By: Branko Koderman
Slovenian education is a political project – today very successful and effective for certain interests. So successful, in fact, that in the last composition of the Slovenian parliament the unpatriotic side achieved almost a two‑thirds majority. This happened even as, in the face of Janković’s C0 project – a sewerage folly that is unhealthy and irrational – the majority of Ljubljana’s residents remained deaf and mute.
Am I exaggerating? I do not think so! I was taught, and later spent my whole life teaching others, that nothing can arise out of nothing, nor can it be the product of mere chance. What was mentioned above comes about because people, voters, that is, choose such leaders and such political representatives who sooner or later bring them misfortune and despair. Do these voters not know how to think? And if not, how and where did they learn not to think?
“Gaber’s school” began to be built soon after independence. The project was the work of the “left” and its allies, in truth, of all anti‑patriotic and unpatriotic social and political forces, after the historic achievement of the Slovenian nation had been internationally and constitutionally enshrined. In the new state of the Slovenian nation, they faced the threat of disappearing into the dustbin of history. How to survive and perhaps, in time, regain full power? In my opinion, their strategic decision was entirely rational: to create voters who would easily fall for their deceitful promises. It was essential to forbid the “Church” entry into the school system. Why? Because a Christian value‑based view of man and reality would have strangled their project in its cradle. Then they built a total panopticon – an organisational system that is meticulously organised, carefully planned, centrally bureaucratised, and strictly controlled. Such a system subjugates people. Complete organisation cannot and must not be a community of people bound by common goals and ideals, with internal relations governed by shared principles, virtues, and values.
Point‑scoring connects the entire system, everything and everyone. Principals and teachers collect points, for advancement. Parents collect points together with their children, for admission to a good secondary school or university, or simply to avoid failing a subject. Children and adolescents collect points in abundance, at every test, school assignment, final exam. For better success? Success in what? Success in knowledge, they say. But what is knowledge? Is knowledge what is written in textbooks and what teachers say? Is that all? In the social sciences, history, languages, and Slovene (I exempt mathematics and most natural sciences from this critique), children and youth study, reread, and cram. They learn “by heart,” some things even in the form of “copy‑paste.” As if each of them did not already carry in their pocket, on their mobile phone, the knowledge and information of almost all of humanity. Do we need this vast and expensive school system for that?
Assessment (point‑scoring) must be numerical, so that the success or failure of a candidate can be mathematically processed. And objective. Objectivity can always be verified. For the principal, the number of classroom observations; for the teacher, the number of seminar attendances; for the student, the number of assessments and the number of points on tests or exams. Everyone can and must objectify their success with written certificates – products. Points accumulate for everyone, and through some kind of Marxist‑dialectical delusion that quantity turns into quality, we supposedly get what – a success story or an outstanding student.
Cognitive and developmental psychology understands such instrumental conditioning as reinforcing narcissistic traits in the personality structure of the individual, which applies fully to children and adolescents. So how is an adult citizen, after such long‑term “training,” supposed to think healthily, rationally, and wisely about the promises of their leaders and representatives?
(Contribution of the movement “Skupnost Kosezov / Kosez Community”; Koderman, Branko: “New School 1”)
Branko Koderman is a professor, psychologist, and sociologist of culture.