Lessons from Privilege The American Prep School Tradition
Lessons from Privilege: The American Prep School Tradition by Arthur G. Powell, published by Harvard University Press in 1996, offers an insightful examination of the contrasting dynamics between public and private education. This 2nd Print edition, comprising 293 pages, delves into the reasons behind the thriving nature of private prep schools compared to the challenges faced by public schools. Powell, a noted historian of education, investigates the lessons that private schooling can impart to public education amidst increasing calls for reform.
In this book, readers will find an exploration of the values that underpin private education, such as community, personal relationships, and high academic standards. Powell emphasizes how these principles can foster passion and commitment among educators and students, which are essential for educational success. He also highlights the significance of economic resources and incentives in shaping effective educational environments. By presenting these ideas, Lessons from Privilege aims to enhance the understanding of educational policy and reform, focusing on the philosophical and social aspects of schooling in America.
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Around 10,000 tax dollars will put a child through many public schools for a year. About 10,000 private dollars will put him through prep school. Why, then, is one system troubled and the other thriving, one vilified and the other celebrated? In this book, a renowned historian of education searches out the lessons that private schooling might offer public education as cries for school reform grow louder.
Lessons from Privilege explores a tradition shaped by experience and common sense, and guided by principles that encourage community, personal relationships, and high academic standards. These “basic” values make a profound difference in a time when popular culture, which mocks intellectual curiosity and celebrates mental passivity, competes so successfully for students’ attention.
Arthur Powell uses the experience of private education to put the whole schooling enterprise in fresh perspective. He shows how the sense of schools as special communities can help instill passion and commitment in teachers, administrators, and students alike–and how passion and commitment are absolutely necessary for educational success. The power of economic resources, invested fully in schools, also becomes pointedly clear here, as does the value of incentives for teachers and students.
Though the concerns this book brings into focus–for decent character and academic literacy–may never be trendy or easily applied, Lessons from Privilege presents sensible, powerful, and profitable ideas for enhancing the humanity and dignity of education in America.
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