Progressive Education and Its Discontents: On the Limits of Idealism in Progressive Education

Abstract

This thesis explores progressive education in contemporary educational contexts with a particular focus on the convergence of democracy and education. It considers the theoretical and political implications of a democratic education through an investigation of its limits. It examines the relationship between the role of theory and schools through philosophical and historical examination as well as through narrative. This study weaves a series of political and satirical cartoons depicting the life of the school through the discursive analysis of educational purpose. The visual narratives illustrate the complexity of theory in practice and serve as praxis itself. By demonstrating theory in action, this study situates the researcher as a subject in an educational landscape in need of reorientation and opens the possibility for imaginatively enacting change on our world. This thesis explores the agonistic tension teachers feel between their educational ideals and their disappointment in the actuality of the school. It questions how to reconcile the pressure to comply with supranational, national and local educational mandates, and the desire to resist these very mandates in order to teach beyond mere qualification towards something more meaningful. This study begins with an exploration of Progressive Era educational ideals and their limits, with a view that their shortcomings stem from an unrealistic theory grounded in a misreading of history. Because the lineage of progressive educational ideals endures today, a re-examination of educational history towards a realist theory of education is necessary for contemporary teachers. Rather than eschew the limits of the historical school, this thesis considers the repercussions of acknowledging and embracing such limits. This study further examines the implications of the co-optation of progressive language by supra-national and national educational bodies as teachers may unwittingly employ a language of compliance in their attempts at resistance. Lastly, this thesis questions what an ethical form of resistance would look like through the use of illustration and commentary as it seeks what educational philosophy and practice is available for teachers who accept the necessity of qualification and the inevitability of compliance—yet strive for something more.