There is no going back: the Covid 19 virus has exposed our fragility and we cannot continue with such a level of disrespect for the planet and its inhabitants. Change is being forced upon us, and the education system that has been built upon mechanical, measurement and outcomes approach is crumbling. We are living in a time of climate breakdown, species extinction, social inequality, unrestrained technological advancement, deep religious and ideological separation. The way we educate ourselves and our young must respond to this situation and to those fractures in the fabric of our lives that are being fully exposed.
The modern education system is built on human greed founded upon comparison and competition. This leads to the destruction and exploitation of our fellow human beings and the planet, creating separation through age, gender, race, class, caste, religion, intellectual ability and economic well-being. The system is run on commercial lines with learning being a commodity serviced by teachers and schools; parents are the customers and young people are the raw material to be shaped to the desires of the school, parents and society.
Education is dominated by the language and values of the marketplace, arising from the exploitation and destruction of the industrial age, and resulting in the climate breakdown and species extinction that we are witnessing. The coming generations are going to be engaged in finding their way through this mess, and the worst thing we can do is present them with the illusion of a future rooted in how things have always been. Tests and exams leading to qualifications that will find the ‘good job’ are irrelevant in a world that is under threat.
I would, therefore, suggest that we do not begin with the mass, not replacing one system with another, but with the individual.
A child is full of wonder, intelligence and the capacity to learn. They have their own particular interests, abilities and ways of being. The process of education as it is now, is more attuned to the ideology of individualism. This ideology is expressed through the exploitation of the individual for commercial gain, creating division and separation through conformity, comparison and competition. However, humanity is made up of individuals who are indivisible from each other, from other living beings and the world of nature that sustains all life.
A process of education, exploration and learning that has the individual in mind also acknowledges the relationship of that individual to the world as a whole. Therefore, this process does not concentrate on separating into categories, but is always looking for connections, looking for the whole picture.
Listen to the young:
Pressure… I must be motivated. The click and grind and motion of the wheel in my head; the treadmill of the brain. Cannot, must not stand still… must move on.
Success… I must be inspired. Please inspire me; inside I am empty. Please fill me with your wise words, positive statements, your exhortations to achievement. Without them I am nothing, another statistic in the data bank of human misery. You tell me I am nothing and then you tell me to be something – thin, beautiful, clever. And you say: don’t talk so much; then, don’t be so silent. So I cannot tell what you are thinking.
Anxiety… close cropped and bare as barbed wire. What is going to become of me? You exhort me not to be a failure and urge me to follow my passion. You talk to me of the global race and the part I have to play in it. So I am looking for the finishing line and thinking about what will happen when I get there. Will I then be spat out, chewed over and over until all outward form is lost? Will I be digested then excreted in some unrecognisable form that once was me? What do you think of me? Do you like me? If you don’t, then I won’t like you.
I can no longer do this on my own. Absorb me in your cleverness, your silky long words are like hypnotic snakes, and maybe, just maybe I could be like you. Tell me what to do; don’t ask me questions; don’t make me think. Reflection takes place in a darkening mirror, and these days the dark frightens me. Comfort me. I am frozen in time, like a mammoth in ice…
But I want to be alive! For I am young, and confusion is the state of all humanity. I am young, please don’t ignore me.
Humanity cannot exist without children, cannot exist without the natural world and neither are resources for exploitation; the world is a living entity. The time has come for a coordinated framework outlining an approach to living which values the young, their education and the Earth that nurtures them. Over the years there have been ideas, insights, books, schools, universities that have pointed the way to educate as if people and planet matter. Experiments have come and gone, and some continue.
The urgency for change is imperative, but it is also obvious that we must proceed slowly, with care, kindness and sensitivity.
There is fertile ground for a global conversation, for dialogue, where through exploring this question of education and its purpose, it will be possible to address the accumulation of crises that face us. A group of people talking together openly with attention on process rather than outcome, allows for real change to emerge. This is a situation where learning takes place – this is education.
I would suggest that there is no barrier to who might participate in this conversation, because we never cease to learn. Nevertheless, it is how this conversation is conducted that will inevitably define its outcome. Conflict will create division and anger; however, cooperation and collaboration will create understanding and agreement. There can be no hierarchy, no leaders, no ideology, only listening and observing with respect, and a mind that understands that we are working for the good of all that lives and dies – towards survival.
Let us return to the individual, but this time not define who we are talking about by age and let us explore the conditions under which they might thrive. It is possible to create an atmosphere of learning that steps out of the restrictions of punishment and reward and a rigid hierarchy of knowledge, to one where learning is essentially a collaborative process of discovery. This implies an informality of relationship, after all, education is a supremely human activity involving many subtle relationships which are unable to be explored in an atmosphere constricted by formality.
The relationship between teacher and student is fundamental to the process of education, being a complex flow of communication that requires humility, sensitivity and humour. Teachers being referred to by their first names, dropping the use of uniforms, and by having small, human-scale institutions, relationships in learning can flourish. Also there must be an acknowledgement of the importance of the use of questions, how they are framed, how they are asked, and the quality of listening that receives them. Underpinning this is understanding the destructive nature of violence, exploitation and separation. Instead of outlining a set of values to which the individual must adhere, there is the possibility of developing insight into the consequences of human behaviour.
Listening and observing are the bedrock of understanding and exist deep within our relationship with the natural world. In order to understand ourselves we need exposure to the sky, winds, birds, insects, trees; all the living things that share the Earth. By observing and listening to ourselves through our relationship with the rest of the world, then we can create a world that is not based on greed and violence.
Our industrialised thinking must be challenged fundamentally for a new approach to education to come about. Ideas concerning the number of people involved in different learning situations, the nature of the learning process, different environments in which learning takes place, what the meaning of discipline is when it comes to learning, and how time is used, need to be examined. The exploration into the process of the socialisation of the individual within diverse cultures at differing stages of life has been sorely neglected and has led to serious and continuing conflict around race, gender, religion and age. Key aspects of human life are becoming devalued, notably parenting, teaching and generally caring for others.
For humanity to flourish, its connection with the Earth cannot be lost, and the careful exploration of this relationship must inform all aspects of a new approach to education.
The ground is right for conversations to flow, understanding to develop and a clarity to emerge within the contradictions and paradoxes that are an integral part of human relationships. Education is a collaborative exploration into what it means to be alive.
Let these conversations take place in open spaces, without fear.
