RUNNING HEAD: COMMERCIALISM AND THE GLOBAL ECONOMY IN SCHOOLS 1

Commercialism and the Global Economy in Schools:

What Happened to Citizenship?

Lisa Howell

The University of Ottawa

COMMERCIALISM AND THE GLOBAL ECONOMY IN SCHOOLS 2

Abstract

This paper explores the decline of citizenship education as related to the rise in commercialism and

corporate influence in schools. The evolution of citizenship education is briefly outlined and the

reasons for its decline are explored. Financial constraints of the public education system, standardized

testing and a strong vocational mandate are cited as reasons why schools have become vulnerable to

corporate influence. The paper examines the effect that this influence has had on students and society

and suggests that there is a strong need to reintroduce citizenship education. The paper argues that

citizenship education will provide immunity to the corporate world in which students are undeniably a

part of. Citizenship education will prepare students to be aware of, to question and to be critical of the

issues that surround them, thus benefiting our global community.

COMMERCIALISM AND THE GLOBAL ECONOMY IN SCHOOLS 3

Commercialism and the Global Economy in Schools:

What Happened to Citizenship?

Schools are facing challenges today that would have many of the founders of public education

rolling in their graves. Standardized testing, lack of funding, few resources, over-sized classes and

specialist cut-backs (to name a few) are contributing to a growing crisis in our education system and

are ultimately impacting the foundations of schooling. Although preparing students for citizenship was

the “very reason why the state compelled parents to send their children to school in the first place”

(Osborne, 2000, p. 1) citizenship education is being undermined, under taught and undervalued in

many of our schools. There is no doubt that there are many reasons why citizenship is no longer

actively expected or achieved in many educational systems, especially considering that “for years,

champions of high-stakes testing and mandatory curriculum standards have invoked a need to ratchet

up the skills of future employees” (Kohn, 2007, p.1) rather than to prepare students for engagement in

civic life. Why are schools so concerned with producing workers rather than “citizens”? If schools are

in the business of creating workers, who then has a say in the curriculum students are learning and, as

importantly, what they are not learning? I will argue that the greatest threat to the engagement of

students in democratic education is the fact that in light of financial constraints and the push to create

“workers” rather than citizens, many schools are becoming corporate partners rather than public

learning places. This shift has meant that “corporate ideology ultimately undermines the democracy our

schools purportedly serve...corporations are out for themselves, whereas democratic citizens, ideally,

are out for each other” ( Kovacs, 2005, p.1). Authentic citizenship education, therefore, is left in the

dust of corporate sponsored lessons, brand loyalty and a curriculum that is driven by corporations.

When we allow our students to become the targets of marketers rather than the critics of it, we are

certainly not preparing them for citizenship, but rather, we are selling them out, quite literally. I will

argue that democratic citizenship education provides our students with the critical skills of thinking and

COMMERCIALISM AND THE GLOBAL ECONOMY IN SCHOOLS 4

critiquing that will allow them to understand and perhaps contest the corporate influences that surround

them. If schools are in fact in the business of developing learners and thinkers and not only consumers

and skilled workers, then a proper curriculum for democracy requires both the study and the practice of

democracy (Parker, 2005, p.351).

The idea that schools were founded to develop democratic citizens is well documented

and explicitly evident in the curricula of the past. Educationalist John Dewey wrote:

The essence of the demand for freedom is the need of conditions which will enable an

individual to make his own special contribution to a group interest, and to partake of its

activities in such ways that social guidance shall be a matter of his own mental attitude,

and not a mere authoritative dictation of his acts. (1916, p. 352)

John Dewey was among the first to argue that the purpose of education was to prepare students

for civic engagement by engaging them in life itself. Indeed, many other academic theorists

such as John Stuart Mills and T.H. Green had very undemocratic educations in terms of process

but had a deep acquaintance with history, philosophy and literature and the capacity to pursue

their ideas (Osborne, 2000, p. 15). It would seem, then, that rich subject content as well as

opportunities for experience, critical thinking and questioning are part of Dewey’s vision of

democratic citizenship. Although many of the first schools in Canada and around the world may

have been seen as undemocratic in this view, “from their very beginnings public schools in

Canada, as in other countries, were expected to prepare the young for citizenship” (Osborne,

2000, p. 1). At schools, students were taught not only subject content, but also cultural and

social expectations. Students were taught how to be good citizens and thinkers. British

Columbia socialist Angus McInnis wrote in 1924 that “education, even present-day education,

with all its defects tends to stimulate the imagination and sharpen the perceptions of those who

COMMERCIALISM AND THE GLOBAL ECONOMY IN SCHOOLS 5

receive it; and under adverse conditions they begin to question the fitness of things” (Barman,

1988, p.20). Although there was much disagreement on what citizenship was and how it should

be taught, most agreed that educating young people for citizenship was an important goal. For

much of the twentieth century, therefore, “educationists paid conspicuous and continuing

attention to the role of schools in producing citizens.” (Osborne, 2000, p. 2)

