Educational screen & audio-visual guide (c1956-1971])

C;:i::t;:! Llpilai Communist of Soviet accomplishments in techlology. What can the individual Communist con■lude from U. S. failures and Soviet successes in he space field except that his leaders were right ill along— that capitalism is innately ineffective uid democracy is decaying? It does not matter hat this is one small area in the vast field of icience, and that the Soviet Union is far behind n many other areas of science. The point is that his is an example of what Soviet government L-an do when it makes up its mind to do it. Against this backdrop of fanatical dedication to mmediate, radical action, our own processes of Jecision-making and execution appear belabored md untimely. We are changed simply by contrast. We are doing business as usual, but "as usual" is no longer good enough. Clearly, we must acquire the capability to deFine national aims and to pursue those aims with the same enthusiastic dedication that our competitors are enjoying. How? The easiest way would be to strengthen the powers of our own government, to surrender ii measure of our individual freedoms so that o)ir i^overmnent could decide what is best for us v\ith()ut fear of being thrown out of office. This would relieve the individual of much of the responsibility of intelligent choice of leadership, uid assure him of positive, dynamic government. It would not guarantee him that he would like what his government did, or that he could retrieve his right to disagree once he had surrendered that right. The other choice is more difficult. If we refuse to part with those individual liberties and at the same time demand more decisive and dynamic leadership from our government, we must be prepared to fulfill the responsibility that is thus entailed. In other words, the burden of providing more effective government lies with the individual. It means that he cannot be ignorant of na tional and international affairs. It means that he must develop some higher loyalty to national interest that is not purely a reflection of his own economic, religious, or ethnic interests. It also means that his interest in government must not be something that is only evinced every four years. It means that his vote in a national election must be a decision based on real knowledge of the issues involved, and that his vote, once cast, is not carte blanche consent that will not be questioned for the next four years. To be realistic, I must admit to some misgiving that we will ever be able to maintain substantial national concern over the full breadth of national and international affairs. It is simply not the nature of most of us to be philosophically concerned with abstractions. We are concerned about the space race only when we are behind. We are concerned about economic trends only when they have caught up with us. We fear war only when we see the possibility of it. We live with the immediate. However, the more knowledge an individual has the more inclined is he to look behind and beyond the immediate— to seek causes for political and economic defect and to attempt to prevent their recurrence in the course of tomorrow's events. One can therefore conclude that the creation of a more knowledgeable electorate would result in the creation of a more responsible and effective electorate. I believe this to be the peculiar challenge of the Sixties: How can we educate for the survival of democracy? If knowledge were stable this challenge would be easier met; it is not. The generation of knowledge is not geared to a timetable. The sheer bulk of learning which tomorrow's child will have to absorb is in itself staggering, all because of the explosive growth of modern science and technology. Even the arts are not immune to change. In the field of languages, for example, there is an unprecedented demand for people who are not linguistically crippled by knowledge of only their native tongues. It is often said that the world is shrinking under the impact of transportation technology. It is to be hoped that the result of the shrinkage will be more intelligible communication among peoples and not merely the movement of pig iron to Japan and fireworks to North Africa. Thus, the educator of the Sixties has a dual burden. On the one hand he is recjuired to teach more to the child, and on the other he is expected to do it in less time in the name of national urgency. What is the answer to this paradox? I submit that the answer to this problem is the increased application of technology to the teaching process. Because we have progressively more to teach, because we have progressively more children to be taught, and because our survival depends upon a knowledgeable citizenry, it is imperative that professional educators make maximum use of those techniques which technology is offering. As long as ignorance is our fundamental challenge, we cannot afford anything less than objective consideration of any means by which ignorance can be overcome. Eblxational Screen and Audiovisual Guide — August, 1960 427