Unschooling and Other Signals of Disruption in Education
Unschooling Could Be Addictive Margaret Mead was a futurist and anthropologist who predicted the concept of lifelong learning in 1966. She was concerned with how to “bring about a desirable state of mild addiction to learning” among students. She espoused that we should encourage school “dropouts,” in the sense that a society where people voluntarily drop in and out of learning experiences throughout their lives is actually healthier than one-size-fits-all educational environments. The image of the future Mead envisioned is being realized in the form of Unschooling , a contemporary education trend that rejects standardized curriculum in favor of student-designed learning. The corporation Beyer recently moved to self-management which resonates with the sentiment behind unschooling: autonomy offers invaluable benefits to an individual’s personal and professional development. Un-mentoring in the professional environment might take a similar approach by expecting the mentee to decide wh...
