Posted on 12/06/2020 6:00:15 AM PST by karpov
Somewhere Winston Churchill said that all wisdom is not new wisdom. That is certainly true of Edward C. Banfield’s landmark book, The Unheavenly City, published 50 years ago. Many, if not most, of the people discussing urban problems today have not yet caught up to what Banfield said half a century ago.
Education is a classic example. People on both sides of many education issues today would be appalled at Banfield’s plain-spoken truths. While people on one side of education issues speak of “inclusion” and “diversity,” people on the other side say such things as “no child left behind.” Banfield, however, presents the brutal truth that there are some students who have no real interest in education, and whose disruptive behavior in the classroom can deprive many other students of a decent education and a decent future.
While others urge programs to keep adolescents from becoming “dropouts,” The Unheavenly City asserts that there are “compelling reasons for getting non-learners out of school” earlier than the current school-leaving age. This, Banfield urged, would be beneficial—not only to the other students, but to the non-learners themselves, and to society. According to Banfield, “children who cannot or will not learn are injured by too-long confinement in school.” “The boy who knows that he has learned nothing since the eighth grade but that he must nevertheless sit in boredom, frustration, and embarrassment” until he reaches the legal school-leaving age “must be profoundly disaffected by the experience.” Banfield cited an empirical study which suggested that “much juvenile delinquency originates in the adolescent’s anger at the stupidity and hypocrisy of a system that uses him in this way.”
(Excerpt) Read more at claremontreviewofbooks.com ...
Whatever happened to shop classes?
Reminds me of the teens in West Side Story!
We force many youth in America to “stay in school” against their will while at the same time hire illegals with less education and the inability to speak our language. Why not hire those that are citizens who have no desire to remain in school and send the illegals back where they came from? Why? Because the illegals will work for less and accept the worst of working conditions as the price to remain here. The employer is the big winner.
Wood shop Grade 10, Metal shop Grade 11, electrical shop Grade 12, required for all boys.
I got more out of them than anything else in high school, and they certainly didn’t slow me down from getting into college or medical school when it was time.
“Long live Thomas Sowell. “
Amen. He and Walter Williams tower above anyone in our now demonstrably corrupt and hopefully to be destroyed Democrat party.
The issue is "revolution" (i.e., communism).
“Whatever happened to shop classes?”
The educational bureaucracy now insist that everyone must go to college, hopefully at taxpayer expense, even the ones who do not have the ability or desire to get through a much watered-down high school curriculum.
Yep I remember such classes.
In my day, in my school, the boys took industrial arts classes, and the girls took home arts classes. I’m sure such class assignments would be verboten nowadays.
Like I said, three years of shop class in high school certainly didn't slow me down from college or medical school, one has nothing to do with the other.
I don't think any of the girls were harmed by three years of home ec either.
“Whatever happened to shop classes?”
They made girls and minorities feel bad.
They weren’t the college track that K-12 pushes hard (the final indoctrination centers).
Graduates from them showed college was’t required for many living wage jobs.
I read this book. My solution, which I sent in a letter to the editor of the paper which panned it, was to suggest everyone get a 12 year chit to go to public school. After grade school say grade 6 they could leave but come back anytime of their choosing, as long as they passed and did not disrupt the class. Each teacher could decide what disruption was.
My solution for minimum wages was to exempt those below 18 who could also be paid in cash without taxes on their pay.
Grass cutting would stop being a Hispanic monopoly.
Basic, standard, college prep, and honors. At grades 7-9 the boundaries were fluid, one could move upwards depending on performance and motivation. At grade 8 students were allowed one or two elective courses, which included choice of required shop classes for all boys regardless of track. We had only metal and wood shop.
Those with desire to pursue more shop skills could go on to one of the two vocational HS which print shop, machine shop, auto shop, and electrical as well as continued metal and wood shop. As I recall these graduates had a very high employment rate, indeed many were sought as apprentices for summer work in senior year.
All high school shop classes had industrial grade machine tools
In the lead up to WWII, one technical high school even had an aviation shop, complete with Link trainer, cut away radial engines. This tech school differed from the vocational schools in that it provided grounding for future engineers with a full academic curriculum as well.
All worked well until the Kennedy Johnson years and the advent of teachers unions with future blue collar workers being totally screwed by the system, becoming the unloved step child of the education system.
And by the way, the entire DC Board of Ed administrators were housed in a single small office building...imagine that. ;>)
Sounds like a wise guy - in the true sense of the word.
My point is most schools don’t offer shop classes.
Your focus on the “law” in such matters in amusing.
I have a true story for you.
A good friend of mine worked for the IRS for many years. He a very sharp accounting type and his boss let him pick clients to audit because of his amazing collection rate.
Then my friend decided to really “go for it”.
He showed up at town and city halls and pulled out all the building permits for the previous year. On the building permits were the trades for the work done, the name and address of the contractor, and the estimated amounts for the cost.
He then sorted the data by contractor and compared the dollars to the contractor’s tax return for that year.
What he found, of course, is that the majority of most contractor’s work was not reported to the IRS. He then started auditing a bunch of them—and he was nailing them to the wall.
It was a total slaughter.
It took a few months, but finally the contractors contacted their local trade association who in turn contacted their lobbyists in DC.
A few months later my friend was called into his bosses office.
He was told to stop auditing all contractors immediately.
He was also demoted and removed to a function where he couldn’t cause any trouble.
Eventually he quit in disgust.
We live in a kleptocracy—the laws only apply to those who don’t have the clout to ignore them.
.
I think all large government entities tend to kleptocracy. I’ve been reading about the early philosophers, the Stoics, and their battles back then were against the Greek and Roman systems that acted in the same way politicians and bureaucrats do today. Give free stuff to the masses and steal as much as you can for your friends and yourselves.
"They bid me take my place among them In the halls of Valhalla Where the brave may live forever."
The time has come for good men to do their duty, as have their progenitors before them.
Amazing story.
Can you say about how long ago that was?
That was about twenty years ago, give or take.
Needless to say, any IRS auditor could try the same tactic today—probably with all the same events happening.
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