Clusterf*uck Nation, a commrntary on today's world

[pbrower2a]

With the recognition that President Trump and those around him would never go so far as to promote an ethnic Apartheid, he could certainly promote an economic Apartheid in education with the effect of ensuring that education exists to enforce social status. Education for the children of the rich will be intended to prepare them to be masters of society. Education for the middle class will be designed to make clerks, technicians and skilled laborers. Education for the poor will be designed to make servants and toilers. For the first group education will be incredibly rich in its offerings. For the middle it will have narrow objectives. For the poor it will be a farce.

Education reflects the long-term vision of those who make the big decisions. In Trump's America some are to be the cleaners  and servers; some are to be the clerks and craftsmen; and a tiny number are to be the rulers. You can predict how the rewards are to go. Perhaps more people will be trained to be clerks and technicians than is necessary so that those who run afoul of the political reality in which 95% are to suffer for 2% or so are to truly suffer among the poor. The poor will be taught athleticism on the job; the rich will reach for the stars.  The middle will be expected to accept dubious privileges in return for being exploited and demeaned  a little less severely.

 

Quote:‘I just want to remind the Honourable Members of Parliament that if the native in South Africa is being taught to expect that he will lead his adult life under the policy of equal rights, he is making a big mistake. The native must not be subject to a school system which draws him away from his own community, and misleads him by showing him the green pastures of European society in which he is not allowed to graze.’

With these notorious words, Dr. Hendrik Verwoerd introduced Bantu Education to Parliament in 1953. This began the era of apartheid education. In 1959 universities were segregated. In 1963 a separate education system was set up for the ‘coloureds.’ Indian education followed in 1964. And an Education Act for whites was passed in 1967 …

The 37 million people who live in South Africa [in 1990, just before the end of Apartheid] … are … officially divided into four ‘population groups’: ‘African’ (about 75%—of whom some 45% are under the age of 15), ‘Whites’ (13%), ‘Coloureds’ (9%) and ‘Indians’ (3%). Apart from a few ‘mixed’ ‘private’ schools, there are separate schools for the four ‘population groups’; it is illegal for a person to attend a state school designated for a ‘population group’ other than that to which she has officially been assigned, or for a school to admit as a pupil someone from the ‘wrong population group’.

Along almost any dimension of comparison, there have been, and are glaring inequalities between the four schooling systems in South Africa. This applies to teacher qualifications, teacher-pupil ratios, per capita funding, buildings, equipment, facilities, books, stationery … and also to ‘results’ measured in terms of the proportions and levels of certificates awarded. Along these dimensions, “White’ schools are far better off than any of the others, and ‘Indian’ and ‘Coloured’ schools are better off than those for ‘Africans’. Schooling is compulsory for ‘Whites’, ‘Indians’ and ‘Coloureds’ but not for ‘Africans'.

http://newlearningonline.com/new-learnin...-education