Writing Our Next Chapter: The task facing the democratic learning community
by Richard Fransham
The Summerhill Festival of Childhood that wrapped up on October 5th confirmed that we have come a long way in the 100 years since A.S. Neill founded Summerhill. Thanks to the countless pioneers of possibilities, as Derry Hannam describes them, hundreds of democratic schools and a wealth of literature now arms a potentially formidable mass of people who believe that children and youth need to be in control of their learning. It is now time for these people to use this arsenal to make change happen.
Looking back 50 years plus to the late 1960’s we find much evidence that people knew schools were failing children. One of the most significant statements supporting this view is found in the government commissioned “Living and Learning” report on the state of education in the Canadian province of Ontario. This is how the Commission described it:
“Today, on every side, however, there is heard a growing demand for a fresh look at education in Ontario. The Committee was told of inflexible programs, outdated curricula, unrealistic regulations, regimented organization, and mistaken aims of education. We heard from alienated students, frustrated teachers, irate parents, and concerned educators. Many public organizations and private individuals have told us of their growing discontent and lack of confidence in a school system which, in their opinion, has become outmoded and is failing those it exists to serve.”
– Living and Learning, 1968, p. 10
At least some people who were witness to those days in the 60’s will tell you today that the state of public education has changed little during the half century since the report was published. Some will even say that we are worse off today given high stakes testing and the highly competitive, dehumanizing nature of the schools most young people attend. As with “A Pilot Study to Evaluate the Impact of the Student Participation Aspects of the Citizenship Order on Standards of Education in Secondary Schools”, best known as the “Hannam Report”, “Living and Learning” is best known as the “Hall-Dennis Report”, named after its principle authors.
In “Dumbing Us Down”, John Gatto, using the language of paradigm shifts, gives insight into why schools have changed so little. He states:
“It is the great triumph of compulsory government monopoly mass-schooling that among even the best of my fellow teachers, and among even the best of my students’ parents, only a small number can imagine a different way to do things.”
– John Gatto, Dumbing Us Down, 1992, p. 12
Thomas Kuhn who popularized the term “paradigm shift” observed that paradigms compete and that dominants ones do what they can to keep contenders out of sight. In the absence of a clear alternative, an inadequate dominant paradigm can exist for centuries, but as was the case with the Copernican revolution, even a clear choice can be suppressed for ages. Copernicus lived in the 1500s, but it was not until the latter half of the 18th century that writings about the heliocentric view of the universe were removed from the Catholic Church’s list of prohibited literature. With our current battle over centres, teacher-centered vs child-centered, the dominant paradigm has kept us at bay for decades, but we must take it no longer. Old paradigm thinking is seriously damaging young people on a daily basis. If we are to learn from history, as teachers in state schools urge us to do, then we will know that brilliant people can premise their behaviours and beliefs on a faulty paradigm. This tells us that if those who are perpetuating the industrial model of education have learned from history, they will be cultivating enough humble objectivity to hold themselves suspect. Disciples of the teacher-centered learning paradigm are aware that the child-centered one exists, just as people in the days of Copernicus knew of both competing views of the universe. So ingrained can be one way of thinking, however, that the task of unlearning is insurmountable for some people. Given what we know today, nobody should presume to write a high-level report about the future of education without some months of lived experience in successful democratic schools like those highlighted in the documentary film “School Circles”.
Every paradigm comes with its own set of problems. Thomas Kuhn uses the term “normal science” to refer to all of the activities the disciples of a paradigm engage in to solve its problems. We are well past the time in history when the conditions should have been established for the normal science of the child-centered learning paradigm to be conducted on an equal footing with the normal science of the teacher-centered learning paradigm. It requires providing opportunities in community schools for people to choose which paradigm they wish to experience. Initially the choice of a child-centered learning environment would be in the form of pilot programs based on Derry Hannam’s 20% idea, the free learner concept defined by Unschooling School, the school-within-a-community-school such as The CHIP Program promoted by OPERI, or the intriguing new HOPE Program being implemented by the Ottawa Catholic School Board. These programs are all scalable on the basis of change by choice where they are as equally visible and accessible to learners as are traditional programs. Some will say that operating competing paradigms under the same roof will never work, but this is a myth built on the presumption that teachers are not professional.
One of the speakers at the Summerhill Festival of Childhood was Kate Robinson, daughter of TedTalk star personality Ken Robinson. She categorized people as immovable, movable, and those who move. The movables are those who could be open to the idea that children need to be in charge of their learning and she encourages the movers to actively engage with the movables. This is where the new chapter for democratic learning needs to be begin with vigor. While the task of loading our arsenal with more examples and literature must continue, it is time for us to focus on systematically, consistently and concertedly applying what we have accumulated over the years to overcoming the people who, intentionally or not, are keeping us out of sight. We need to wake up enough people in our communities that we cannot be denied publicly funded access to our paradigm through our community schools.
A way to start this new chapter with gusto is to get behind the Youth Rights Day movement that was discussed at the Summerhill Festival. It creates the opportunity to start friendly conversations with people, many who are suffering in silence, to let them know that they are not alone in their discontent with how young people are treated in our society. Making ourselves visible to them will leave them uplifted and energized to help overcome the perpetuators of the old paradigm who are obstructing an orderly evolution to a better society. This is an opportune moment, created by COVID, to ensure the education revolution that Jerry Mintz of AERO says is finally happening does not peter out.
Imagine the question: “Do you know about the Youth Rights Day?” reverberating in communities throughout the world. It’s a simple wake-up call that could have millions take a first step towards realizing that we are ultimately driving towards securing our future by reclaiming our humanity. It is a question that provides a segue for us to talk, with the authority of the whole democratic learning community behind us, about the work we are doing individually to usher in our paradigm. At some point, it might be appropriate to introduce the view conveyed by Carol Black in her documentary film “Schooling the World”: “If you want to change a culture in a single generation, you have to change how it educates its children.” We are at a critical fork in the story of our civilization. Will we collapse or reboot it is the question? Zak Stein sheds considerable light on this decision to be made in his book “Education in a Time Between Worlds”. For a quick introduction to his views listen to the recording of a talk he gave at the Ecoversities conference this year. There is a recognized urgency to getting this decision made as soon as possible.
The United Nations sustainability goals, particularly goal 4 about quality education can be useful to establish some credibility for what we say. It needs to be noted, however, that despite wanting to be visionary, people with leadership roles in the UN still have a foot in the old paradigm. Some are producing a document titled “The UNESCO’s International Commission on the Futures of Education” that is not as insightful as proponents of child-centered learning expect it to be. Gabriel Groiss and Katy Zago are working with others to provide a response to a draft copy of the document that UNESCO has provided in order to obtain feedback. They were at the Summerhill Festival of Childhood to inform people of how the draft falls short of recognizing the benefits to our paradigm and they urged people to provide input into the response being written. Numbers matter and they have created the opportunity for us to write together another page in our new chapter. The more signatories we have to the response Gabriel and Katy are crafting, the more likely we are to make some significant gains. To become a signatory you can email youthrightsday@gmail.com requesting to be included.
The following links are to Facebook posts intended to convey how simply we can use the Youth Rights Day to advance towards our common goal while at the same time gaining attention and support for each of our individual efforts. It is a starting point for us to get traction. It requires that we each actively become ambassadors for our cause, champions of change in our communities. Join the Youth Rights Day Facebook group for the sharing of ideas about how to make the day a success in communities throughout the world.
