Insider Rowing

Against School really blew me away the first time I read it in the September 2003 issue of Harpers. I can’t remember if my pal Mark lent it to me, or if I picked it up in my friend’s bathroom, but I’ll never forget how it completely shifted my perspective on schooling, and in particular, my own secondary school education. It’s just that intense.

To quickly summarize, John Taylor Gatto, who taught in New York City public schools for 30 years, argues that the current American system of schooling is designed to create a dumbed down, conformist class of workers.

The best quote, the one that really hit me like a sledgehammer, is this: “We want one class of persons to have a liberal education, and we want another class of persons, a very much larger class, of necessity, in every society, to forgo the privileges of a liberal education and fit themselves to perform specific difficult manual tasks.”

That was spoken by Woodrow Wilson in 1909, at the time president of Princeton University.

Gatto ends his article on a hopeful note, suggesting home schooling as an alternative means of education, and also suggesting that all of us have the capacity to be geniuses, if given the right opportunities. Wow.

I had a really strong emotional reaction to this article for several reasons. Firstly, I’ve always privately maintained that my high school education was deeply flawed, and did more to stunt my growth that encourage it. I could probably blog 2000 words on that subject alone, but suffice it to say I was rarely engaged in what I was learning, nor did I become much of a critical thinker during that time period. Even in college, I spent more time playing sports and socializing than in actually acquiring knowledge. Why? This might sound like a crock, but learning via conventional methods (ie memorizing books and taking notes) was just too tedious. And the thing is, I love learning, and deeply hunger for knowledge. I read voraciously, and if I find a subject that interests me, I’ll devour everything I can get my hands on about it. Not only that, but I’ll write and debate about something to death. It’s part and parcel of who I am. It wasn’t until I got to graduate school and started taking small classes in a workshop style, with a high degree of interaction with my peers, did I really come into my own academically.

So what does this mean for coaches and rowers? Well, if you’re a coach, you’re also basically an educator, and it’s your job to think critically about the education that your charges are receiving. Gatto’s article is worth reading simply for the perspective. If you’re a rower in high or college, my best advice is look for creative ways to engage yourself in your education, think critically, and don’t settle for conformity or mediocrity. Without a doubt, you’re a genius at something, and one of your life’s tasks is to identify that quality and use it.

The full article is online at Gatto’s website.