Paul L. Thomas: Unpacking Nonsense: Knowledge as Commodity
Thomas blogs at Radical Eyes for Equity. His recent post looks at the links between knowledge, adulthood, and the challenges of the rightwing attack on public school.
Whether we call what students learn in school “knowledge” or “content” or “curriculum,” we always must be aware that what students are taught is always chosen by someone for some reason; in other words, there is no politically, ethically, or intellectually neutral “knowledge.”
In fact, every classroom is by its nature of humans interacting with different levels of power a political space.
All of this lies beneath the current attack from conservatives and Republicans on Critical Race Theory (CRT) and the 1619 Project (what we teach in U.S. history).
The reasons these attacks on public schooling are relevant to the school choice debate are, as I recently noted, that all alternatives to universal public schooling (private schools, charter schools, homeschooling, and unschooling) benefit from a discredited (and demonized) public education system.
Now one of the natural consequences of the rightwing attack on schooling is waving the “For Sale” sign: