Eating is an agricultural act - Wendell Berry

Monday, May 11, 2009

the corporate approach to education

treats children and education...
based on management, input, measurement, and manipulation.
courtesy - schoolsmatter
this is the core mindset with which corporate philanthropies approach education reform.
bill gates and the gates foundation are at the forefront of this approach.
considering the influence of the man and the sheer amount of money that is being pumped in, it is sad that there is a sore lack of thought and intellect.

in telling critiques of the plans of the gates foundation (as evidenced from a recent Washington Post enclave on education), deborah meier and jim horn bring out the obvious and misplaced thinking towards improving education.
What is intriguing is that neither Gates nor Hiatt stop to wonder if the absence of correlation might indict the tool for measuring the impact of teaching: standardized test scores.
while this is, of course, all happening in the US, india is not immune to such thinking.
already the dell foundation is an active player in the indian education space and clearly with the forecast that india will be the labour force of the world in the coming generation, we shall see more misplaced reform.
in this mess, i think azim premji is likely to be the saving grace.

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