CAN EDUCATION SCHOOLS BE SAVED?

As a professor in a school of education, I have a big stake in how this question is answered. There is a simple answer. Education schools survive because they bring in so much money and this makes them quite popular with university presidents. Education school classes have large enrollments, they do not require elaborate and expensive equipment and education school faculty are always among the lowest paid in a university.

Education schools are certainly going to survive. The more important question is whether they will be relevant. To answer this question it is necessary to define two distinctly different belief systems in education. The first of the two asserts that the most important purpose of education is the enhancement of academic achievement. Proponents of this view want students to increase their reading comprehension, become more skilled at performing mathematical computations, know history, and understand science. The operational definition of academic achievement is performance on academic achievement tests. The adoption of academic achievement as the primary purpose for our schools is an assertion that schools are best evaluated in terms of how their students perform rather than by what teachers are doing.

Education schools and the national organizations that support them have a different focus. They believe that instructional methods should be evaluated in terms of their fidelity to a progressive philosophy of education. Their focus is on “learning” rather than academic achievement. While the terms “academic achievement” and “learning” may appear to refer to the same activities, the instructional methods designed to enhance “learning” are primarily child-centered and may not only fail to increase academic achievement, but also degrade it. Instead of teachers teaching students, they believe that it is the role of a good teacher to create (2) the proper environment for learning and if this is done properly, students will “learn” by constructing their own meaning. “Learning”, unlike academic achievement, is evaluated in terms of what the teacher is doing. It does not require an examination of what is happening to the students in the classroom.

There are two major competing philosophies in education (1). One asserts that teachers should focus on increasing their students’ academic achievement. The other dismisses the importance of academic achievement and instead defines good teaching as the creation of a classroom atmosphere that avoids explicit instruction in favor of giving responsibility for learning to the students. The two approaches are incompatible and there is really no way to create a compromise between the two. The question left unanswered is who gets to decide between the two. Legislators, governors, and the federal government have declared that academic achievement should be paramount. The faculties of education schools and the national organizations that support them have decided otherwise. We will have to await the outcome of this contest, but it looks like (3) the education schools already are ahead on points.

(GEORGE K. CUNNINGHAM. June 11, 2003. )

Observe os seguintes fragmentos do texto:

1. 1) they believe that it is the role of a good teacher to create (2)
   

2. 2) We will have to await the outcome of this contest, but it looks like (3)
   

Indique a quem se refere o pronome pessoal destacado no:

1. a) Fragmento 1;
   

2. b) Fragmento 2.