The Education Counter-Revolution

Education, which is currently dominated by the politically correct Left, is a major front in the culture wars. Curiously, the politically correct Left is vulnerable as much because of its success in this field as its failures. Its success means that, because it has almost entirely captured the curricula and colonised the educational workforce, it has become extremely conspicuous, having nowhere to hide or any credible way to dodge criticisms regarding shortfalls in education outcomes. Its failure is that an education system dominated by the politically correct Left did not deliver the improvements it promised from when it vigorously promoted “progressive education” in the 1960s.

If an education system dominated by the politically correct Left had delivered, one could argue that, despite the ideological diversity of the mainstream community, it is better that the politically correct Left dominate education. But despite the hopes and expectations of these protagonists, this state of affairs did not eventuate. Ideological bias in the curricula and shortfalls in teacher quality are public issues not simply because some writers for the Australian recently took an interest. (Thank goodness they did.) These are public issues because every day countless disappointments and injustices are experienced by those involved with the education system that collectively amount to a groundswell of concern and a desire for reform.

The push is coming from below, not from above. The concern is widespread, crossing the political divide. Many parents who are on the Left want a better deal for their children just as much as those parents who are not on the Left. There are also dedicated and capable educators (on the Left and the non-Left) in the education system who see what is wrong and desire change.

Reform is needed. When it comes, it will be widely welcomed. However, it will be implemented incrementally and there will be residual problems, and something has to be done for the students who are in the education system now. My approach is to empower the individual. That is why I have written The Little Black School Book. Initially inspired by my own experiences at school and university, it is mainly derived from my experiences tutoring many students to achieve consistently high grades, often despite the education system rather than because of it. It presents the techniques I developed, which amount to a new educational paradigm.

The study guide as a genre is, for the most part, dry and paternalistic. It is the type of book that people feel obliged to read rather than want to read. However, I looked at this genre optimistically and saw its exciting untapped literary potential. Consequently, The Little Black School Book is several books in one. It is a study guide, yet it is also a self-help book for young people, and others, which helps them navigate an important dimension of their life, their education. It also presents a critique of the current education system. More ambitiously, it presents a Machiavellian treatise on education that goes beyond contemporary debates. It can therefore be read as a book of practical advice or as something more substantial.

The following extract is from Chapter 1, “First Principles”, where I introduce this new educational paradigm. Although it is pitched at senior high school and university students, it deals with pertinent issues to which the rest of us former students can readily relate. Importantly, it is firmly on the side of the students, showing them how to tip the power imbalance in their favour.

There are realities that affect the progress of every student regardless of whether they acknowledge them or not. If they do acknowledge these realities, they can transform any situation into an opportunity. Of course, there are some very encouraging situations produced by dedicated and competent educators, as well as by broad-minded examiners, who provide environments in which a diverse range of students can thrive. However, when this is not the case, students need to take a different approach. Otherwise, encounters with ideological bias and shortfalls in teacher quality can produce heartbreaking consequences for students. It does not have to be that way.

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First Principles

To succeed you have to recognise that your educators are human beings, possessing a combination of psychological strengths and failings. Whether you can capitalise on their strengths and avoid becoming a victim of their failings will largely depend on your recognition and exploitation of the psychological dimension of the teacher–student relationship as well as the cognitive process by which your work is graded. Whomever your examiner is does not matter when objective empirical facts are in question. The assessment of whether 1 + 1 = 2 or the date of the last federal election will not change whomever your examiners are, provided they are competent. These questions could be assessed by a computer. But many short-answer questions and most essays are different. The essays that are encountered as assignments or in exams, which constitute the core of assessment in the Arts or Humanities, as well as being important in many other subjects, are assessed subjectively.

Although many students wish it was otherwise, a grade on an essay represents a subjective opinion rather than an objective fact. It is only the opinion of a particular teacher on a particular day. A grade can often tell you more about what a teacher is like than what an essay is like. Assessments of the same paper by different teachers can vary by 20 per cent or more and still be “legitimate” or justifiable according the “professional” opinion of each teacher.

