Education and Capitalism: Struggles for Learning and Liberation

Edited by Jeff Bale and Sarah Knopp | Published by Haymarket Books www.facebook.com/educationandcapitalism

The main argument in the book

(1) Teacher and student activism to reform schools on the inside radical pedagogy, culturally relevant and democratic curriculum, etc. is crucial, but not enough. (2) In order to create an education that truly liberates, teachers and students have to connect school-based struggles to social movements outside the classroom, too.

The book uses Marxist politics and ideas to develop this argument across 7 essays
(1) Schools under capitalism are not set up to meet intellectual or even vocational goals, but instead to socialize students to fit into their place in society (2) African American parents and youth have waged a centurieslong fight to win access to education only through such struggle has school improved for students of color (3) The crisis in bilingual education is not a question of research or best practices, but a political question of the strength of anti-racist, pro-immigrant rights movements (4) Obama has not only not undone Bushs education policies, but instead has doubled-down on neoliberal education policies to attack one of the largest sectors of unionized workers and privatize one of the last public spaces in this country (5) Teachers unionswarts and allare central to building a fighting movement; social justice educators need the union as much as the union needs them (6) & (7) Mass social and revolutionary movements have had the most dramatic and longest lasting impact on pedagogy and literacy skills that serve democratic human development

The focus of my comments today

(1) What is the nature of public schools under capitalism (2) If public education is like that, then why should we defend it? (3) Why should the Occupy movement in Michigan connect with the fight for public education, and how?