john-taylor-gatto-weapons-of-mass-instruction

Hector Isn't the Problem 89
had been dismissed for the Christmas holiday that morning, at which
time he had high-tailed it to his old elementary school (which was
still in session), intending to turn the younger children loose, to free
the slaves like a pint-sized Spartacus. I found this out at the faculty
Christmas party when the principal came over to where I was camped
by the potato salad and cried, "Gatto, what have you done to met
Travel forward now one year in time: Hector is a freshman in high
schooL On his second report card, he has failed every subject and has
been absent enough to be cited for truancy.
Can you see the Hector portrayed by these implacable school recordsr
Poor, small for his age, a member of a minority, not paid much
attention by people who matter, dumb in a superdumb class, a bizarre
gate-crasher, a gunslinger, a total failure in high schooL Can you see
Hectorr Certainly you think you can. How could you notr The system
makes it so easy to classify him and predict his future.
What is society to do with its Hectorsr This is the boy, multiplied
by millions, whom school people agonized about in every decade of
the twentieth century. This is the boy who destroyed the academic
mission of American public schooling, turning it into a warehouse
operation, a clinic for behavioral training and attitude adjustment.
When the Christian Science Monitor made a documentary about my
class and Hector's, the principal said to the hlmmakers,"Sure, the system
stinks, but John has nothing to replace it. And as bad as the system
is, it's better than chaos:'
But is the only alternative to a stifling system really chaosr The
country has been sold the idea Hector is the problem of modern
schooling. That misperception is the demon we face, under its many
guises and behind its shape-shifting rhetoric. Forced schooling itself
was conceived to be the front line in a war against chaos, the beginning
of the effort to keep Hector and his kind in protective custody.
Important people believe, with the fervor of religious zealots, that civilization
can survive only if the irrational, unpredictable impulses of
human nature are continually beaten back and conhned until their
demonic vitality is sapped.