What is the purpose of school and how do actions align to that vision?

I see a lot of posts debating topics in education, and you might have seen them as well. Whether it is how to teach reading, skills in math, or the place of technology in education, I think that many identify with a “side” rather than realize that the best answers are often somewhere in the middle.

For example, I was asked to be in a news interview about “phones in the classroom,” which I politely declined. From my experience, I would be brought on as the “pro-phone” guy, and the adversarial conversation would be great for the viewer’s attention.

The thing is, I am not the “pro-phone” guy; I would like to think that I have a more nuanced take on education and feel that we should identify negatives but also ultimately look for opportunities.

My gut feeling was based on an experience with media in this type of conversation.

Years ago, I was pitted against someone and was brought on as the “anti-cursive” educator (without my knowledge until I arrived). During the conversation, I said things such as students should learn to read cursive, but I am not sure we can spend the same amount of time teaching cursive today that we could when I was in school. No matter what decade you went to school, the time frame of the day was pretty much the same as it is today, but the demand on teachers continuously goes up. It is not sustainable. We have to make decisions on what stays and what goes. Not because I am pro or anti-anything, but because I understand how time works. It is finite.

I have also encouraged people to revisit what the “basics” are in our world today.

Many would say that “cursive” should still be a basic skill taught in classrooms, yet some of the same people could not figure out Zoom during the pandemic. Is the utilization of technology a basic skill or not? I am not making a judgment but legitimately asking the question, and I have encouraged others to have the same conversations in their communities.

Yet, what I am writing right now is not about where you stand on any issue in education. It is to revisit the question, “What is the purpose of school?”

Is it to prepare kids for a workforce (which is another way to say, prepare them to work for someone else).

Is it to prepare them for the “real world” (which they also currently live in)?

And when we say things like “college and career” ready, what does that mean in detail?

If you were to ask me to answer the question, “What is the purpose of school?” in one sentence, I would say, “It is to help learners find a pathway to success that is meaningful to them.”

That might not be as specific as some would like, but I could break it down even further with a few thoughts.

How do we help students find and develop their strengths while also exposing them to things they might not know they are interested in? We must ensure they have basic skills to learn whatever they want and need in the future.

I shared this image years ago, and it wasn’t meant to be an absolute but a conversation starter:

The hope was to spark conversations and go beyond the idea that many of our students walk out of school being extremely good at something very specific: the ability to do school.

That might make us feel good now, but does nothing for them in the future.

I do not believe that “having kids be good at school” is ultimately anyone’s goal, but what are our hopes, and how do they align with our actions?

I wanted to write this to pose a question that I think should be central to our conversations about why we embrace the practices we do.

What is the purpose of school?

For many families, it is to get their kids to college. For some kids, that is also their goal. And some that is the goal of both, one, or neither.

When I say “to help learners find a pathway to success that is meaningful to them,” I don’t exclude post-secondary institutions, but I do not want to limit any student to see that as the only valuable path.

So maybe the disconnect in any of the “education wars” is not only that we disagree with the action, but perhaps the purpose of school in the first place.

I think it is a conversation worth having, and maybe if we agree (at least within the vicinity of each other) on the purpose of school, then it might change our conversation on some of the strategies.

But I do think the more we center our conversations around finding a common purpose for the education system, the more likely we are to find solutions that best serve our communities.

(This is an old TedX Talk from Seth Godin, but I think it is a valuable watch on the idea of “What is school for?”)