building on ur conversation , what if we solved all the challenges that the public schooling has - what if we really had the best teachers and schools . and invested the money that goes into the private lessons and so on in that.
I sometimes don’t feel that is the solution as the whole system of education to get graduates that are fit into the market economy doesn’t fit anymore. we need to have a shift in the way we think about that , we need to change the old narrative of this system and find another narrative that doesn’t fit into it , and I think one of the steps in order to do so is to learn from the “Experts” that are trying to get out of this system like the initiative from upper Egypt .
I also think this is a global problem even in the countries with the "best " educational system
I was just thinking out loud with u …and looking forward for ur feedback
what do you mean by “I sometimes don’t feel that is the solution as the whole system of education to get graduates that are fit into the market economy doesn’t fit anymore.”? what are you refering to?
@Dina after reading it …It is not clear at all :D:D
I am referring to "the whole educational system " that doesn’t fit anymore into our way of life now .
to be more clear
The current educational model was designed in the 18th century during the enlightenment era and the industrial revolution. Till now there has been little change in this model even with the exponential growth technologies the learning process in the classroom or even online is still the same.
The current compulsory schooling started in 1880 with some colonial intentions and influenced by Bentham’s utilitarian thoughts of “useful” curricula within the industrial revolution economical system this model was successful to produce people with similar skills to join the market of the industries , but this doesn’t work efficiently anymore.
and it is a global problem not only in Egypt , that kids go to school not to learn but to get grades , which after that turns into money -and we all know that it doesn’t work this way anymore - for example the participants of the workshop a big portion of them studied something and work in a different field -
and I think this model is collapsing along with other (political - economical )models , and since we are trying to “look over the edge” and find solutions I don’t think that having a good "formal schooling "system is the solution . I don’t have one but I was suggesting to follow on the footsteps of the people who are already out or trying to get out of this system
We got interested in education also in the first Edgeryders iteration. It is fascinating – almost as if there were a completely new phase just behind the corner eating away at the shell of the old one. I wonder if we could compare notes across the different experiences, in Europe as well as in Egypt? Examples of edgeryders trying to find new models for education include:
I was actually trying to do something like this , was trying also to include democratic schools as an alternative that is out of the formal ways .
I really want to start the discussion , I have looking in the education issue for a while now , and I can hopefully get someone from a democratic school in Berlin to the discussion
u got me more excited … will look into the links u shared in the morning as I really need to sleep right now
@hazem In that case, There are many people in Egypt who are now looking into this, Cilas is one of them, I think you are familiar with it. Megawra just had a recent event discussing alternative models of education and they had many participants as well sharing their thoughts and experiences.
@dina yes I wish I could attend the last event about the alternatives for education . actually there are lots of efforts everywhere and forums discussing this issue . I don’t have a clear view of how to push things forward in this issue , CILAS is a very good example for this alternatives but what’s next how to scale up this impact . now I have a lot of tabs opened that I have to read first and I will have a meeting this week with someone from a democratic school in berlin and will get back to the discussion with - hopefully a clearer view . but since I didn’t actually go through the discussion u had in cairo and the thing about privatizing education u touched upon in the article is quite an issue ( I can relate to that as I am studying in Sawiris university -TU Berlin Campus ELgouna ) I want to know ur opinions about how to "fast forward " the present in order to get to the future u talked about in the article. can U tell me more about ur own vision about that ?
@hazem well @labanita was sharing her experience with her daughter’s education and among all the problems we discussed, the privatisation of the education experience is what we agreed would be a good starting problem to tackle.
I actually studied 2 years in the german university in Cairo which is a “prestigious” private university, but I left it and went to Malaysia and studied in a local university there. I am not gonna compare both universities because they are each very different, and each have their pros and cons, and am not gonna say that Malaysia has a good education system, they’ve got their share of corruption as well. But it got me thinking if I’d be willing to channel half the money i would have paid in the GUC to Helwan university instead, and get a better public education, for a chance to better the local university on the long run. If what we are missing is the budget then there is a good chance that this would work out.
