Monday, May 21, 2012

In defense of public education

Although this is a blog in English, I´m going to embed two videos in Spanish about the importance of public education. We all learn or work in a public school and I think we should think about what this means. In my opinion, this is not a political matter, but a matter of rights. The public school guarantees equal access to knowledge and it´s sad that at this point we still have to fight to defend this right. But, as Napoleon said, "the only victories which leave no regret are those which are gained over ignorance". In other words, this is a battle worth fighting for. 

4 comments:

Alejandro Torrillas said...

Hi Paqui!
I think these videos are very beautiful and they express very clearly what public education is. I agree with those protests and those strikes of our parents and teachers but I disagree about the students strikes, ones because they didn't know about the aim of the strike and the only want to lose lessons, others because they only want to create confusion and to go against the system and others because they respect and know the aim of the strike (I like those ones) but I think that the way we have to change this injustice is not going on strike. We don't have any power now, but in the future some of us will rule, all of us will stand the country and work a lot to lead the country to the best way. Our weapon against this injustice is our work now and its appliance in the future, to know about what's wrong and to change it, to don't commit again the mistakes of the past and to fight against corruption, injustice, shameless people who became reach due to the suffering of other people, this would be our aim and this is our weapon against what all of you are protesting now.
Thanks to saw us this videos they're very interesting.
Bye Paqui, see you tomorrow.

Paqui Pérez Fons said...

Hello Alejandro,

I agree with you about the fact that some students take advantage of these situations to play truant and skip lessons. But I don´t think students don´t have any power. People are very powerful if they are not alone, get together with other people and have a common goal. The age doesn´t matter if you´re convinced that your fight is right. I like your ideas of fighting corruption, injustice and shame and I also think that it´s always time to fight against these and other bad things. Conformism has always been mankind´s worst enemy. I would be very happy if at least part of my students understand that behind all the data we study there is a story of battles for progress and against conformism. And I think you´ve understood this, Alejandro, and this makes me feel proud of you.

Have a good night.

MCM said...

Hello, at first thank you Paqui for showing us this videos, which in my oppinion are very interesting, because they show how is everything and how important is public education, I recomend everyone to look at them and I think that you will like them, as I started thank you Paqui.

Paqui Pérez Fons said...

Hello Manuel,

As I told you by e-mail, the public school is made up by all the different people who work, learn and share experiences. This diversity is a reflection of what we have in society. If you want a better society, we have to start building it from below and public schools are an essential instrument to do it. The better public schools we have, the fairer and richer our society will be. As I wrote on the post, I think this is a fair struggle and we, teachers, need the students and parents´ help. Thanks for watching the videos and writing a comment here.