To appreciate the subjective nature of assessment, it helps to compare it to a film review. Have you ever read several reviews of the same film? You may have noticed that for one critic the film was brilliant but to another it was a waste of money. Some reviewers are renowned for preferring action films to romances while with other reviewers it is the other way around. Some reviewers revel in the artistic sensibilities of European cinema while others celebrate the commercial characteristics of Hollywood productions. It follows that if you are sufficiently familiar with the tastes of the reviewers, you could probably predict their reactions to a particular film before they have seen it. You would probably recognise that a reviewer who prefers romances and European cinema will probably not appreciate the latest Hollywood action film no matter how accomplished it is in its cinematic artistry. When critics review films they bring to the process their beliefs, values, tastes and ideological perspectives. This tendency can be readily understood by the following term: bias. Teachers are no different.

A teacher is unlikely to give an “A” grade to an essay that espouses ideas that they would not vote for in an election. This will be the case no matter how good the essay (although there are examiners who are exceptions, their existence does not compromise the usefulness of this rule). My reference here to electoral politics is intended to highlight the role of political ideology in the examination of essays in the Arts and Humanities especially. You can probably recall being told the following by a teacher: “It does not matter what you say as long as you argue well”. This is rarely the case, and if you follow that advice it is at your peril. The teachers who say this probably do not intend to deliberately mislead you. They may have simply never acquired the ability to distinguish between objective facts and subjective values.

Consequently, it pays if you adhere to the following dictum: Do not follow teachers’ advice according to what they say about their attitude to assessment; rather observe their behaviour and learn what to do from what they actually respond to. People can say almost anything, deceiving others and even themselves, so it is usually their actions that reveal their true underlying feelings. Often they will say one thing, such as proclaim their fairness, but act another way, by rewarding essays that reflect their biases and penalising essays that do not.

Never forget that the audience you are actually writing for is your teacher or examiner. Your essay has to appeal to the person who will grade your work. In many English essays, students are asked to specify in a preamble their target audience. In doing this, many students fall into a trap; for example by stating that their target audience was teenage males, believing that this gave them the liberty to write the slang and sexist comments that appeal to this particular audience, not appreciating that their actual audience was a middle-aged feminist teacher with an acute antagonism towards this form of material.

This was the experience of one of my students. He was a typical red-blooded teenage male who decorated his dormitory room with posters of fast cars and bikini-clad women. His English teacher had given his class an assignment to write a creative essay. She had provided the class with copies of what she thought was a good essay. The class was expected to use it as a model. This essay expressed the desire for an ideal politically correct world. Each paragraph began with the phrase “I like …” and expressed the desire for the abolition of racism or war and so on. This student did not appreciate the theme but he was inspired by the format. He decided to write an essay about what teenage boys really like. In his preamble he clearly stated that the target audience was teenage males. His “I like” essay celebrated the joys of action movies and beautiful women, and it included the following witty reference to young females: “The less dressed is the best dressed”. My student passed a draft of his essay around his dormitory. His peers rocked with appreciative laughter. It was obviously a hit with his target audience, which was a key official assessment criterion.

My student handed in his draft to his teacher for comment. Because it was stylishly written, entertaining and perfectly crafted to appeal to its target audience, he expected praise. Her response was far less. She said that it could offend some examiners. What? She was the only examiner. It was internally assessed class work. What the teacher’s response really indicated was that she could not give an “A” to an essay that contravened her fundamental beliefs. Her conscience would not permit it. It would be like expressing approval of ideas to which she was opposed. She hid her true sentiments behind the notion that the student’s essay would offend some other examiners. An essay of this kind could never receive an “A” from this examiner, no matter how well written. To receive an “A” from her the student would have to write a different essay, one that reflected the teacher’s politically correct Left values.

I advised the student to write another essay for his teacher. Interestingly, he chose to submit the original essay. He was proud of it. He claimed that it was the best thing he had ever written. He knew it was first-rate but he accepted that he would have to bear the cost of a grade that was unfairly lower than he deserved. He was confident that he could make up the grades he needed elsewhere. Besides, he was in Year 11, not Year 12 where every mark counts towards university entrance. Does this kind of experience sound familiar to you? Here is another.

