The Education Act

For the last five years or so, something has been gnawing at me. The problem is that when you speak to some people who claim they are educators, they can't define education in ways that actually tell you what they are trying to do when they educate. It isn't helped by the fact that the local Education Act (last revised in 1985) doesn't define education very well except by indirect means.

Take, for example, some of the definitions that are provided by that Act:

• "higher education" means education beyond the standard normally required for admission to a university;
• "pupil" means a person of any age receiving instruction in a school;
• "school" means according to the context — a) an organisation for the provision of education for 10 or more persons; or b) a place where 10 or more persons are being or are habitually taught whether in one or more classes, or in the case of a correspondence school, the place or places where instruction is prepared or where answers are examined or corrected;
• "teacher" means a person who teaches pupils in a school or who prepares or issues lessons or corrects written answers in a correspondence school and includes a principal.

So, what is 'education', and what does it mean to 'educate'?

I am still grappling with the answers to that in the local context. Stay tuned; updates will come.