space Race Led to US Students Doing Tons of Homework,” History [Channel], August 13, 2019, accessed October 23, 2022, https://www.history.com/news/homework-cold-war-sputnik#:~:text=The%20response%20from%20the%20U.S.,science%2C%20mathematics%20and%20foreign%20languages.

An advocate of natural rights continues his/her presentation[1] …

By way of background, this posting continues a dialectic argument that counters the prevalence of the parochial/federalism construct as the main view of governance and politics – that prevalence held in the US until the end of World War II.  To gain a historical appreciation, in those years after the war the nation shifted to the natural rights view – a highly individualist view of governance and politics – that encouraged a set of values, theories, and preferences that has, more than any other view, guided the way Americans see how they should behave politically.

         Among those adopted views was a preference for a political systems model, adoption of a transactional approach to politics, and a diminution of communal sentiments and values that were central to the parochial/federalist view. The newer view did favor higher degrees of equality – as defined by the natural rights view[2] – which led to such developments as the civil rights movement among African Americans.  It also affected how educators have run the nation’s schools, including those schools’ curricula.

         In that vein, this blog has presented the natural rights view of how education should be run, and how it should develop its approaches to instruction, especially in terms of content.  To assist that effort, this blog has utilized Joseph Schwab’s commonplaces of curriculum.[3]  It is now ready to report on the last of those commonplaces, the milieu.

The Milieu

         The milieu is defined as the general social environment of the classroom and the school site.  For the purposes of this dialectic argument, the milieu is seen as being affected by the following factors:  the expectations of schools, the youth culture found at school sites, and the socio-economic status of schools’ student bodies.[4]  Christopher Hurn places a great deal of emphasis on these factors in his description of the sociological make-ups of American contemporary schools.

         Specifically, this argument will provide answers to the following questions:

 ·      How do current expectations of schools affect the implementation of a natural rights construct?

·      How does the socio-economic status of individual school populations affect the implementations of a natural rights construct?

·      How does the youth culture of a school affect the implementations of a natural rights construct?

 Expectations of Schools

         The expectations of schools are derived from the prevailing social-cultural values of the American people.  The logical assumptions people seem to share is expecting that their schools support, in the school’s civics’ curriculum, the values they hold toward government.  Salem Middle School in Lithonia, Georgia offers a typical list of general expectations and one can readily see their civic quality.  Here is their general comment followed by a list of expectations:

 The expectations, rules, procedures and consequences of [a teacher’s] classroom are intended to keep the classroom environment safe, orderly, and productive.  Please respect the rules so that we can maximize learning time together.  The rules are not hard to follow, nor are any of them “out of the ordinary.”  They are simply expected behaviors for high school students in this classroom.  If you have any questions about any of these rules, or why they are in place, you have the right to find out – please ask me as soon as possible.  There should never be a rule that does not have a purpose!

Thank you for your cooperation!

CLASS EXPECTATIONS

1.    Respect yourself, the teacher & others …

2.    Put forth your best effort at all times …

3.    Be prepared for class each day …

4.    Follow directions when given …

5.    Pay attention, participate and ask questions …

6.    Preserve a positive learning environment …

7.    Take responsibility for your actions …[5]

 Each of these expectations are followed by further clarification; so, for example, number 6 has three further statements, the first being “Student actions that interfere with teaching or learning in the classroom will NOT be tolerated.”[6]

         This example is included for a couple of reasons.  One, as already mentioned, readers can detect a civic orientation to these directions.  Elsewhere, this blogger has pointed out that under the natural rights view, public school instruction avoids the promotion of values with one exception.  That exception has to do with school governance. Misbehaviors will “NOT be tolerated.” That is, good behavior is valued.

         Two, one can detect the natural rights’ bias for transactions. Students are to behave and participate in classroom efforts; in exchange, it is understood that they will be educated.  Or stated another way, there is no concern for a common good; all goods are stated in terms of personal advantage.  And three, as transactional exchanges go, all references are directed at individual interests – not the communal welfare of the class or the school.

         John Goodlad addresses these biases.  That is, he developed a series of goals for the typical American schools by analyzing curricular documents from a sampling of districts. He identifies this list of goals:

 ·      Develop knowledge of the basic workings of the government …

·      Develop a willingness to participate in the political life of the nation and community …

·      Develop a commitment to the values of liberty, government by consent of the governed, representational government, and one’s responsibility for the welfare of all …

·      Develop an understanding of the interrelationships among complex organizations and agencies in a modern society and learn to act in accordance with it.[7]

  This listing was formulated in 1984 and represents a remnant of a federal leaning.  How?  By, at least, giving communal factors some mention (notice “welfare of all” and “understanding interrelationships” which can be interpreted as being federal). But “interrelationships” can also refer to a systems approach for dealing with organizations such as schools as holistic/interrelated entities consisting of parts, including staffs, clientele, and/or serviced people.

         But, as ironically put by the online site, “Partners,” it states that:

Americans usually view every person as [a] self-sufficient individual, and this idea is important to understanding the American value system. Everyone is their [sic] own person, not a representative of a family, community, or any other group.

You may view this as rather selfish and egotistical, or as a welcomed freedom from the restraints of family, community, social class, etc. Yet, this self-centered attitude prevails in American culture—placing the most importance on the individual, not the group.

Likewise, U.S. Americans do not like to think of themselves as being dependent upon others or as others being dependent upon them. This can affect the boundaries placed on personal relationships, which starts with friendships.[8]

 This last quote captures what it means to adopt the natural rights view.

Beyond that, though, Goodlad’s listing above reflects a basic support for the political system model in the study of the US government and its associated values as defined by natural rights advocates.  And with these initial observations regarding [9]the milieu, this posting ends.  The next posting will continue to describe this individualism and how it affects policy preferences and schooling.

[1] This presentation continues with this posting.  The reader is informed that the claims made in this posting do not necessarily reflect the beliefs or knowledge of this blogger.  Instead, the posting is a representation of what an advocate of the natural rights view might present.  This is done to present a dialectic position of that construct.  This series of postings begins with “Judging Natural Rights View, I,” August 2, 2022.

[2] Natural rights advocates define equality as individuals having equal standing before the law.  They do not include in their definition any notion of equality regarding specific living conditions such as meeting minimum economic welfare standards.

[3] Joseph Schwab presents his conception of the commonplaces of curriculum development – they are subject matter, students, teachers, and milieu.  See William H. Schubert, Curriculum:  Perspective, Paradigm, and Possibility (New York, NY: MacMillan Publishing Company, 1986).

[4] These factors are identified by Christopher Hurn.  See Christopher J. Hurn, The Limits and Possibilities of Schooling:  An Introduction to the Sociology of Education (Boston, MA:  Allyn and Bacon, 1993).

[5] Ashley Owens, “Ms. Owens’s Classroom Expectations, Rules, Procedures and Consequences, Salem Middle School (n.d.), accessed October 19, 2022, https://salemms.dekalb.k12.ga.us/ClassroomExpectationsRulesProceduresandConsequences.aspx.

[6] Ibid.

[7] John I. Goodlad, A Place Called School (New York, NY:  McGraw-Hill, 1984), 53.