Work, Leisure, and the Tasks of Schooling

Abstract

Instead of conceiving school as a passage, as a place and a time in our lives that we attend and then leave, democratic education challenges us to find ways to make schooling an activity that will help citizens take their place in the world of work and participate in the decisions that will shape their lives. Educational practice becomes democratic when it fosters activity rather than passivity. Instead of arguing about how well education prepares our youth for success in the job market, only to complain about the besetting selfishness and lack of public spirit that now mars our culture, we need to reconstruct education in terms of citizenship and social policy. If we want to understand the inclusive activities of a democratic education, we need an educational theory that emphasizes method rather than doctrine. This shift in emphasis will permit us to reassess educational means and outcomes without demanding adherence to some single and absolute standard. An emphasis on method also suggests ways to reinvent the relationship between work and leisure in educational practice. At each level of scholarly pursuit, we ought to provide students with opportunities to reflect on the way in which their learning develops aspects of character. Rather than conceiving individual character as a private preserve, school can help the individual test current ideologies and explore the wider community of cultures in the world. Instead of demanding and exploiting obedience to norms that separate performance from social reality, democratic education for character seeks connection and participation. Education is not a means to some later or finer end: it is the formal principle of a good life, a life fulfilled in public as well as in private pursuits.