BACKGROUND - I had 3 years of conventional college toward a teaching degree. In one class it was stated that there are two teaching styles: planned and spontaneous. Spontaneous is the style I preferred, but, when I started my first student teaching class, the planned style was the only one offered. So I withdrew from my remaining classes and decided that, if I wanted to teach, I could do it in a free school of some kind. Now I'm attempting to start a free school, whose objective is to teach how to achieve Liberty.
- In the 1980s I read some of John Holt's books and magazines and was persuaded that his assessment of conventional education was largely correct, that the purposes of compulsory education are to provide cheap babysitting, to keep kids from competing with adults for jobs and to program kids for slots in conventional society, in which kids of the rich get the best jobs and kids of the poor get the worst jobs, in a manner that appears superficially to be fair to all. His book, Instead of Education, was probably the best one for explaining this.
SCHOOL PRISONS - Compulsory education is unjust imprisonment. I was painfully aware of my imprisonment and the unfairness of it when I was a student, but the abusive nature of it wasn't clear to me till I read Holt. Kids need to learn self-direction and self-sufficiency in order to mature socially and to pursue happiness, as is their right. Imprisonment in schools greatly delays or prevents this. Kids need to choose their own education and to have advisors available to them to help them choose it more productively. Parents need to understand that every course of study kids normally are exposed to in compulsory education can be taught without outside teachers. The internet makes conventional teachers largely irrelevant, as it makes much more information available. Although grade school and high school are called compulsory, the law generally has loopholes for any parents who do not want to send their kids to school prisons.
LEARNING - Teaching is one of the best ways to learn, so I want Liberty College to provide plenty of opportunity for students to teach or demonstrate whatever they want to. The first thing I want to try with Liberty College is weekly "fun times", where students and the public are invited to speak or perform for 3 minutes each. If it lasts 60 or 90 minutes, 20 to 30 people could have turns. There may also be longer time segments available afterward for more in-depth classes. I want to get everything videoed and posted to Youtube etc and all the speeches on computer files to be posted on a website in order to get a wider audience and to inspire similar projects everywhere, as well as to help organize knowledge & make it accessible.
ADVANTAGES - I want Liberty College to be a resource for anyone of any age. Kids and adults of any age could enroll in any classes. The college could serve as an alternative to compulsory schooling. I hope some of the advantages of Liberty College will be that:
1. Students are not subjected to negative peer pressure or the stress of competing for grades or of feeling imprisoned;
2. Students learn as fast as they want or at their own pace;
3. Grades reflect specific knowledge and skills, not temporary memorization, and tests are given individually and only when the student is ready;
4. Classes are cheap and can be paid with donations, loans, or barter;
5. The college will help students get apprenticeship jobs or start businesses while learning.
JOBS/COURSES - The kinds of jobs they could get at the college are: teaching, politics, ministry, business, accounting, management, marketing, self-defense, security, consulting, arts, writing, editing, computer tech, alternative health professions, parent/guardian training, horticulture, mechanics, construction, alternative science etc. My idea is for the college to make arrangements with appropriate local people to apprentice students for 3 to 6 months or more or to make students partners in various kinds of business etc. As apprentices students would work for little or no pay, but mainly just for the experience.
- Subjects under ministry would include: mythology; history of religion; world history; psychology & consciousness; morality & the Ten Commandments; health; knowledge; relationships; parenting; starting a church etc.
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Topic: A Private Pro-Liberty School in New Hampshire? (Read 54416 times)