It's back-to-school now, which means listening to the children groan about teachers and homework; teachers groan about students and grading papers; and commuters groan about being stuck behind school busses in rush hour traffic. But, on the whole, wouldn't you think it would mean someone, somewhere was learning something?
It's certainly not the voters of this country, who consistently defeat most school referendums, allowing an underpaid, underskilled teaching staff to basically warehouse vast numbers of their children in broken down, aging infrastructures stocked with badly skewed and often outdated materials.
I know that, as a nation, we are absurdly anti-intellectual and yet, at the same time, highly critical of our educational system. And, as Arianna Huffington points out in today's column, we want only the best for everyone, but we're not willing to make the sacrifices necessary to ensure that everyone gets to have the best.
And I'm reminded of Ireland during the Penal Law days, when everything Irish was outlawed, including the schools. And how the Irish kept their culture alive through the Hedge Schools, which were literally that -- small classes run by traveling teachers on roadsides, hidden by large hedgerows.
I'm trying to picture the children of that day, being awakened in the morning for school. "But Ma, I don't wanna!" And that mother's ringing (and quite possibly stinging) reply. And the door closing on the young scholar's backside, as he makes his way to class. During times like that, I doubt you ever heard a teacher complain about parental apathy toward their children's education. And given that teachers, if caught, could be and were put in jail or killed, you were more likely to have a seriously committed teacher in charge of your son or daughter's education.
Madeleine L'Engle once said that religion would have more power and impact in our lives if it were outlawed. (Which is possibly why ultra-right-wing-conservative-Christians tend to paint themselves as the underdogs, even though they're the largest "denomination" in the country.)
But what if public education itself were outlawed? You'd have parents moving heaven and earth to find a teacher for their children.
At the moment, so long as public education is free and readily available, no matter how substandard it is, we settle for the face-saving complaint, the holier-than-thou pronouncimento, generalized finger-pointing in all directions -- anything so long as we don't have to, God forbid, actually DO something about the problem.
A limited amount of homeschooling is already an accepted part of the U.S. educational system. But if the educational system breaks down any further, the U.S. may have to begin a whole new construction phase.
I think it would be funny to see hedgerows in the inner city. And possibly quite refreshing.
8:20:27 PM 
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