Lots of planks and platforms in current politics offer plans and policies, but none of them seem to have any new suggestions for education. But think of this — something not only new, but revolutionary:
The recent USA Presidential election and the impending dominance of Democrats has stirred up talk about socialism perhaps growing in America, as it has in many countries. Oddly, when we think about American socialism the most entrenched form of it is seldom mentioned: public education.
In a bit of a flight of futurism, I have a prediction that the mobile devices that will soon deliver the internet individually to kids worldwide will crumble public education by mid century. Although I believe it has been mostly subjective, the education establishment has pushed back against the internet and mobiles with a deep instinct to protect the socialization of education. What if that instinct is contrary to what works for learning? I think it is.
From the dawn of human time, children learned individually, apprenticing with family work and then tribal chores. Not until knowledge got imbedded in media (scrolls and then books) and those media got scarce, did the notion of gathering the kids where the books were take over education. Early on the gathering was mostly at religious venues. For the past century or so government supported institutions have been where kids have been sent by law to learn; this practice is socialism.
Mobile delivery of the internet puts the media in the individual’s control and makes knowledge no longer scarce. The justification for socialized education is gone. Why shouldn’t kids apprentice at home and then in workplaces — while sourcing their basic knowledge from the mobile in their pockets. Why shouldn’t teachers become private professionals, to whom students come as paying clients? Underwriting such tutorial expenses for individual kids would be a lot less “socialized” than the present system.
We may still need to socialize lunch programs and day care, but learning can once again be individualized. With a mobile in a pocket, no child will be left behind.