For the quality of education itself, teaching methods and so on, I think the student’s attitude is a great player in that as well, specially in fields like Art and Design where it’s all hands on experience, it’s what you can make out of it. Even in a private university like the GUC if this is missing then even the best system would be useless. I’ve been hearing a lot of people recommending these uni graduates over these particular uni, and privatisation really plays a role in that, but to be honest you’ll find good and lousy designers having the same education background.
plz share ur experience -sorry for the late replay
@dina if u have time please share ur thoughts about more differences between GUC and Malaysia :)
for my university now its really not a specific issue it’s just worth mentioning that studying "development " in “Elgouna” is weird
-------------
totally agree with u that the process depends on the attitude of the students " also can relate to that as my background is architecture" but if so why not to rethink the whole learning process according to the learner himself ? for example a lot of people who ended up in this design education like courses may not have been here if they can choose from the very early beginning to learn what they love !!
hello everyone after some long silence, here at last some input from my side. Many people in Egypt are already connecting and have started to work on the alternatives and possible ways out of the current mess toward a more equitable education (system) for all. Some initiatives I am part of can be found on facebook for now, with some members overlapping into the edgeryders network already Check for Education Square, the Egypt Family School group Redirecting... that established itself during the 24h education hackathon in March (http://eduhack14.wordpress.com/) building on Suzi Balaban’s work. I will eventually share all the links etc. but pls bear with me being a slightly technology-challenged older person - old enough to be listend to, ha!!! Thanks @ericzoetmulder for that glorious note!
I think the problem will not be solved with updating the current educational system, it will be solved by a new parallel system that is efficient. the evidence here is that in egypt we have many people who spent their lives trying to enhance the system and it ended up all in vain. what I am proposing here is may be “for and by society education” that aims at making people able to learn alone. Check the link here it will help you in understanding what is the good education “that meets its purpose”.
hopefully this technology would be sooner or later available but the problem that we should always remember that technology is just a tool . like in the video this “futuristic” vision education or the learning process is happening in the traditional way even with this high tech - a classroom where a teacher has all the authorities giving the students his own vision or input - we should really rethink that .
couple of days ago I was in a democratic school - hopefully someone from the school can join the discussion- if not I will try to write my notes about this approach . but one of it was not to have any" superior " level over the children they can decide what to learn and when also they can decide what to eat and wear and so on … I will try to write a longer post soon
@Hazem , Technology is just a tool that’s right, but most of schools don’t have even computers and if they had students don’t have benefits of it , they consider it like decoration issues (dont touch ) .
" a classroom where a teacher has all the authorities giving the students his own vision or input " that is a big problem , so I suggested that teachers should have some courses about how to work as teachers & schools need some control .
waiting for your school visit details as soon as possible :)
It’s not about FREE education, but QUALITY education
Taha Hussein pledged for free education and started under King Farouk, this did not improve the situation much.
It’s not only about the spaces, it more the content and teaching. I am not happy with the Arabic language curriculum compared to the English or French, very shallow. You need money to train and pay teachers.
It also about qualified teachers who can read and write correctly and can teach. In some cities and villages in the Red Sea Governorate for example children reach technical secondary education while they can barely read and write. How? Teachers gave them the answers during national tests.
hi all ! sorry for leaving the discussion all that long , anyway here is some notes I collected during my visit to 2 democratic schools in Berlin as an alternative to formal education .
1st of all in the 2 schools the people believe its an alternative among with other alternatives also it is not the only way to go and not meant for every child ,
the main value behind this way is to set the “pedagogical education” aside and let the children decide for themselves and this makes the difference between democratic and homeschooling as in home schooling it is hard to discard the paternalism or the authority of the parents on the child .
although this creates a “bubble” where the school has it’s own way of life like meeting every week or a justice committee to decide in different issues but it is actually nearer to the "real world " than traditional schools as the child faces real problems and try to solve it on his own and that makes the child more independent and self oriented or motivated .
some problems :
-still follow the state (in Germany ) so that kids have to pass some national exams at the age of 16 , it is the same problem of certification everywhere .
- if parents don’t follow the same values at home it becomes harder for the kid to have 2 different life styles and affects their progress
- not for everyone as this 2 much freedom and self dependence don’t work with “shy” kids for example , there should be mentors or something like that for especial kids and here comes the problem of scaling
- may be it is a coincidence but in the 2 schools the internet isn’t used to its full capacity -lets say it like this- or it is not well introduced to be a source for any information ,its used mainly for gaming -which is not a wast of time - and for basic searches . but not to collaborate in an online project or course or whatever .
and I will have a meeting this week with someone from a democratic school in berlin and will get back to the discussion with - hopefully a clearer view . but since I didn’t actually go through the discussion u had in cairo and the thing about privatizing education u touched upon in the article is quite an issue ( I can relate to that as I am studying in 