The thinking behind Amy Gutmann’s Democratic Education does not reside in prescription, but rather recognizes both nuance and complexity. As a result, she not only presents a philosophy of education that embraces political controversy, but does so within a context that promotes dialogue as a means to achieve “social progress” through how we educate our children (p. 5). She suggests “[t]he primary aim of a democratic theory of education is not to offer solutions to all of the problems plaguing our educational institutions, but to consider ways of resolving those problems that are compatible with a commitment to democratic values” (p. 11).
To that end, while acknowledging tensions that are evident in educational philosophy, her argument is that “all educable children [must] learn enough to participate effectively in the democratic process” (p. 170). In doing so, the goal of public education she espouses should serve to “cultivate the skills and virtues of deliberation” (p. xiii), so that, as she states in the preface to the first edition, we teach children “enough to participate intelligently as adults in the political processes that shape their society,” promoting “a common standard that is compatible with diversity.” Her model assumes a shared responsibility for education, where parents, education professionals, and governmental entities contribute to “cultivating moral character” (p. 42). At the same time, she also writes “[a] democratic state of education recognizes that educational authority must be shared among parents, citizens, and professional educators even though such sharing does not guarantee that power will be wedded to knowledge” (p. 42). This is in keeping with the idea that democracy is not a process so much as an ideal that we strive to achieve and maintain.
Further, Gutmann’s idea that a democratic theory of education must be compatible with diversity reflects her view that “its principles and conclusions are compatible with our commitment to share the rights and the obligations of citizenship with people who do not share our complete conception of the good life” (p. 47). Key to this idea are the importance of both critical inquiry – teaching students to be curious and free thinkers – and political access – where students are equipped by their education and authorized by political structures to share in ruling. Gutmann says that “[c]hildren must learn not just to behave in accordance with authority, but to think critically about authority if they are to live up to the democratic ideal of sharing political sovereignty as citizens” (p. 51), arguing that “[e]ducation in character and in moral reasoning are therefore both necessary” (p. 51). In the preface to the first edition of the text, Gutmann asserts that “[d]emocratic societies must therefore prevent majorities (as well as minorities) from repressing critical inquiry or restricting political access”. But critical inquiry and political access are not possible in a system that is exclusionary or discriminatory, as these practices negate the ideal of a democratic education. When applied to primary schooling, she argues that the social purpose of nondiscrimination becomes one of nonexclusion in that “no educable child may be excluded from an education adequate to participating in the processes that structure choice among good lives” (p. 127). However, she recognizes the system is not perfect, because it cannot guarantee that parents won’t pass on their prejudices to children or that education can remain a neutral prospect (p. 42). At the same time, Gutmann says this standard is ”necessary but not sufficient” (p. 127), because we need a more fully developed plan in place to fully implement non-discriminatory practices that considers not only the allocation of resources, but also the distribution of those resources as well as the distribution of students within schools (p. 127-128). It is here that she sees the ideal of equal educational opportunity as the most popular – and promising – standard in education (p. 128).
The process-based model for teaching democratic deliberation, then, can best be conceptualized as a continuum where children are taught the concepts of democratic deliberation by adults who, in turn, participate in democratic deliberation to make decisions about education that, in turn, will subsequently affect more children. Similarly, within that model, the participatory function of adults is to maintain what Gutmann refers to as the complete democratic standard, comprised of two standards, non-discrimination and non-exclusion. In this participatory model that is governed by both respect and tolerance, adults participate in the democratic process that not only establishes the threshold for engagement – the lowest point of entry into the democratic process – but is also inclusive of engaging in, as well as authorizing, the process. We become part of the system we have been taught to nurture and uphold, keeping the process, yet recognizing and reveling in continuing debate. In order to do this, she maintains that a democratic theory of education should focus on “conscious social reproduction” (p. 14), in other words, “citizens are or should be empowered to influence the education that in turn shapes the political values, attitudes, and modes of behavior of future citizens” (p. 14).
