The Problem of Compulsory Schooling | The Unbounded Spirit

Malaysia's Education Blueprint (MEB) 2013-2025

(source HERE)

In the blueprint, the Ministry of Education will be extending compulsory education from the current 6 years to 11 years. Is the right move?

Buddhism talks about the true nature of oneself, the "Buddha seed" that needs to be cultivated and nurtured. What are we doing here, is there a Buddhist response to the MEB?

Here's a quote:

"The evidence for all this as it applies to little children lies before the eyes of anyone who has watched a child grow from birth up to school age. Through their own efforts, children learn to walk, run, jump and climb. They learn from scratch their native language, and with that, they learn to assert their will, argue, amuse, annoy, befriend, charm and ask questions. Through questioning and exploring, they acquire an enormous amount of knowledge about the physical and social world around them, and in their play, they practice skills that promote their physical, intellectual, social and emotional development. They do all this before anyone, in any systematic way, tries to teach them anything.

This amazing drive and capacity to learn does not turn itself off when children turn 5 or 6. We turn it off with our coercive system of schooling. The biggest, most enduring lesson of our system of schooling is that learning is work, to be avoided when possible."

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