Friday, September 16, 2011

Historical Perspectives
Entry #1
September 16, 2011

Innovators and “makers” have made huge impacts on today’s education system.  I chose Horace Mann as my innovator because of his proven leadership skills. “Mann comprehensively surveyed the condition of the state’s schools, established training institutes for teachers, increased the length of the school year to six months, and gathered support for more funding for teacher salaries, books and school construction.”  One of the most important parts of this statement dealt with increasing the length of the school year for children. Increasing the amount of time spent in school meant that children would spend less time in activities that would not improve their school-based education, such as working manual labor that would not fully be a major investment into the future of society. Also, a self-explanatory statement mentioned “He often argued for public education in economic terms, saying that it would increase the wealth of individuals, communities, the state and the country as a whole, while teaching respect for private property.”
Mann continues to influence schools today because schools still have training institutes for teachers, the current school year is only three months extra than his original six, funding for school buildings, teachers, and supplies are still being sought , and the truth of how education can benefit members of the community and the community itself still holds true today.
I chose Frederick Taylor as my “maker” due to business aspects being applied to education.  Men like these, and the brilliant efficiency expert Frederick W. Taylor, who inspired the entire "social efficiency" movement of the early twentieth century, along with providing the new Soviet Union its operating philosophy and doing the same job for Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany;….” This entire statement is important because it reveals that Taylor is a huge influence on socialism, an idea that “educates” its followers to serve certain corporate based institutions such as governments and even schools such as universities. Frederick continues to influence schools today because most schools from different education levels do educate and encourage their students to have careers involving corporate-based institutions.
Going off of initial impressions, I believe that innovators were molding their students to serve the community as a whole, while “makers” were molding their students to serve corporate-based entities such as governments, for-profit corporations, and universities. It also occurred to me that many of the “makers” came from business backgrounds and were self-made moguls who may have not been fully educated, while many of the innovators graduated from secondary and post-secondary schools, making them understand some of the issues needed to be addressed in the different levels of education.

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