A student of mine, who was doing Year 12, was determined to achieve the highest grades. I was tutoring him in a modern history subject that featured the Russian Revolution. He was keen to score high results in a research essay on Lenin’s New Economic Policy, the topic the class had been assigned. To get him started I put him in touch with an expert specialist librarian at a leading university who showed him through the library’s substantial holdings on the subject. Brimming with enthusiasm, the student read widely and deeply, taking far more effort than would be expected from a high school student. His formidable effort paid off. His first draft was an intelligent, well-structured, well-documented and well-argued essay that was more like university than high school standard. I was very impressed. He submitted the draft to his teacher for comment. He was astonished by the result: only “C+”. All his previous essays had received “A’s”. What was happening? My student was concerned and bewildered. He had put more effort into this essay than the others combined. I looked at his work again. It was superb, I thought to myself, then I realised that was the problem. Unfortunately, it was beyond the intellectual capacity of his teacher to appreciate. What he had to do was “dumb it down”.

We went back to the notes that my student had taken in class. They revealed that his teacher had a very confused and erroneous understanding of the topic. The teacher, of course, did not realise this. Unfortunately, the teacher was unwilling to entertain any interpretation of the subject matter that differed from his own. I advised my student to omit everything from his draft that significantly differed from the teacher’s opinions, while the teacher’s own thoughts were imputed into the essay, in some cases in the teacher’s exact words, no matter how inane some of these thoughts were. My student retained his clear structure and expression, but not much remained of the impressive content of the first draft. My student was willing to do what was necessary to succeed and he did. He received an “A+” for the essay. That year he achieved a perfect score for History, 100 per cent, and took out the school’s History prize. If he wanted to know what the nature of Lenin’s New Economic Policy was really like, he could always consult his first draft.

What can we learn from this student’s experience? We could start with the following: Although improvements in quality generally do bring improvements in grades, contrary to widespread assumptions there are circumstances where improvements in quality can be counter-productive in achieving high grades if the examiner is ignorant, incompetent and narrow-minded. On these occasions you may have to temper the quality of your work that is submitted for assessment.

There is more we can learn from this example. With some examiners, the achievement of an “A” does not necessarily involve submitting what you know to be the right answer, but rather what you believe the examiner thinks is the right answer, even if it is the wrong answer. If you have ever suspected that you have previously been unfairly penalised for having the right answer, you are probably correct. But now you know what you can do about it. If you suspect that your understanding of the topic is too sophisticated for the teacher to appreciate, then you may have to dumb it down by mimicking the teacher’s understanding to receive your “A”.

While helping students as a private tutor I have observed that these kinds of situations are more common than most people realise. They are invisible to the many students who slavishly follow their teacher’s instructions and do not take responsibility for their own education. Consequently, they do not have the additional knowledge to serve as reference points for comparison and consequently they do not realise that their teacher is in error and they have learnt incorrect facts or analysis. These students labour under the false assumption that their educator is more competent than he actually is, even though on occasions they may experience the discomforting feeling that what the teacher is saying does not quite add up.

To some students, this revelation about teacher competence may be shocking and it may not conform to what they perceived was reality. Unfortunately, due to the trust these students placed in the system, this reality was imperceptible. For others, you may find in this revelation a considerable vindication. Some students do not realise that they were taught erroneous material until it is too late, when they are externally examined and they find that their learning of this material produced less than the desired results. Some find this out at university, when what they learnt at school is refuted by an expert lecturer. Others find out years later when their faulty knowledge is tested in a situation of employment, when they find that they have to relearn what they learnt in school.

There is even more to learn from this student’s experience and other similar examples. We could also recognise the following principle: A good scholar is not necessarily a successful student, and knowing the difference is the key. You need to become both. A command of fundamental study skills, the capacity to reason, plus the unleashing of your intellectual creativity and talent will make you a good scholar. But your ability to engage effectively with those who are in authority over you will make you a good student. With each essay you write, you have to choose whether your objective is to develop your intellectual creativity or to achieve high grades. On numerous occasions these are not complementary objectives.

If you choose to develop your creativity in ways that are contrary to the ideology and expectations of your examiner, you have to recognise that you may pay a price in grades. The method you will learn in this book will help to give you that choice because, first, you will appreciate that there is a choice and potential cost involved. I confess that at school and university I often chose, knowing what was at stake, to develop my intellectual creativity and carry the cost in grades, especially in years that were not crucial to my progress to the next stage of the education system. Those essays that were rewarded least were usually my best.

