People start losing interest in Oklahoma...

Sir Ken Robinson advocates a revolutionary idea in education. He argues against the old ways of education that focused on two foundational pillars: economic and intellectual. Education took a turn towards focusing learning to these concepts and thus initiated a “standardized” curriculum. Kids are now brought up in an education that pursues complete uniformity in knowledge. Robinson argues that we should be moving in the opposite direction, towards a divergent thinking mentality; in which we begin to focus on creativity and seeing multiple answers to a situation.

 Robinson’s video shows a strong connection to Brave New World. The government in the novel thrives upon productivity, “Ninety-six identical eggs working ninety-six identical machines!” And they achieve this by “standardizing” individuals to their future specific roles in society. In the video, the analogy is made that schools “manufacture” kids in an “assembly line” manner. Public schools are seen to be sharing the same “ford mentality” that exists in Brave New World.

 In the Enlightment and Industrial Revolution the idea of public education was first introduced. According to the video this idea angered many people of the time. They believed that it was pointless and a waste of time to educate lower-end individuals. In Brave New World, the government also sees it as unnecessary—a waste of energy—to educate everyone, and thus they separate the society into different castes and levels of knowledge.

Also the video talks about an ADHD “epidemic,” which is less an epidemic than it is a trend. Children are being numbed to “distractions” in order to achieve focus in class. In Brave New World, the drug soma has a close relationship to the ADHD anesthetic. When the government feels that its people are being unproductive or distracted they have conditioned them to drug themselves.  This worry-free state leaves actions unaccountable, and furthermore, not attemptable.