ABSTRACT
Recent years have shown the growth of federal legislation and programs having a profound impact on educational policy and practice, and a decline in reliance on broadly based educational justifications. Paralleling this development has been the emergence of well-endowed and influential private foundations, and an increase in corporate influence in shaping policy. In this volume the authors consider the discourse, rhetoric, and underlying values that sustain these developments alongside those that underlie more longstanding and competing educational theories and practices.
This volume highlights the importance of recognizing opposing conceptualizations of education—some more educationally productive than others— and their core values, approaches to student learning, strengths and weaknesses, and justification. The authors analyze and critique what Jane Roland Martin has referred to as ‘the deep structure of educational thought’, and seek improved educational policy and practice with particular reference to curriculum and pedagogy. It features a comparative analysis of competing discourses including autocratic control, limited personal development, and praxis.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
chapter |6 pages
Introduction
part |42 pages
Autocratic Control and Subjugation
chapter |17 pages
Evolving Aspirations from Local Community to Global Village
chapter |23 pages
Centralization and Control in Chester Finn and the Fordham Institute
part |56 pages
Knowledge and Understanding
chapter |24 pages
General Education as Education for Knowledge and Understanding
chapter |30 pages
Literacy as a Pathway to Knowledge and Understanding
part |63 pages
Praxis: Autonomy, Democracy, and Transformation
part |10 pages
The Vocation to Become More Fully Human