Most Likely to Succeed

The documentary feature film, Most Likely to Succeed, produced by Ted Dintersmith, gave me so much to think about. I was already aware of the influence of the industrial age on our education system due to one of my favorite videos on youtube. It is an animated short that addresses the shortcomings of education in a similar way to the documentary mentioned earlier, but it doesn’t go very far in offering solutions. However, it does provide a more comprehensive perspective on the shortcomings of our education system. It can be viewed here.

What makes Most Likely to Succeed so compelling, is that it seems to offer potential solutions to the apparent shortcomings of our education system. Importantly, it acknowledges the inherent gamble of enrolling your children into High Tech High, the unorthodox school of focus. It will take several years for us to be able to make well-informed claims about the success of the school, as it takes such a modern and innovative approach. My worry is that our school system is so thoroughly established and steeped in administration and bureaucracy, that even irrefutable and definitive data will not be enough to motivate the cultural shift necessary. We, as a society, are so reliant on infrastructure and establishment, that I doubt our ability or willingness to make the required changes. As much as I love the idea of democracy, I fear it will fall behind, stagnant when compared to the dynamic ability of authoritarian rule to make sweeping changes.

I can only hope that High Tech High is so successful, and the resulting data is so compelling, that our society will buy into the drastic cultural shift required for such a change. For the time being, I look forward to incorporating the philosophies present in the revolutionary documentary, anywhere and anytime that I can.