Undoing Dewey

from the Nehemiah Institute                                                                    Vol. XVIII, No. 1, January 2005

It was precisely the mixing of school and government that was the heart and soul of John Dewey's pedagogical reasoning. In 1894 Dewey accepted the position of chairman of the Department of Philosophy, Psychology and Pedagogy at the University of Chicago. It was here that Dewey established his Laboratory School.

As noted by education expert Samuel L. Blumenfeld, "Here was, indeed, a master plan, involving the entire progressive educational community, to create a new socialist curriculum for the schools of America, a plan that was indeed carried out and implemented. Dewey put forth his collectivist concepts of an organic society, the social individual, the downgrading of academics (emphasis added), and the need to use psychology in education."

In 1897 Dewey published his "My Pedagogic Creed" in which he stated, among other beliefs, "I believe that education, therefore, is a process of living and not a preparation for future living; I believe that education is the regulation of the process of coming to share in the social consciousness; and that adjustment of individual activity on the basis of this social consciousness is the only sure method of social reconstruction. I believe that every teacher is a social servant set apart for the maintenance of proper social order and the securing of the right social growth. I believe that in this way the teacher always is the prophet of the true God and the usherer in of the true kingdom of God."

Dewey got his wish – a messianic school system, but without the God of the Bible. What his messianic system has gotten us is a mess. As Blumenfeld stated, "More than ninety years have gone by since Dewey set American education on its progressive course. The result is an education system in shambles, a rising national tide of illiteracy, and the social misery caused in its wake."

It is time to undo Dewey.