Lurking in the minds of many ancients was a sense of importance for education of men. Persons who gave time to education either as teachers (some slaves) or students were special to society. We remember a few of their names, usually attached to a major preoccupation, persons who are remembered today in philosophy (including religion), medicine, literature, statesmanship, art (including architecture), drama, – and so the list may be extended. The Bible notes the influences of teachers in the priests and prophets, but also in rabbis (as Jesus or John the Baptist) who taught the people, in more than religious concepts related to both spiritual and natural life. The Apostle Paul encountered in later years his eminent teacher in Israel, Gamaliel, who by his wisdom, extricated Paul from a band of citizens angered at Paul’s teachings. Greek and Roman gentries, especially Roman, valued slaves educated so to educate their children. The emerging church kept education alive in the decline of society, although there were secular schools, limited largely to private rather than public support. Augustine, highly eminent in the Church nearly 500 years after Jesus Christ, was an eminent teacher of rhetoric before his conversion. He carried over what he felt was useful from that body of secular education to his ministry in writing, preaching and counseling. The church utilized the ancient trivium and quadrivium to advance education in the context of Christianity. In the last two centuries, education emerged in the west separated into secular (state and private), and religious (sectarian and private). Coexistence has not always been friendly. In my lifetime, the public institutions have surpassed the private in student numbers in higher education. This appears largely to be due to funding from government and growing secularism unencumbered by admitted religious values in social life. Religion has fallen into privacy, in the interpreted version of separation of church and state.
Education has gradually evolved from education for life development (the liberal arts), to the domination of specialized training for life occupation. This latter emphasis increased in the twentieth century. In casual conversations with parents of students, one is impressed at the accent of parents that education should prepare their children for more lucrative occupations than would be the case if they did not seek a college degree. The common first degrees are Bachelor of Arts, but the occupational focus is increasing and the liberal arts education is somewhat reduced in that marketable specialization. In the development of society, the responsibility of an industry to develop its personnel has moved to the educational institutions. With monetary reward presumed, the shift is understandable, even if the purist would prefer the model that education is for the development of the person. Some aspect of the old indenture, as a lad to a sea captain or a bookkeeper to a banker, has gone by the way. In high school I was invited to a modern type of program then developed by the Ford Motor Co., and one from Goodyear. We called it, The Flying Squadron. The young adults entered, and would move from department to department learning about the skills needed by the company. These may have gone by the way. I have no information if any parts of those programs have been continued. I never hear of them now as we did before World War II.
Professionals, successful in their careers, have told me they did not feel educated. Education, secular or religious, presumably leads to maturity in application. Training leads to skill in some performance toward a product or service – all to excellence (few or no errors). Education, in its high purpose has a religious meaning in its value formation and practices for life. Training relates to high purpose in the use, practice and competency in skills that improve the tools, personal and mechanical, to gain the life context desired. There is a mixture of both change and un-change in the combinations. There is, as there is for many valuables for life, some mystery in the process. The balance is found in that which is sometimes noted as maturity – life rightly directed that seems to move upward. The public seems to be little instructed in the meaning of education and training, and how both may be achieved most effectively. Education through a terminal program is first personal, and afterwards professional in motivation. When we learn of that marriage our lives and meaning are elevated in a sense of personal elevation. *Mark W. Lee, Sr. — 2016, 2020