So, what is education for?

21st January 2005, 12:00am
Surely it is problematic that state schooling has increasingly been set adrift from its knowledge-based moorings and has become preoccupied with broader social concerns. The ideal of a cultural transmission of knowledge has been sidelined by a new set of aims, such as tackling obesity, creating active citizens, and combating social exclusion and low self-esteem. As schools become littered with behaviour improvement consultants, anti-bullying counsellors and healthy eating instructors, it feels as though schools have become a new vehicle for an official behaviour modification scheme.