Today in class we discussed about businesses breaching into the school environment. Many school budgets across the nation have been shrinking, and when you add increased student loads, you have the problem of not being able to accommodate for teaching materials. Here is where businesses step in, willing to provide materials for classroom use, but of course, with ulterior motives.
In some schools, children are taught by Clearasil that Clearasil is the way to clear up bad skin, by Exxon's Energy Cube that fossil fuel does not pose a threat to the environment and that alternative energy is costly and hard to get, and by Pacific Lumber that forest-clearing is fine because the "Great American Forest...is renewable forever." Now as some of you might know, this is completely bogus.
I was pretty shocked when I learned about this because I never had to go through such things when I was in K-12, or at least they weren't that blatantly obvious. If I were a parent, I would want my child to go to school for the sole purpose of learning, and not for more exposure to advertisements. Some schools are forced by a certain Whittle Communications to show its Channel One, which broadcasted news with slick graphics for 10 minutes and, surprise surprise, various commercials for 2 minutes. And then the 12-minute cycle would repeat itself. If the teacher refused to show it, he/she could be fired. Absolutely ridiculous. If I wanted more grooming of consumerism, I would have just home-tv-ed my child.
In a class of about 60 people, only 5 people didn't want any business being involved with the school curriculum. The rest were fine with it because they didn't see any harm in it. I guess I shouldn't be surprised since most of them are business majors (no offense to any business majors in here). To some, it was okay because these businesses would provide for better facilities and supplies, so it was like choosing the lesser of two evils. One evil that shouldn't have been there in the first place.
So what do you guys (and girls) think? Are you fine with your kids growing up and possibly studying in such environments?