HISTORICAL CONCEPTS
Cultural Development
Human Endeavor
ETHICAL FOUNDATIONS
PROGRESSIVE IDEAS
Enabling people to reach their fullest potential in body, mind, and action, education is is perhaps the fundamental institution for the individual. Its great charge has been stated as "to teach people how to think", but this is too narrow, as even the most repressive regimes can be said to have embraced that statement. It is better to say that education's end is to allow people to consider thoroughly, rationally, and decide dispassionately regarding any given matter. Educated discourse and people ought to display the quality of authenticity; education ought to be universal.
Young people in particular are likely to adopt the attitudes of their teachers and thus are susceptible to countless corrupting influences. Because children general cannot make qualitative judgments concerning their own education, it is incumbent upon parents to ensure children learn in an environment that develops their capacity for self-evaluation. To abdicate this duty is to abandon the child's prospects for continued growth. An adult must be able to secure the education necessary to continue to progress in life. Thus, the failure to educate properly in youth is in fact proof against a full life.
The US today bemoans its lagging educational status in comparison to other countries, but remains defiantly against reform in education. The enforcement of national educational standards would ensure a modicum of education for all, but the idea meets with strong opposition. Moreover, many schools in the US offer only a subsidized babysitting service as a substitute for education: a complete waste of human potential. Imagine the problems we could tackle if all children had access to a good education; think of the doctors, teachers, thinkers, and leaders we lose for lack thereof.
Ancient learning
Confucian education
Medieval European education
Modern education