The late actor and writer Peter Ustinov once asked, “What is education but a process by which a person begins to learn how to learn?” The author epitomized the idea of education for education’s sake. Though this is a concept educators and many students agree to be ideal, our president works toward an entirely different agenda.

The administration that gave us the ineffective No Child Left Behind Act has made a strong initiative to cut costs and budgeting in education, except where it seems least cost-effective to do so.

In his State of the Union address, President Bush voiced concerns on the seemingly unprofitable direction in which he sees the elementary educated generation headed.

“We need to encourage children to take more math and science, and to make sure those courses are rigorous enough to compete with other nations,” Bush said. “If we ensure that America’s children succeed in life, they will ensure that America succeeds in the world. .”

And while politicians and economists concur a jump start in technological innovation might give America a fiscal advantage, I wonder when the institution of learning became an international race.

In the same token, art and music programs in schools have been on a steady decline due to lack of funding for years. According to a recent study by the National Center for Education Statistics, only 25 percent of eighth graders had the opportunity to take a music class. While studies have shown incorporating art and music within education helps students with reading, writing, social behavior and overall receptiveness in a school environment, more art and music programs are cut or diminished every year because of increasingly stringent budgets. Yet in the name of economic leadership, organizations like the National Science Foundation have given hundreds of millions of dollars toward math and science improvement.

Instead of focusing on improving the actual educational experience, our government seems to be more concerned with economic competition. What is so troubling about this is that we are approaching education as a means to marketing our country. We rob students of the enlightening and enriching experience a well-rounded education should be. The double whammy of this shortsightedness is that in declaring one segment of teaching to be separate and more important than other areas, we close ourselves off from the possibilities of other advancement and progress.

In this age of dwindling financial aid availability and soaring educational costs, the climate of our educational system is increasingly more cash-conscious. The focus of curricula, not only at the elementary school level but also in our colleges, is increasingly centered on monetary consequences and less on actual enlightenment. It takes both a student and teacher with a lot of foresight to be able to value learning for its own merit these days, and I hope in our studies, spending and political choices we all make the conscious effort to put that idea into practice. The current political administration might not be rooting for you, but Peter Ustinov is.

Voices

Columns reflect the opinion of the author and not necessarily that of the Northern Star staff.