Deliberate Dumbing Down of America Public Education

85 students in Community Education; and to serve as a handbook on Community Education for school officials and community education leaders.” The following excerpts are from The Role of the School in the Community : Chapter III. An Overview by Jack D. Minzey and Clarence R. Olsen As the social forces have sought to bring action to bear on community problems, the need for a vehicle of action has become apparent. Not all groups have identified the most effective means of implementing their programs structured about community problems, but a number of influential persons and groups are aware of the community education concept and are extremely optimistic about its possibilities as the means by which their goals of social engi neering can be accomplished.(p. 40) Chapter VI. A Developmental Process by Curtis Van Voorhees When a community school director attempts to identify courses to be included in the ques tioning process it is important to remember, as previously mentioned, that people are typi cally unable to identify many of their own problems and needs. While they may sometimes be able to identify what they want in the way of a class, it is unlikely that many people who need assistance in preparing nutritious meals are aware of that fact. And parents who are in need of information about child health practices are unlikely to recognize that they need such help. So it must be remembered that the simple existence of a problem does not guar antee its recognition by the person with the problem. Community school coordinators must, therefore, develop a questioning form which will get at the unidentified problems of people without unduly alarming or offending the respondent; they must seek to solicit information from people which will allow community school coordinators to plan better programs for the people they attempt to serve—programs that will hopefully change, in a positive way, the attitude, behavior and life style of the community residents. [Ed. Note: The term “community education” is rarely used today due to its socialistic philoso phy causing extreme controversy in the 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s. The average American rejected the notion that the community was there to serve his/her needs and that decision making by unelected councils was acceptable or perhaps preferable to decision-making by elected officials. The change agents wisely dropped the label and now use terms such as “com munitarianism,” “participatory democracy,” “site-based management,” “school-based clinics,” “year-round schools,” Hillary Clinton’s It Takes a Village to Raise a Child concept, all of which are individually or collectively Community Education. As Anita Hoge, a well-known education researcher, says, “It doesn’t take a village to raise a child unless you live in a commune.” At a Community Education Conference held in Washington, D.C. in 1976 a community educator from Alaska stated that “community education could be likened to the system in Russia and China. ”10 ] M ASTER P LAN FOR P UBLIC E DUCATION IN H AWAII —T OWARD A N EW E RA FOR E DUCATION IN Hawaii was published in 1969 by the State of Hawaii Department of Education, Honolulu, Hawaii. This publication was partially funded under Title V, Sec. 503, P.L. 890–10 (U.S. Office of Education). Excerpts follow from this extraordinarily frank Master Plan which would serve as a model for the rest of the nation: The Sick Sixties : c. 1969

Implications for Education... Second, the computer will enhance learning.... The teacher will operate as a manager.... The teacher will have a ready record of each student’s performance