By the early 1980’s, most Canadian schools saw a movement away from this fundamental

principal of educating citizens. As the new global economy became increasingly powerful,

schools responded by becoming highly vocational in content and methodology so as to produce

highly skilled workers for the economy. This vocational orientation stresses the “promotion of

self-interest with little emphasis on the promotion of the public good” (Bruno-Jofre & Henley,

2000, p. 39). Although some schools engage in citizenship-like activities such as character edu-

cation, virtue education, student councils, environmentalism and peer helpers, at the “policy-

making level the talk was increasingly on international competitiveness and entrepreneurialism”

(Osborne, 2000, p. 2). Moreover, when we allow schools to become “venues for commercial

activity, we downgrade the educational experience by teaching kids — implicitly and explicitly

— that competition and consumerism are just as, if not more important than, cooperation and

citizenship” (Repo and Shaker, 2006, p.84). This cohesion of school with the global economy

has opened the door for corporate agendas to take the desk at the front of the classroom rather

than the ideas, interests and needs of the local school community. In his article, “Bill Gates and

the Corporatization of American ‘Public’ Schools”, Philip Kovacs (2005) writes:

One can’t help but wonder how increasing achievement will prepare students for citizen-

ship. Arguably, the best way to improve citizenship is to send children out into the com-

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munity as citizens…this, of course, is not the type of education that Gates and other

business leaders are after, as they need number crunchers whipped into shape by the pro-

verbial raised bar. (p. 1-2)

Aside from citizenship education being isolated to the realms of social studies or extra-cur-

ricular activity, this push to transform schools into training grounds has also brought with it

standardized testing. Schools and politicians are indeed eager to find out how their “future eco-

nomies” will perform. Standardized testing requires teachers and students to spend much of

their time preparing for the tests, which are in Mathematics and Language Arts. Little time is

left for other subjects, such as citizenship, art or even recess, “all in the name of spending more

time on task” (Kovacs, 2005, p. 2). Countries compare standardized tests internationally as they

look to determine how their future generations will compete in the global economy. The results

of standardized testing, and the goals of the global economy, inform the curriculum, leaving out

fast areas of knowledge. Knowledge such as history, the arts and

philosophy; knowledge that indeed sculpted many of the minds of our great theorists.

The immense pressures of standardized testing also leave schools prey to corporate incentive

programs, such as Pizza Hut’s “Book it!” Program to boost test scores (Garcia & Molnar, 2006,

p. 78). Corporations have yet another door to enter into our schools; using rewards to motivate

students to achieve more, attend school more often and become better skilled-workers. In

“Empty Calories: Commercializing activities in America’s Schools”, Alex Molnar and David

Garcia (2005) write:

A relatively new phenomenon that helps to promote commercialism in schools is the

role played by the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB). The increasing emphasis

on test scores as measures of achievement and on numerical accountability measures has

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created a context in which incentive programs may be particularly enticing for schools

seeking to boost those test scores. NCLB’s consideration of attendance rates also has led

to attendance-incentive programs in some schools. (p. 4)

Exacerbating the issues of testing and the drive to create a strong future economy is the fact

that schools have also experienced financial constraint due to chronic underfunding that “leaves

them vulnerable to commercial influence — the “money must come from somewhere” theory of

education funding (Repo & Shaker, 2006, p.78). Molnar and Garcia (2006) state that “the

reduction of public funds available to schools and the desire of corporations to be visible in

schools have produced a climate in which inadequate public funding is accepted as normal and

corporate dollars are eagerly sought” (p. 78). When we allow corporations to bring their

advertisement- laden materials into our schools, we are not engaging our students in this type of

critical engagement that promotes the discussion that Dewey and his counterparts see as the

forefront of democratic education. What we do instead is expose them to a biased view that

teaches them what to know and therefore, what to think. In “The 500-Pound Gorilla” education

critic Alfie Kohn (2002) muses:

It’s worth thinking about how corporate sponsorship is likely to affect what is included –

and not included – in these lessons. How likely is it that the makers of Clearasil would

emphasize that how you feel about yourself should not primarily be a function of how

you look? Or consider a hypothetical unit on nutrition underwritten by Kraft General

Foods (or by McDonald’s or Coca-Cola): would you expect to find any mention of the

fact that the food you prepare yourself is likely to be more nutritious than processed

products in boxes and jars and cans? Or that the best way to quench your thirst is

actually to drink water? Or that a well-balanced diet requires little or no meat? Or that

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smoking causes cancer? (Kraft General Foods -- and Nabisco, for that matter -- are

owned by a tobacco company.) (Para 7).

Corporate-sponsored lessons leave out information and are quite often misinforming. They

present a biased and incomplete look at products and are self-serving to the corporations, not to

the students. Why would we want our lessons to serve a corporation rather than our students?

What does this say about the way we view them, our education system and ourselves as

educators? Is our mission of providing the best education for all students compatible with

practices that offer those students up as an “untapped point of entry” to marketers? (as cited in

Molnar and Garcia, 2006, p. 82) Could we indeed do something different, and better? Could we

look at corporate-sponsored lessons with a critical eye and deconstruct them to understand the

subtleties and the dangers? Could we engage students in conversations about what is indeed left

out and why? Could we elicit debate in our classrooms about commercialism in schools? Could

we encourage our students to become engaged in the political movement to monitor and protect

our schools from commercialism? Would this constitute citizenship education?

