ABSTRACT
We should learn from these experiences and should encourage our students to develop their reason so that they can avoid similar fates. We need reason to be taught in schools so that students will develop into mature adults who understand that their passions will come and go throughout their lives. Indulging in one’s passions can indeed be a source of great joy, but also of peril. If students can detach from their passions from time to time, they can bring greater balance and purpose to their lives. Passion is sexy. Reason is not. There are no best-selling books spreading the message that “using your reason changes everything.” But developing students’ reason is a primary responsibility of schools, including those old-fashioned brick-and-mortar buildings practicing what Robinson describes as “industrial/academic education.”15 Schools historically have taught students to develop habits of personal prudence and restraint that require short-term sacrifices for long-term gains. A long and distinguished body of academic research has shown that students who are able to delay gratification experience advantages over their peers. Their academic achievement is higher, they withstand stress better, and they are less likely to fall prey to alcoholism or other forms of substance abuse.16 Students who have learned to defer gratification have become skilled at using their reason to understand that immediate satisfaction of many of their cravings has negative long-term consequences. They have learned that they will be better off if instead of giving in to passions they learn to control their behavior. Such adjustment of behaviors is not innate, but it can be learned in school. Robinson is right that schools have gone too far in the direction of standardization, testing, and prescription. He’s also right that we need a major paradigm shift toward a more humanistic model of education. But to achieve this worthy goal, we’ll have to learn how to balance passion with the uniquely human gift of reason.
