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Education is the transfer of knowledge to others. This involves facts, theories, and other constructs. It also contains methods of communication such as language and methods of thinking, reasoning, and classification. They must be provided with the data and the tools to use that data. One without the other is useless.
Control of the curriculum should be in the hands of an elected body drawn from those that contributed to the funding of the educational institutions – in this case, the taxpayers. Since the goal of most education at the public level is for creating new citizens with the same body of basic knowledge as the community, they are the best informed as to what is and is not part of that body of knowledge. This does spawn the question of what level – national, state, community, or school – is the best for determining the curriculum. All too often, they are in conflict with politics winning out over prudence. In the best of all possible worlds it would be at the school level with parents (and the student) free to select the school that best fits their needs/wants/desires. (Baltimore City for example had open enrollment where you could go to any school as long as you passed the entrance exam for that school.) Schools that did not meet the objectives would be rewarded with declining students until they could no longer economically function. Likewise, successful schools would be emulated. (I could go on for three pages. If you want a follow-up, please PM.)
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