What’s my problem with Junior Achievement?
Junior Achievement was in my fourth-grader’s classroom recently.
I don’t know why Junior Achievement makes me feel like I have to take a shower. It shouldn’t. It’s a nonprofit. Volunteers come into the classrooms — more than 4,000 classrooms this year, according to their website. They provide positive adult role models. They want kids to be successful. They want to prepare kids for careers in business. They’re international. They — wait a minute, what was that last one?
Junior Achievement wants to prepare kids for successful careers in business.
The day-long (?) program in my daughter’s classroom was titled Our Nation (R). The program was supposed to teach how businesses operate in the United States. Concepts taught, according to their program scope and sequence (this is a PDF file) include advertising, careers, corporations, markets, price, products, and profit.
Is this what conservative Christians feel like when a teacher reads Heather Has Two Mommies in class?
One of the projects they did was to assemble pens, to learn about production methods, I suppose. So, a junior achiever who really enjoyed the pen-assembling project may strive to one day contribute to the economy of Our Nation by being a Production Manger at a pen-making company, like BIC. Hey, it looks like that position is open now – oh wait, it’s in China. Never mind.
My daughter brought home a pre-printed postcard telling parents what had happened in school that day: “Guess what? A volunteer from Junior Achievement came to my class!” It enthusiastically described what they had accomplished. The last line read:
“I can hardly wait until we make products!”
I can tell you, right now, if that sentence ever came out of my daughter’s mouth? I’d have her packed up and shipped off to The Farm faster than you can say “return on investment.”
I’ve spent a lot of time teaching her how to fight the assaults she will inevitably face in this corporate-driven, socially accepted consumer madhouse of a society. I just didn’t think I’d have to fight it in her public school.
March 19th, 2007 at 1:29 pm
It will get worse. That is only one of many reasons that I am strongly considering home schooling. I want to be the person to brainwash my kids.
March 19th, 2007 at 3:12 pm
Yes, it will get worse. As I’ve said before, just wait for the ad nauseum fundraisers. Unless your kids go to a school with a sane fundraising policy, expect to send about 60 percent of whatever you spend on fundraisers out of town. What you’ll get in return is a small amount of overpriced product - you know, that stuff that your fourth-grader just learned to make.
March 19th, 2007 at 7:14 pm
Over the past 35 years My Brother the Second Grade Teacher has taught a thousand children how to read. What more noble a career?
About 20 years ago I asked him, “Yes, but what have you taught them to read?”
I apologized, eventually, for being a shithead, but by then it was too late: He decided I was right.
You might enjoy a recent essay by Jacob Hornberger comparing indoctrination between the Cuban and American systems. His thesis follows:
“There are two major values of public schooling, from the perspective of government officials. One, this institution provides the means by which government officials can slowly but surely, over a period of 12 years, mold the mindsets of children into one of conformity and obedience to authority. Second, public schooling enables government officials to fill children’s minds with officially approved political, historical, and economic doctrine.”
I’m allergic to home schooling on religious grounds. But I think I know why you felt like you needed a shower.
March 21st, 2007 at 6:47 am
Stay tuned on the Junior Achievement, there’s more to come. Yikes.