Where is The Vision and the Leadership in Our Schools?
- © Michele Toomey, PhD • June 9, 2000

Hard to find. There are pockets of visionary educators and leaders here and there throughout the country, but they are the exception. for the most part, we have been entangled in a time warp. The elitism of the classical old school tradition is held up as the standard for fine education with a cut and paste mentality for making any modifications.

Never mind that classical education is predicated on lecturing, that the past is the dominant time frame, and intellectual achievement is the primary goal. As we enter the 21st century with its awareness of different learning styles, of the effectiveness of experiential learning, and the obvious need for practical tools for living life in these complex, technologically demanding times, we find our educational system archaic and failing to truly educate our children.

Our students are, for the most part, not turned on to learning. They are, in fact, turned off. This is a devastating phenomenon that permeates the failure of our schools and feeds the alienation of our youth. Absenteeism, high drop out rates, poor performance, drug and alcohol abuse, promiscuity, vandalism, bullying, violence, depression and suicide are all expressions of our failure to engage, much less excite our students.

The educational process should prepare them for a healthy, respectful, caring and successful life. Band aids aren't enough to mend this failing system. It needs a complete overhaul. Private schools as well as public schools should study the educational needs and interests of their students, and frame a curriculum around them. They also should approach education in its fullest sense of the word, meeting the students where they are, and bring them forth. That means meeting them emotionally as well as intellectually. They must care about their students' fears, their hurt, their anger, and their despair, about their hopes and their dreams, their strengths and their weaknesses, about their struggles and their accomplishments.

In effect, a key element in this educational overhaul is the psychological dimension of our children. Classical education not only doesn't attend to psychological needs, it tends to look down on them. Intellectual elitism considers itself superior to and apart from any emotional needs. Science, math and literature outrank psychology every time. A big mistake, but a common one and a legitimized one. Academics are a school's sacred cow. Psychological health is its assumed state. To have to include psychological issues in its curriculum is to lower its standards and to have to address psychological health is an embarrassment.

So where are our educators who hold leadership positions? In their ivory towers, pretending that they are leading the way, without bothering to notice how many students are not only not following, but aren't even looking in their direction.