The Purpose of Education

The Following is an essay I wrote for one of my education classes.

The education system within the United States is, I believe, at an interesting crossroads.  Not necessarily in a strict temporal sense, but in terms of its ultimate goal: Should it be the goal of the system to produce academically oriented students with a more philosophical bent, or should the goal be to create functional cogs that can operate within and contribute to the global economic machine.  Or, is there possibly a compromise between the two?  Do they, practically, represent two extremes of a single spectrum?

Before I go any further, it should be noted what I mean by “produce.”  The implied analogy coincidentally commodifies students.  I, in no way, support this mental leap.  By “produce,” I instead imply something along the lines of “facilitate the development of.”

The word “educate” has acquired a complex meaning, rife with implications.  If one traces the word back to its origin (educere), I believe an important aspect of its meaning is uncovered.  Educere means to lead out.  To lead out of what? Some have said darkness, some ignorance, some say naïveté.  I tend to believe that, as educators, we will be leading our students out of their pasts into their futures.  Whether that past implies actual ignorance or simpler naïveté, is somewhat inconsequential.  What is important is that we will be facilitating the futures of our students.

This, in and of itself, would be of tremendous value, noble even; if one extrapolates the effects educators (operating within the educational system) have on students to the broader societal level, then educators are facilitating, and thereby shaping, society’s future.

This aspect of teaching is what most excites me.  As a future science teacher, I have a tremendous passion for the content I’ll be presenting.  Luckily, my undergrad career was filled with instructors who also had a passion for the content they were teaching.  Some classes, though, I realized would not directly serve any practical purpose in my future career.  Why, for example, did I, as an undergrad, have to take Calculus?  I can remember sitting in Hillman library, attempting to complete my homework, when it really hit me: It’s not the content that’s important (I haven’t had to take a derivative since the fall semester of my freshman year), but it’s the thinking skills that were important to obtain.  Using methodical logic and applying abstract tools to scientific problems is essential.  Calculus provided me with some of those abilities.

I’ve been a teaching assistant in the biology and chemistry departments at Pitt for the past three years.  I’ve always struggled as to whether I should let my students in on this “secret” that I discovered in the library.  When I’m going over biochemistry with a bunch of freshman whose eyes are glazed over at 8 in the morning, part of me wants to assure them that the content they’re learning will be re-learned in later courses, and that it ultimately has little utility, even for those students planning to go onto pharmacy or medical school.  But I stop myself short of ever doing that.  Why?  I’m not sure yet.  This is a question that I still struggle with, but it’s allowed me to realize something about science education specifically, something that I believe could be generalized to education within most content areas: For the majority of one’s students, the actual content you’re asking them to learn will be of little practical utility in their lives.

So, why do it?  Why should we attempt to teach content to students that they’ll never put to use?  I think it’s important to return to the original question: What is the purpose of education?  After admitting that a spectrum exists between the two aforementioned extremes, my following point of view could possibly be taken as extreme as well, but I’m willing to defend it.  I truly believe that the core purpose of education is to produce (i.e. facilitate the development of) individuals who can function sympathetically, effectively, and thoughtfully within society.

It might sound as though I’m trending towards the more functionalistic side of the spectrum, but I assure you that my point of view is rather moderate and incorporates both extremes.  In order to achieve the three adverbs in the above purpose statement, a student must be somewhat academic, philosophical even.

The role of the educator then becomes to facilitate this transition, development, leading out, of the student into a functioning member of society.  Personally, I feel that my role within the lives of students is to make them think about what they’re learning, and to make them ask questions about why they’re having particular reactions to material.  I want students to expose their own biases, recognize questions of axiology.  I want them to understand that there are different ways of knowing, different ways of asking questions: Is this an ontological or and epistemological question?

As a practitioner, I hope that I can find ways to implement this theoretical approach into my classroom.  As a scientist, I’m interested in measuring the success of said implementation.  I want to ensure that my students are able to glean everything from the education that I provide to them which I was able to glean throughout my education, and then some.  I want to train them to think scientifically and to use those tools of inquiry to analyze the paradigm that encompasses their being, including their own biases and experiences.

As education has evolved from the transfer of salable skills to the facilitated development of thinkers, we must recognize that, as teachers, we will have to teach (i.e. educate) the future carpenter, theoretical physicist, and artist.  Our lessons need to provide both immediate and lasting utility.  This is the purpose of education.