If you choose to be a good student rather than a good scholar then you must be wary of the potential costs that could result from originality. Virtually all examiners claim that they appreciate and reward originality. This is a misleading claim that can lead to many of the most innovative and capable students being profoundly disappointed. Examiners do reward originality, but not all kinds of originality. Examiners generally do not reward original ideas that challenge or undermine their ideology or paradigm or upset their comfort zone. These ideas can make them feel profoundly uneasy, even hostile. Wars are fought over ideologies and paradigms, so do not underestimate the lengths people may go to protect them. A harsh grade is the least a teacher could do under these circumstances.

The originality that examiners do reward is that which can be classified as “I wish I had thought of that myself”. These are variations of ideas that fit within the examiner’s paradigm while introducing, for example, a novel dimension that complements or enhances the examiner’s position or viewpoint. Interestingly, the examiners who penalise the more radical expressions of originality would not recognise themselves as doing so because they would perceive the student’s original work as wrong-headed or simply wrong. Furthermore, because they have previously rewarded examples of the second kind of originality they would, quite honestly from their perspective, regard and proclaim themselves to be open-minded and fair.

As I said earlier: Do not follow teachers’ advice according to what they say about their attitude to assessment, rather observe their behaviour and learn what to do from what they actually respond to. Be cautious about presenting your original ideas unless they are of the kind likely to be appreciated by your examiner. Meanwhile, you should record and preserve your more radically original ideas. They are precious, but recognise that your school or university may not be the appropriate forums in which to present them. If you observe what examiners consistently reward, you will notice that conformity, or at least the appearance of it, is the surest means to high grades.

This principle was my first realisation of the reality, my first step towards the new method. It seemed to explain to me so much about my past experiences and promise so much for the future by orienting me towards a new direction forward to higher grades. I was seventeen and reflecting on my academic predicament during the summer holidays between Years 11 and 12. More realisations followed that summer and I commenced the new academic year with a new perspective, a new strategy and renewed enthusiasm. One of the issues that I learnt to appreciate differently was teacher bias.

Teacher bias is one of the issues most complained about by students. I suggest that you look at the issue in a new way, so instead of it being a problem it becomes an opportunity. Make your teacher’s bias your friend, because if you do not it will be a formidable enemy. Once you recognise the subjectivity of assessment, the role of bias, the possibility of teacher error, and the potential cost of originality, it follows that your campaign for straight “A’s” must begin by establishing a psychological profile of your examiner. This will enable you to include in your essay everything that you calculate will press the right psychological buttons of your examiner to pay a dividend in grades. You can tailor your essays to suit the idiosyncrasies of each of your examiners. The more obvious their biases the easier your task will be. Once you can read and exploit teacher bias you will be able to play your examiners like a violin.

Before we begin learning the Method, there is another important principle for you to appreciate: Make your enemies your friends and your weaknesses your strengths. You should always be thinking about ways in which you can transform people who may be obstacles to your progress into assets or transform things that you do not know into things that you do know. Later I will show you some powerful methods how to do this. In addition to what I can teach you, you should always be thinking about additional ways to solve your particular problems. Free your mind. Think creatively about any problems you face. Do not settle. Do not take “no” for an answer. This principle also makes the point that you should not accept any adverse situation regarding your skills as unchangeable. Remember that there was a time when you could not read, but you changed that situation by acquiring the skill you needed. You should have the attitude that any weakness you may currently have is not permanent. Your first step to improvement is the recognition of your ability to improve.

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As this extract implies, the consequences for students using my methods are that everyone is happy. The teachers are happy because they are presented with essays that they enjoy and reward highly. The students are happy because they receive high grades and the glory and opportunities that come with them. This, of course, makes their parents happy and proud.

ld be noted that most of The Little Black School Book involves giving students the ability to learn, research, write essays, and reason independently. This frees them to use the education system to become the person whom they want to be rather than what the education system intends them to be.

Dr Mark Lopez is the author of The Origins of Multiculturalism in Australian Politics: 1945-1975 (MUP, 2000). He wrote “The Classroom Lottery” in the March issue. The Little Black School Book will be published by Connor Court (connorcourt.com) this month, $29.95.