Littleton tragedy and Botstein's "Jefferson's Children"

Ilias Chrissochoidis (ichriss@leland.Stanford.EDU)
Sun, 25 Apr 1999 22:59:45 -0700 (PDT)

The juvenile version of "total solution" applied to Columbine High School
last week makes even more relevant Leon Botstein's call to replace the
American High School (Chapter 3, pp. 79-130). He proposes a uniform
secondary education which along with elementary school should take 11
years to complete. At 16, a high-school graduate could choose between
4-year colleges, community colleges, community or military service or
vocational schools. The strongest reason is of course the fact that the
onset of adolescence has dropped three years since a century ago, when the
current system was instituted.

Most relevant to the interests of these e-mail lists is the idea of close
interaction between high school and college teachers sharing the same
subject. The most provocative, though, proposal is to revert the current
teaching compensation hierarchy (grosso modo, the lower the age group of
students the higher the teacher's reward). Fair, isn't it, given that the
risk factor in teaching American adolescents these days may be higher than
fighting adults in hostile Kosovo. Being stabbed or shot by your own
students certainly describes a state of barbarism for which we all,
eventually, bear responsibility. The teaching responsibilities of a
scholar far surpass his or her official paedagogical duties. For one
continues, I think, to teach even in the way one handles the sources and
in the way one exercizes authority over students, colleagues, and the
general public.

Thanks for your patience

Ilias Chrissochoidis
Stanford University
ichriss@leland.stanford.edu