Writing and Social Change

I would state that the article plains states that trends in society heavily influence what we believe education is and what it should do. The trends in my own period ( 1900-1917) showed a curriculum that became more about producing highly functional workers rather than enlightened individuals who could argue what texts meant. Of course, as time went on, that changed. I noticed that the periods would seem to shift from focusing on the individual to focusing on the community itself and the individuals role in that community. One could make the argument that the struggle society seems to be involved in is the role of education as far as it goes to producing individuals of good "quality." John Dewey that education is specifically engineered to produce persons that would be of use to the "democratic community."

Dewey felt that while education should enable individual's to make use of their talents, these talents should mainly be developed for the benefit of the community. (Yes, I'm a Dewey fan.) The cultural continuities that are highlighted by this argument confirm that we feel education plays a vital role in the development of the individual. Although this at first seems too simplistic an observation, we must remember that as society's view of community shifts, usually the role education is meant to play shifts as well.

We have gone from producing highly enlightened individuals to individuals who are highly aware of matters of community today's philosophy that requires individuals have elements of both---as if somehow through personal awareness and education, we can make our communities a better place. It is not a philosophy of one for all to say or all for one so to say, but rather a philosophy of one that sees the needs of the community and acts upon them.