NSW Premier Morris Iemma today sang the national anthem on live TV to act as a role model to other students who might soon be forced to sing their patriotic hearts out every morning (“Compulsory anthem to advance racial harmony”). The idea is to curb future racial outbreaks. And new subjects that will soon be introduced to teach “Australian values” as a result of a “fundamental lack of respect for authority”.
There’s certainly a problem with nationalism in the classroom. The indoctrination of children is still believed to have been a landmark (Hitler Youth) policy which furthered the fate of Nazi Germany. Hitler once proclaimed that, “You, my youth, are our nation’s most precious guarantee for a great future. Never forget that one day you will rule the world”. Mussolini, likewise, recruited an army of children, based on the Jesuit maxim, “Give me the child for his first seven years and I’ll give you the man”. Although acquiring values in education is inevitable (yet subconcious), you don’t make a concious decision that confuses schools with a value system.
I always find it such a paradox that Australia boasts itself as multicultural, but rams home a message of truly Australian values over and over again. You can’t have the best of both worlds – such extreme form of nationalism doesn’t mix with multiculturalism.
‘Values in the classroom’ is rightfully the subject that courts most controversy and media attention. Take the debate extraordinaire over Intelligent Design. Further examples include the Islamic madras (or alleged terror schools), the banning of the Hijab, or maybe even the debate over postmodernism conquering the English syllabus. Also have a look at the “Values Education Study”.
Looking at the overall picture - there seems to be an underlying assumption that education is always either the origin or solution to a problem. When it comes to terrorism, the Islamic madras (religious school) is blamed for propagating the ‘axis of evil’. When it comes to the AIDS crisis, education seems to be all-time solution. Is education really ‘all that’?
