By Mario deSantis, March 14, 1999

I have been writing for sometime on the failures of our government in providing a democratic leadership for the provision of public services and the supporting conditions for economic development. My emphasis has concentrated in health care, but we have problems all over the horizon: business, agriculture, crown corporations, and what is worse education. Education is the foundation for sustaining the long run economic viability of the province, and it appears to be in a more precarious situation than health care. Our Premier Romanow promised that Saskatchewan would be the shining light to the world and that "...the time for mortgaging our children's future is over. The time for building their future is here...."(1). Our politicians have nothing to show but their rhetorical assets, while in fact we get the mastering art of "...lowering expectations..."(2), and "...poor leadership, no decision-making and dishonest, uncaring, uncompassionate government..."(3) Our tin pot dictators have taken position all over the province, and now are undermining the new generation by continuing the degradation of our educational system. Again, one of the most important reasons for such degradation in our universities is "...the current military-style, top-down structure that is proving so inefficient, so destructive to good morale and so wasteful of taxpayer money..."(4)

After acknowledging that Saskatchewan students scored low in a 1998 literacy test, Darryl Hunter, Education Department Official, commented "...We know here in Saskatchewan our students are not getting to some of the higher levels of creative and critical thinking..."(5) Instead to address the literacy problem by thinking critically and constructively(6), the education department is going to fix this problem with a new province wide language arts curriculum. This is what Saskatchewan requires, an additional top-down fragmentation of our curriculums for enhancing the creative and critical thinking of our students; I wonder how our students can express their creative thinking under the current assembly line management of our classrooms, and how they can enhance their critical thinking when our own leaders have no clue of what critical thinking is(7). I am acquiring the understanding that our educational leaders are a good match for their health care counterparts: they are both emperors with no clothes. Our school system doesn't require a new curriculum, we require a change of mind, to go back to the understanding of the epistemological foundations of knowledge and the nature of learning (8) (9) (10), and come up with an educational vision supporting the later success and societal contribution of our children.

Endnotes

1. Saskatchewan New Democrats Home Page, as at March 14, 1999 http://www3.sk.sympatico.ca/saskndp

2. It's about that vision thing Mr. Premier, by Randy Burton, The StarPhoenix, February 4, 1999, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan

3. Letter to The StarPhoenix: Agriculture minister acting like lawyers do, by Evan Asseltine of Glaslyn, SK. The StarPhoenix, January 12, 1999, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan

4. U of S hassles force early exits, by Robert A. Carlson, The StarPhoenix, March 11, 1999, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan

5. Sask. Students score low grade in literacy, By Kevin O'Connor, The StarPhoenix, March 11, 1999, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan

6. Refer to Mario deSantis' articles on System Dynamics published in the North Central Internet News http://www.ftlcomm.com/ensign/desantis35/SysDyn-Feb21-99.htm

7. Refer to the board trustee infighting saga over the proposed $10 million-$16 million new Education Centre in Saskatoon. February and March articles in The StarPhoenix, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan

8. Need of Transformational Changes in Saskatchewan: The biological origin of cognition and implications for Education,by Mario deSantis, September 27,1998 http://www.ftlcomm.com/ensign/desantis11/desantis11.html

9. John Dewey (The Father of Modern Education) http://www.infed.org/thinkers/et-dewey.htm The Center for Dewey Studies http://www.siu.edu/~deweyctr/

10. THE CHILDREN'S MACHINE: Rethinking School in the Age of the Computer, by Seymour Papert, 1993 Basic Books, New York (This page was produced by Elizabeth Murphy) http://www.stemnet.nf.ca/~elmurphy/emurphy/papert.html