In response to this review. (Also, so strange for somebody to go from this to that review. I mean, he acknowledges in the review that his mind has changed on the book, but the initial response is just SO effusive that it seems like there is something more going on.)
Dr. Robinson,
I appreciated your lengthy treatment of Freddie’s book, but disagree with you about what is possible within constrained resources. Even given your conclusion that everybody could achieve at a high level if they are given what they need for their learning, no conceivable education system could give every child exactly what they need. Any teacher will be able to tell you that every student’s learning profile is unique, not only their interests, but all across different academic abilities. Even the most ambitious conceivable system for equitable education provides shared environments and experiences that are going to be more advantageous to some than to others. Even in your example of the cactus and the orchid, it may be possible to improve both of them somewhat, but if you really want the cactus to take off, you’ll need to reduce the watering, which will then create an opposite inequality. The maximum number of students that a high school teacher would likely be able to completely individualize a curriculum for would probably be about 25 (even this would be a stretch). The system would need to expand its workforce at least sixfold (high school teachers today usually have a student load of around 150). In Florida today, this would mean that 5% of the population would need to be employed as teachers.
The conclusion that we can achieve this kind of equality of outcomes is not only unrealistic, but it’s disrespectful of the dignity of individual differences. Not every Slow Sally will go into philosophy. Maybe her challenge in Chemistry isn’t that she needs the philosophical questions answered, but that she dislikes the experience of the effort it takes to focus on several concepts at once and relate them in her mind. I’m sure you have met or known people like this – who just dislike the mental discipline of thinking carefully about complex matters. This, in my opinion, points to the root problem the cult of smart has created for our society: that we attach a moral valence to this temperament.
I’m sure with the right training and effort I could be a triathlete, but I find that kind of physical exertion to be unpleasant to the extreme and would be resentful of any system that demanded or shamed me for not achieving that level of athleticism.
This note has become slightly longer than I intended it to be. I do want to reiterate my gratitude and appreciation for your work, as it has required me to think through Freddie’s argument again and test it against your critiques. However, I’m not convinced that it doesn’t stand on its own against them.
In solidarity,