To this effect, a democratic society that considers among its most fundamental rights liberty and justice for all – equal opportunity – it is imperative that any actions regarding education be based on a “principled understanding of our educational purposes” (p. 4). Such an assumption includes not only “who should have authority to make decisions about education” (p. 11), but also “what the moral boundaries of authority are” (p. 11). So, while “educational authority must be shared among parents, citizens, and professional educators” (p. 42), the boundaries of what and how morality should be taught should be a negotiation between parents, educational professionals, and the government (p. 42). While Gutmann explores several paths for teaching morality, citing psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg’s three moral principles of authority, association, and principles (pp. 60-63), she thinks schools should teach a morality of association, where morality is taught within a concept of knowing – that people have a tendency to exhibit moral behavior when they can apply it to a situation with a person they know, as opposed to a nameless face. It is within this context, though, that Gutmann asserts it is the responsibility of teachers, parents, or community members to challenge errant beliefs. For example, teachers cannot permit racist rhetoric in a classroom to go unchallenged on the basis of freedom of speech, because it infringes on others’ rights to the mandatory principles underlying a democratic education: liberty, justice, and equality.
Although Gutmann’s revised text was published in 1999, its theoretical framework arguing the purpose of education and its participants seems at odds with both the back to basics movement that began in the 1980s as well as the mandates established by 2001’s No Child Left Behind Act, legislation enacted to perpetuate beliefs grounded in back to basics ideology. While she maintains that we need “a principled understanding of our educational purposes” in order to make policy determinations (Gutmann, p. 4), she also warns against simplistic solutions to complex problems. Given her endorsement of the importance of establishing a dialogue regarding educational concerns, Gutmann refers to the back to basics movement as the “least common denominator for agreeing on a national agenda for education” (p. 4), noting that such a stance is problematic in that it focuses on a standard of agreement – basic education for all children – a position that, by default, prevents us from addressing much more controversial – and relevant – issues that hinder school improvement, such as racial integration and educational equality.
The process of the federal government establishing that states submit to federal mandates by providing testing data in order to receive funding, and then those states, in turn, requiring local school districts to prepare students for testing by suggesting criteria for curriculum, which, in turn, requires local schools to align their curriculum with what the state will be testing – is a bastardization of the interaction among interested parties in a system of democratic education, where what is taught, how it is taught, and how it is assessed becomes a result of government dictates, a top-down model that is anything but democratic. This is problematic in several ways. First, according to the preface of the first edition of Gutmann’s text, “[w]e all learn about education from experience, but we do not all learn the same things”. Such a belief means that, depending on the negotiation of all interested parties, students will learn, though not necessarily in the lock-step method that is being dictated in many school districts across the state and country.
Moreover, the idea that the educational philosophy representing the back to basics views of those in power during the last administration when NCLB was enacted further distorts Gutmann’s idea that a particular agenda, whether held by the majority or minority in power, cannot be used to repress our critical inquiry. Hoffman (2000) notes, “The reform movement is being led by politicians who are using their positions of authority and power to control the actions of educators” (p. 620). He cites state-mandated standardized tests, prescribed curricula and methods of instruction, federally-mandated initiatives that fund research contingent upon adherence to its own politically-motivated research, among others, that “create the illusion of democracy, [though] they are not democratic” (p. 620).
What is happening in many American schools, including mine, is that we are operating under what Gutmann would identify as a cause-effect model, as opposed to the process model she deems is more in line with a democratic theory of education. The current emphasis on testing in our schools, essentially providing data to the state that is sent to the federal government to maintain funding, has caused the state to rewrite K-12 curriculum, resulting in school districts rewriting their curriculum to match the state’s expectations so students are better prepared for success on state-wide assessments.
These changes have resulted in a transformation in the way we educate our students, and it is all based on the dictates of a few. Even though we understand that “human learning … is best when it is participatory, proactive, communal, collaborative, and given over to constructing meanings rather than receiving them (Bruner, 1996, p. 84), NCLB’s mandates have perpetuated what Freire (2007) calls the Banking Concept of Education, where, to prepare for standardized testing, students “record[], memoriz[e], and repeat[]” without understanding meaning (p. 71). This focus obliterates the notion that education is a shared process, as Gutmann argues, and instead turns students “into ‘containers,’ into ‘receptacles’ to be ‘filled’ by the teacher” (Freire, 2007, p. 72). In addition, Hoffman (2000) contends that “[schools] enculturate the young toward the values, beliefs, skills, and understandings that will preserve existing structures. But our schools can also, under the best of circumstances, challenge us to examine our own society, reflect on its strengths and weaknesses, and set our sights on improvements. This is what a democracy demands if it is to thrive, not just survive” (p. 616). Because of the integrated nature of the process Gutmann illustrates, if current foci are not changed, their negative impact could become embedded in our educational system, a negative spiral in perpetuity. On the other hand, however, a shift from current trends could also spiral, providing a much needed change.
