One of my favorite things is the free bookshelf. You never know when you’re going to find one, or what is going to be on it. A library offers a very similar experience; free books for anyone curious. Libraries buy books by celebrities and trends, books that were purchased at “the time”, and are stored waiting for someone who might enjoy it. When you check out a book from the library, you’re the looker, and you’re getting the authors views but, the free bookshelf is a glimpse into the lives of the people who sought something important in the book, and then were unwilling to throw them away. To me that’s meaningful.
On the 4th floor of building ten there is a set of shelves, floor to ceiling, full of education texts. Some of them are academic textbooks, others are collections of anecdotes. The book I picked was Thomas Fleming’s “Schooling in British Columbia from 1849 to 2005“. Here are some of the things I learned;
- The first education act was passed in BC in 1872, making education over 150 years old in my province.
- The arguments we have today about education are as old as the education act; “Kids don’t know anything these days”, “We need to go back to basics, reading, writing and arithmetic”, “The industrial format of schools is hurting how people develop”…… (not exact quotes, just general sentiments expressed)
- Being a schoolteacher in the early years was very different from today. Many teachers worked in squalor conditions in rural BC communities. (What an adventure!)
- Teaching has always been a haven for career driven women. It’s one of the only places that women could find work, and it paid well enough to maintain your independence.
- Trends come and go in education. Right now we seem to be on an opening up of what schooling can be, one day it will tighten up again.
- The last residential school closed in 1996, but the effects of colonial education will last generations to come.