It would seem so. Findings from the International Association for the Evaluation of

Educational Achievement (IEA) study of 90,000 students in 28 countries advances the

importance of issues discussions in open classroom climate (as cited in Hess, 2004, p. 257) In

an open classroom climate, “students experience their classrooms as places to investigate issues

and explore their opinions and those of their peers” (Hess, 2004, p. 258). In the world of

corporate-funded schools and skilled-geared curriculums, however, the open classroom climate

of discussion may be dangerous for the political agenda and the corporations that see schools as

prime targets for reaching-and teaching- consumers. The fact is that classrooms which promote

discussion, criticalness, questioning, wondering and curiosity are preparing students to think,

COMMERCIALISM AND THE GLOBAL ECONOMY IN SCHOOLS 9

and, as Dewey said, “anyone who has begun to think, places some portion of the world in

jeopardy”. (as cited in Martin & Loomis, 2006, p. 50) Indeed this was the case at a New

England high school as described in this passage by Repo and Shaker (2006):

When a student at a New England high school attended a mandatory school assembly

where students were instructed by uniformed McDonald’s employees about job

interview skills, he took the opportunity to outline some of his criticism of the

corporation. For this, he was publicly reprimanded, forced to write a written apology to

the McDonald’s representative, and then, under threat of suspension, required to go on

the school P.A. system (which all students have to listen to) and apologize to the school

and the McDonald’s representative for his statements about McDonald’s and for

disrupting the assembly. (p.74)

This is a terribly sad outcome of a student’ who had the ability to think critically and to seek

engagement in dialogue and debate. Why was the student not applauded for his desire to think

and ask questions? Instead, he was forced to apologize over the P.A. system, thereby giving

each and every other student the explicit message on behalf of the school: Don’t think. Don’t

ask questions. That is not the purpose of school. Do not dissent, not even politely.

Unfortunately, examples of corporate influence explicitly hindering the pursuit of student

discussion and debate are numerous. Corporate influence of this nature seems to directly

contradict to the research findings of the International Association for the Evaluation of

Educational Achievement, which reports that “open classroom climate for discussion is a

significant predictor of civic knowledge, support for democratic values, participation in political

discussion and political engagement” (Hess, 2004, p. 258) The student who spoke critically

COMMERCIALISM AND THE GLOBAL ECONOMY IN SCHOOLS 10

about MacDonald’s and was subsequently reprimanded for it is, regrettably, not alone. In 1998,

a Georgia High school student was suspended for wearing a Pepsi t-shirt on “Coke in Education

Day” which was part of a larger promotional “Team up with Coca-Cola Contest.” ( Repo and

Shaker, 2004, p.74) The situations involving these two students underline that schools, under

the influence of corporate funding, act to restrict their student’s rights to freedom of speech and

dress to protect their sponsored programs and corporate involvement.

We live in the era of corporate-driven policies, consumerism, standardized testing and

financial cutbacks to education. These issues have all seeped into our schools, informing our

curriculums and shaping what we do and do not teach. We seem to have forgotten that students

will grow up to be not only consumers and workers that participate in the global economy, but

they will also be part of the world. If we expect our global economy to thrive, we need

successful societies that include social policies, political and electoral involvement, appreciation

and engagement of the arts and an evolving history that is indeed woven by us all. Educating

students to live in the real world and have the capability to problem-solve, make complex

decisions and ultimately contribute to a community is immunity in today’s world of corporate

influence. We know that many situations in our contemporary society lead to the erosion of the

collective community. Our quest for individualism has created an inward turning that produces

competiveness, self-sufficiency and whose “self-centres undermines his or her citizen identity,

causing it to wither or to never take root in the first place. Private gain is the goal, and the

community had better not get in the way” (Parker, 2005, p.344).

Aside from placing our students in the hands of the marketers, commercialism in schools

targets the democratic foundations of public education. In his article, “What’s wrong with

commercialization of public education?” Larry Kuehn asserts that the ultimate problem of

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commercialism in schools is that it undermines the principles of democracy: “The public

schools are an integral part of the institutions of democracy. Democracy requires public space,

places where debate and discussion inform decision-making. And it requires education that

prepares people to participate as critical citizens in that public space” (2003, para. 1).

Commercialism and corporate influence in our schools is part of the systemic erosion of our

collective communities and democratic spaces. To ensure that we are educating to build

community, we must educate to build and strengthen communities, not corporations. Creating

classrooms that foster open-mindedness, dialogue, critical response, compassion and a sense of

helping others builds community. It ensures that students will have the chance to speak their

minds, engage in “controversial” issues and think beyond the text. It immunizes them to the

corporate world, encourages them to be “conscious consumers” and prepares them to become

the well-rounded citizens, not only workers that this global community so desperately needs.

COMMERCIALISM AND THE GLOBAL ECONOMY IN SCHOOLS 12

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