Another Brick in the Wall: Pink Floyd, Race to the Top, and the "Standardization" of Public Education
Dr. Erica Vernold Miller will be presenting at the 2014 NYSFEA Annual Meeting at Colgate University on February 28, 2014. A summary of her presentation is as follows:
In 1979 the iconic band, Pink Floyd,
released the album and subsequent movie (1982) The Wall. Hailed by critics as one of the best concept albums ever
released; The Wall used graphic
lyrics and imagery to tell the story of the fictional character, Pink Floyd, a
troubled man struggling to find his way in post-WWII Britain. Traumatized by the
after effects of the war, an ineffective educational system, an authoritarian government,
and the superficiality of pop culture consumerism, Pink builds a metaphorical mental
wall closing himself off from reality (Urick, 2010).
Semi-autobiographical, the
educational system, described in The
Wall, is a dramatization of band member, Roger Water’s, own educational experiences.
Penning the lyrics,
We don’t need no education.
We don’t need no thought control.
No dark sarcasm in the classroom.
Teacher leave them kids alone.
Hey! Teacher! Leave them kids alone!
All and all you’re just another brick
in the wall.
(Gilmour
& Waters, 1979, track 5)
Waters and bandmate, David Gilmour,
expressed their concern that rote standardized learning, likened to thought
control, produced compliant drones who could be easily manipulated by the government
(Urick, 2010).
Although written 35 years ago, the
messages found in The Wall seem to
resonate prophetic today given the current state of the U.S. educational
system, rife with top down unfunded mandates, pushes for standardized curriculum/testing,
and growing educational product consumerism. This paper presentation will use the lyrics
and imagery from The Wall as a lens to
examine how Race to the Top is impacting the delivery of education in our
public schools. Special attention will be given to the role that the
standardization movement has played in the demise of creativity in today’s
classrooms. The presentation will culminate with examples of teachers who
despite the governmental reform agenda, have resisted the adoption of rote
drill and kill practices and instead found creative methods to successfully meet
the individual needs of their students.
References
Gilmour, D. & Waters, R.
(1979). Another brick in the wall part
two. On The wall [CD] . New York,
United States: Columbia
Records.
Urick, B. (2010). Pink Floyd’s The Wall a complete analysis. Retrieved
from http://www.thewallanalysis.com/.