2. I Quit, I Think: The Underground History of American Education by
John Taylor Gatto from archive.org
I
Quit, I Think
In the first year of the last decade of
the twentieth century during my
thirtieth year as a school teacher in Community
School District 3, Manhattan, after teaching in all five secondary schools in the district, crossing
swords with one professional
administration after another as they strove to
rid themselves of me, after having my license suspended twice for insubordination and terminated
covertly once while I was on medical
leave of absence, after the
City University of New York borrowed me for a five-year stint as a lecturer in the Education Department (and the faculty rating handbook published by the Student Council gave me the highest ratings in the department my last three years), after planning and bringing about the most successful permanent school fund-raiser in New York City history, after placing a single eighth-grade class into 30,000 hours of volunteer community service, after organizing and financing a student-run food cooperative, after securing over a thousand apprenticeships, directing the collection of tens of thousands of books for the construction of private student libraries, after producing four talking job dictionaries for the blind, writing two original student musicals, and launching an armada of other initiatives to reintegrate students within a larger human reality, I quit.
City University of New York borrowed me for a five-year stint as a lecturer in the Education Department (and the faculty rating handbook published by the Student Council gave me the highest ratings in the department my last three years), after planning and bringing about the most successful permanent school fund-raiser in New York City history, after placing a single eighth-grade class into 30,000 hours of volunteer community service, after organizing and financing a student-run food cooperative, after securing over a thousand apprenticeships, directing the collection of tens of thousands of books for the construction of private student libraries, after producing four talking job dictionaries for the blind, writing two original student musicals, and launching an armada of other initiatives to reintegrate students within a larger human reality, I quit.
I
was New York State Teacher of the Year when it happened. An accumulation of
disgust and frustration which grew too
heavy to be borne finally did me in. To test my resolve I sent a short essay to The Wall Street Journal
titled "I Quit, I Think." In it I explained my reasons for deciding to wrap it up, even
though I had no savings and not the slightest idea what else I might do in my mid-fifties to pay
the rent. In its entirety it read like this:
Government schooling is the most radical
adventure in history. It kills the
family by monopolizing the best times of childhood and by teaching disrespect for home and parents.
The whole blueprint of school procedure
is Egyptian, not Greek or Roman. It grows
from the theological idea that human value is a scarce thing, represented symbolically by the narrow peak
of a pyramid. That idea passed into
American history through the Puritans. It
found its "scientific" presentation in the bell curve, along
which talent supposedly apportions
itself by some Iron Law of Biology. It's
a religious notion, School is its church. I offer rituals to keep heresy at bay. I provide documentation to
justify the heavenly pyramid. Socrates foresaw if teaching became a formal
profession, something like this would
happen. Professional interest is served
by making what is easy to do seem hard; by subordinating the laity to the priesthood. School is too vital
a jobs-project, contract giver and
protector of the social order to allow itself to be "re- formed." It has political allies to
guard its marches, that's why reforms
come and go without changing much. Even reformers can't imagine school much different. David learns to read at age four; Rachel, at
age nine: In normal development, when
both are 13, you can't tell which one learned
first — the five-year spread means nothing at all. But in school I label Rachel "learning disabled"
and slow David down a bit, too. For a
paycheck, I adjust David to depend on me to tell him when to go and stop. He won't outgrow that
dependency. I identify Rachel as
discount merchandise, "special education" fodder. She'll be locked in her place forever. In 30 years of teaching kids rich and poor I
almost never met a learning disabled
child; hardly ever met a gifted and talented one either. Like all school categories, these are
sacred myths, created by human
imagination. They derive from questionable values we never examine because they preserve the
temple of schooling. That's the secret
behind short-answer tests, bells, uniform time
blocks, age grading, standardization, and all the rest of the
school religion punishing our nation.
There isn't a right way to become
educated; there are as many ways as fingerprints. We don't need state-certified teachers to make education
happen — that probably guarantees it
won't. How much more evidence is
necessary? Good schools don't need more
money or a longer year; they need real free-market choices, variety that speaks to every need and runs
risks. We don't need a national
curriculum or national testing either. Both initiatives arise from ignorance of how people learn or
deliberate indifference to it. I
can't teach this way any longer. If you hear of
a job where I don't have to hurt kids to make a living, let me know. Come fall I'll be looking for
work.
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