Aristotle defines need for public education

A librarian might well puzzle over how to catalog Randall R. Curren's book, Aristotle on the Necessity of Public Education. Is it political theory, Aristotelian scholarship, or philosophy of education? “[It is] an extremely rich and important contribution to all these fields of inquiry," says David Carr, professor of philosophy of education at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, in his review of the book. And while graceful, clear prose may make it accessible to readers, and originality of thought may tantalize scholars, those attributes alone are not enough to explain the excitement the book has generated.

Last fall scholars and doctoral students discussed the book in a four-session symposium arranged by the Syracuse University Cultural Foundations of Education Department, with a presentation by Curren in December.

A pair of book-related talks were held in March 2002 at the University of Wisconsin. One is part of a 2,400-year celebration of the death of Socrates, and the other is in conjunction with the University's Distinguished Lecture Series, cosponsored by the education, philosophy, and political science departments.

A southern European journal, The School Field, is arranging an issue devoted to the book, including contributions from top scholars in the United States, the United Kingdom, South Africa, the Netherlands, and Greece.

Curren has been invited to present at a "mini conference" on the book this spring at the Institute of Education in London, England.

He has agreed to coedit a new international journal to be launched in 2003, Education: An International Journal of Ethics, Policy, and Practice.

Why all the attention? The book addresses this generation's most critical educational challenges and bridges the perceived distance between them and classical political thought. According to Eamonn Callan, professor of education at Stanford University, the book demonstrates how Aristotle's ideas about public education can suggest solutions to "some of the most daunting problems in American education." It considers education and social justice, education and moral virtue, education and the law, education and culture. Aristotle, according to Curren, associate professor in the educational leadership program at the Margaret Warner Graduate School of Education and Human Development, lays out a program for successful public education: Education must address the practical skills needed to prepare individuals for respected employment; it must include "character education" and civic education; and it has to develop the student's capacity to engage in intellectual activities through the use of reason and analysis.

Curren pauses from a multitude of class preparation tasks during the winter break to talk about the book. His research, he explains from his ground-floor office in Dewey Hall, began with the central question underlying all successful educational processes: "What does a child-centered ethical perspective demand?" He paraphrases Aristotle's argument that the primary tool of society is education, because putting persuasion before force is necessary to demonstrate proper respect for human beings. A human being, in order to do what is good, needs to have a conception of what is good and possess the capacity to act from it. Curren's research took him not only to the library and the Internet, it enticed him to participate for a year and a half on a site-team that developed a character education program for elementary school children in a local school district, and to participate in two White House conferences on character education, and a conference on civic education sponsored by UNESCO and the Council of Europe, held in Europe last fall.

In his work on Aristotle, Curren struggled to understand the relationships between individual and collective responsibilities for character and action. He acknowledges the debate among contemporary scholars between the need to teach critical thinking skills and to emphasize character education. “A lot of people see tension between [them]," says Curren. "I don't. True moral education has to synthesize the two." He believes that the task of philosophy is "to try to find a way to inform the decisions people make, to help them to do it well." "The ultimate struggle for the human race," Curren believes, "is an educative one."