In addition to upsetting the shared power inherent in Gutmann’s view of a democratic education, schools that focus on testing and teaching to the test prevent students from developing critical thinking skills. Hoffman says that not only has the “critical reading of texts [] taken a backseat to ‘teaching the basics’ in the reform movement, … [but the] texts themselves have become a primary control mechanism in the de-democratization of schools, teaching, and learning” (pp. 616-617). In this system, as Freire asserts, “The more students work at storing the deposits entrusted to them, the less they develop the critical consciousness which would result from their intervention in the world as transformers of that world” (p. 73). If an inner city student’s school, facing punitive measures as a result of NCLB, decides to eliminate recess, electives, and other aspects of what is important in a liberal education, that student is unfairly penalized because of who she is or where she lives. Suddenly, as Kozol (2005) writes, early preparation for testing has resulted in “hundreds of thousands of children who have made what urban districts often claim to be dramatic gains in elementary school … [who] are sitting in [secondary] subject-matter classes where they cannot comprehend the texts and cannot set down their ideas in sentences expected of most fourth and fifth grade students in the suburbs” (p. 281). Ensuring that students are prepared for the test, to the exclusion of learning to think critically, does not represent equal educational opportunity and does not benefit our students.
Furthermore, an educational system that subscribes to such an ideology has forgotten what education should comprise. Benjamin Barber (1993) says, “We have forgotten that the ‘public’ in public schools means not just paid for by the public but procreative of the very idea of a public. Public schools are how a public – a citizenry – is forged and how young, selfish individuals turn into conscientious, community-minded citizens” (p. 44). Our current culture of education has thrown all of this away in the name of so-called empiricism – measuring so-called progress using flawed instruments that require students only choose the correct answer from a list. Democracy is not choosing from a list, but debating the elements that require consideration for that list. “Certainly there will be no liberty, no equality, no social justice without democracy,” Barber points out, “and there will be no democracy without citizens and the schools that forge civic identity and democratic responsibility” (p. 46). The list is being dictated to our students, and ones who do not measure up are eventually eliminated from participating in the process, victims of unequal educational opportunity. And for all of us, high-stakes standardized testing “… in the proliferation of reductionist curricula for reading, in the silencing of professional dialogue and debate, in the marginalizing of minority positions and people, in a muting of the voices in the texts our students are expected to read, and in a stern control over the ‘correct’ interpretations of these already bland texts” (Hoffman, p. 617), is a danger to democracy.
As we continue to struggle with issues of education at the dawn of a new administration, and are hesitant to get too excited at the possibilities of democratic reform, we must stay true to the ideals of a democratic education, remembering that “[t]he education crisis … stems from a dearth of democracy: an absence of democratic will and a consequent refusal to take our children, our schools, and our future seriously” (Barber, p. 45). To use the (unfortunate) nomenclature of the day, in a democratic system of education, we are all stakeholders, and as such, we must strive to ensure the system allows the freedom of debate and negotiation so that another generation is not lost in a prescriptive struggle for dominance and power.
References
Barber, B.R. (1993). America skips school. Harper’s Magazine, 287, pp. 39-46.
Bruner, J. (1996). The Culture of Education. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
Freire, P. (2007). Pedagogy of the Oppressed. (M.B. Ramos, Trans.). New York, NY: Continuum.
Gutmann, A. (1999). Democratic Education: With a New Preface and Epilogue. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
Hoffman, J.V. (2000). The de-democratization of schools and literacy in America. The Reading Teacher, 53(8), 616-623.
Kozol, J. (2005). The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America. New York, NY: Three Rivers Press.
