The Role of Fathers

The following articles address the issue of fathers and what role they play in the social and intellectual development of children. The first article is from Newsweek and its entitled “It’s a Wise Father who Knows…his child.” The second reading is an article from the Wilson Quarterly entitled “A World Without Fathers.” The third reading is by David Blankenhorn and is chapters 1 and 4 of Fatherless America: confronting our most urgent social problem. The fourth reading is from Dan Kindlon and Michael Thompson’s Raising Caine – chapter 5. The fifth reading is chapter 4 of Arlie Russell Hochschild’s The Time Bind: when work becomes home and home becomes work. The final reading is a short series of articles from Sue Shellenbarger’s Work and Family: essays from the “work & family” column of The Wall Street Journal.

Section VI: Education for What?

This final section addresses the philosophical issues that need to underpin education in democratic societies. It looks at the questions, problems and opportunities that today’s young people will most likely be confronted with, and hopefully it will get you, the reader of this curriculum, to start thinking about what really should be the purpose of education.

The first article is Peter Drucker’s “Beyond the Information Revolution” which appeared in the October 1999 issue of The Atlantic Monthly. The second article comes from The Atlantic Monthly and was written by Ted Halstead. It looks at “A Politics for Generation X.” The third reading in this section comes from Neil Postman’s book The End of Education: redefining the value of school. Postman addresses the question education for what head-on.

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