A Bit About School and Augury

In Ancient Rome, the interpretation of signs and portents associated with important upcoming events was called augury. It was practiced by divine seers, seeking answers in the skies and flight patterns of birds. Their good work was called auspice, the origin of our modern word auspicious.

Today’s skies portend difficult times; birds are flying toward extinction. People continue to destroy one another because of old notions of superiority. Yet, our numbers continue to increase. In 1960, there were 4 billion of us; now there are nearly 8 billion. There is a pandemic, and a growing crisis in water, food and sustainability. Billions of people are threatened by great heat and drought, powerful storms, and rising waters. Our governments are overwhelmed by the fortunes of the rich. Powerful multinational companies profit from secrets of our personal lives, operating beyond the reach of reasonable governance.

As with the Romans, people today are easily distracted. Our bread and circus is pizza and Netflix. We adore science fiction and fantasy but deny science. And yet, we can see the future.

Earth’s population will reach 9 billion by 2040; 10 billion by 2060; 11 billion by 2100 (source). Then, we slow down (increased longevity leads to decreased birth rates). In the interim—the years we’re living—there will be great migrations for climate safety and economic opportunity from Asia and Africa (where growth is rapid and abundant) to Europe and North America, (where growth is slow and inadequate).

We know all of this because modern prognosticators use better tools than omens and augury. They analyze abundant data to develop precise scenarios. We share ideas, opinions, beliefs, knowledge, insights, and wisdom. We mobilize to change the way decisions are made. We are re-establishing a baseline of truth. In short, we are making plans.

Acknowledging the Yiddish proverb—“Mann traoch, Gott Lauch” (“Man Plans, God Laughs”)—we know more about earth and its future than our predecessors because we possess three magnificent tools. The best of the three is school. That’s because caring people in local communities make school possible as a public good. Second best is the internet. It connects people all over the world, but it’s controlled by technology companies and government, so the internet may or may not be a public good. Media—linear, interactive, social—is third, and it’s mostly operated for profit, too. We could make plans to transform the internet and media so they operate for the public good, but birds are flying in the direction of school instead.

Today, most humans do not attend school, and never will. We think of school as a tool to shape the minds of young people. Nine out of 10 of the world’s children, 6 out of 10 teenagers—but very few people attend school after age 25. As a result, 80% of the world’s population learns not from school, but from the media, the internet, and one another.

Under the auspices of the powers controlled by the people, at this auspicious moment, let’s inaugurate a new way to think about school. Forget the 20th century model; it was built for another time and a faded set of priorities. In the 21st century, school becomes a global endeavor that lasts a lifetime. Forget about everybody learning, remembering, knowing or believing the same things as one another. This is no longer possible, no longer desirable, and no longer necessary. Instead, everyone benefits from our diversity of knowledge and our ability to share. If everyone included all of the people in the world (and in time, perhaps some of the animals), and we considered lifelong learning to be a right, not a privilege, then school would serve a very special role in every community on earth.

Seven days a week, from early in the morning until late at night, every school in every community would be filled with people of all ages (people are living longer, so it won’t be unusual to see 9-year-olds interacting with 99-year-olds). School becomes a place where everyone belongs, everyone can pursue a productive purpose, everyone can learn on their own terms and in their own ways. Food and shelter are freely provided. Primary healthcare is always available, too.

In practice, how can this possibly work? It can work if people want it to work, if it serves a need for a sense of belonging, a safe place, a place to collaborate and learn from one another, a place where ideas and projects grow. It won’t work if school remains synonymous with curriculum, relentless testing, an inflexible building or campus, or a population that excludes most of the people who live and work nearby. It will work if school is synonymous with community, relentless pursuit of friendship, the entire physical community, and people of all ages.

Consider a walk in the park, or in a nearby forest. There are trees. The ecosystem is fascinating, but mostly imperceptible without a guide. Fortunately, there is willingness to learn, and a small multi-generational group makes it their business to study trees, and to share their enthusiasm. The group focuses on white oaks, then local squirrels. Curiosity grows, but in unpredictable directions and the group becomes fascinated with four-foot squirrels that glide through the forests of Bhutan. Where? Near India and China. Peaceable kingdom. Measures progress not in economic terms, but in GNH. That stands for Gross National Happiness. People in Bhutan evaluate their health and well-being, resilience and diversity, living standards and use of time, health, education, and community vitality. Trees might measure their happiness in similar ways. Soon, the entire community is talking about GNH. This is bottom-up learning, and we’re likely to see a lot of it because our newly inaugurated model is defined not by standards, but by sharing. The same thing is happening all over the world.

Two people are interested in learning Bhutanese (Dzongkha), but there is no Bhutanese teacher nearby. There is YouTube, and on YouTube, there is Tshetem Norbu from Tashi Yangtse in eastern part of Bhutan. Tshetem speaks English, and spent some time in the U.S. He is a tour guide, but he also teaches Dzongkha. We have a starting point! With creativity and persistence, there will be Dzongkha lessons. And there will be students of all ages, not only from the local community, but from Greenland, Estonia, Tanzania, New Zealand, and Panama, too. Inevitably, there will be curiosity about the language spoken in Greenland, and the trees that grow in its local forests. We ask questions. This is the way everyone learns. This is the way we build and sustain community. We learn locally, in places where we can see and touch one another. We learn online, where we can access the world, hoping to travel to Bhutan and Greenland. There, we will eat suassat, a traditional Greenlandic soup made from seal (or whale, reindeer or seabirds), and ema datshi, a popular Himalayan Yak-cheese-and-chili dish with endless local variations. We’ll laugh ’til we’re silly, we’ll fall in love, we’ll raise beautiful Kalaallit-Bhutanese families.

We’re smarter than we were yesterday. And tomorrow, we’ll know even more than we do today because we’re now following the flights of one another. There is so much more to learn, but the forces that once controlled our lives are not vanquished. Those forces remain very much alive, studying the data, buying and broadening the technologies, plotting to recapture school, the internet and media. For the first time in a long time, the forecast is positive. We are in control of our thoughts and our actions. For now.

Postscript: The word auger now refers to a tool, such as a drill bit with a helical (screw-like) shaft for boring a hole. Centuries ago, an auger was used to drill into the hub, or nave, of a wheel, resulting in the contemporary word, navel. In the future, perhaps augury (related to the future) will become an antonym for augery (my made-up word for navel-gazing or doing nothing about the future at all.)

About the Author

Howard Blumenthal is the founder of Kids on Earth (www.kidsonearth.org) and the author of the upcoming book, Our Whole World in Their Hands: 21st Century School & Our Global Future. He is a Senior Scholar at The University of Pennsylvania.