Education and Reason

The speech by Pope Benedict XVI to the German parliament (September 22, 2011) offers some considerable food for thought for educators. This speech can be read as an essay designed to challenge the relativist consensus which has assumed such importance in the public square today. Pope Benedict proposes the retrieval of the cultural heritage of Europe as a necessary resource for the healing of the societal fractures of the west. Here is a brief extract from his speech:

"The culture of Europe arose from the encounter between Jerusalem, Athens and Rome-from the encounter between Israel’s monotheism, the philosophical reason of the Greeks and Roman law. This three-way encounter has shaped the inner identity of Europe. In the awareness of man’s responsibility before God and in the acknowledgment of the inviolable dignity of every single human person, it has established criteria of law: it is these criteria that we are called to defend at this moment in our history."

This important speech is not ‘a call to arms’ but a call to study of and reflection on the roots of education. The contemporary educator can – and indeed must – draw on this cultural heritage in order to re- anchor educational thought in the very body of knowledge which gave rise to the institutions which we treasure today. To ignore the historical record  – a key tactic of those who wish to remove religion from the public square and especially from education -  is to ignore what is essential and integral to the human person.

Free schools in England

The opening of what are called ‘free schools’ in England this autumn is not without controversy. While these new schools are not private schools, they receive public money while remaining outwith the control of local education authorities.

Supporters of free schools claim that these schools are a response to demands from parents who are unhappy with the existing state provision. Furthermore, they claim that they will promote a more ‘traditional’ curriculum unhindered by the influence of the state. Opponents of the free schools movement claim that these schools will only cater for the children of affluent parents and create further division in education and society more generally.

This argument will continue as both sides are operating from a firm ideological basis. The key point seems to be the definition of good education. While much contemporary thinking on education seems to be focussed on achieving competencies across a range of suitably designed targets and utilitarian outcomes, there is another way that Blessed John Henry Newman encouraged: an education underpinned by solid intellectual and moral formation. Newman claimed that this  would be more useful than an education designed specifically to be useful! Perhaps the advent of the free schools movement will offer a space for some educators to offer a radical alternative to the status quo.

It will be interesting to track the development of, and the political reaction to, the 'free schools' in the coming months and years.