The article also seems to indicate that treatment in school trains students for their roles in society as adults. Students subjected to aggressive surveillance learn that the state exists to monitor and subordinate them, while those with inclusive schools learn that the state is there to protect their interests. More arrests are made in schools with exclusionary models, and academic time is de-prioritized. These practices indoctrinate students on how to behave as citizens. Unfortunately, Hirschfield says that they reproduce racial and economic inequalities.
Most of the studies we've read this semester support the idea that education matters significantly in citizen competence. This article brings to our attention how school environment teaches people a way of life regardless of what they are learning in the classroom. Additionally, educational resources often suffer when money is spent on elaborate security measures instead. Students could benefit from further research on the effectiveness of surveillance and from insulation from the political agendas of local officials and administrators.
School Surveillance Targeting the Future of American Democracy?
ReplyDeleteIn class, we discussed the potential impact of school surveillance on students and their view of and relationship to the government. School surveillance programs have the potential to create an adversarial relationship between students and school authorities. The development of such relationships can ultimately have serious long term consequences for the way students will act as citizens and respond to the government as they become adults. Perhaps, the issue of school surveillance is much more important than most people have recognized in recent years.
From Hirschfield’s reading, the blog, and our class discussion, I believe that the long term impacts of school surveillance span beyond the idea of simply creating docile citizens who understand the power and control of the government. The adverse impacts of school surveillance can do more than simply frame students’ relationship to the government in terms of positives and negatives. School surveillance in public education has the potential to detrimentally affect the development of free thinking and creative individuals. I would like to suggest that perhaps school surveillance does not simply target student drug dealers and weapon bearers, but free thinking and creative individuals who attempt to break free of the monotony and uniformity of public education. Is school surveillance silencing the future leaders of America? Do the measures to protect our nation’s children stifle creative, “out of the box” thinking?
The following YouTube video suggests that the public education system has waged war against American students. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nM-aqAZTqHI). The narrator also argues that it has become increasingly difficult to distinguish public schools from prisons with the rise of surveillance systems, police, and strictly enforced schedules. Furthermore, it references a documentary called “The War on Kids,” which further addresses the rise of prescription drugs (like Ritalin) in secondary aged students, the rise of the “police state” in schools, and the controversial impacts of “zero tolerance” policies on weapons and drugs. Clearly, the YouTube video has an agenda; however, it highlights some important concerns about the future stability and productivity of American democracy. The repression of free thought and action in public schools—to a certain degree—probably influences the levels of student democratic participation as children come of age.