The Quality of a Hogwarts Education

[Bart Lidofsky]

No: HPFGUIDX 188149

rick:
rick:
>> I think the key phrase is "When compared to the Granger's schooling...." 
>> And compared to the US public schools or UK Comprehensive education, a 
>> magical education seems lacking in even the practical skills of basic 
>> mathematics, reading/writing/research, etc.  That make an educated 
>> person and well rounded citizen.
>>
>> On the whole, you're probably right about the US system, but even on a 
>> K-12 basis, this education seems lacking in important skills.
>>     

Bart:
    There's a piece that has been passed around the Internet for a few 
years, a purported 8th grade final examination from 1895. Although most 
kids, or even adults, would have a lot of problems with that exam, a 
major reason why (as pointed out by Snopes 
<http://www.snopes.com/language/document/1895exam.asp>) is that many of 
the questions in the exam have far less or even no relevance to life in 
21st century America (or Great Britain).

    Similarly, the Wizarding World, while occupying some of the same 
space as the Muggle world, has been separated from it. Information that 
is considered important to Muggles is far less relevant in the Wizarding 
World. Now, it is true that students at Hogwarts are expected to have 
basic proficiency in certain areas, such as reading, writing, some basic 
arithmetic, and research skills (and one wonders how they get this, 
other than those who had been attending Muggle schools), but much 
information that is important to Muggles is just irrelevant to Wizards. 
For example, the history of rule of law and democracy in Great Britain 
is very important to create a well-rounded citizen; to member of the 
Wizarding World, it is probably a level of importance as knowledge of 
the detailed history of the Indian caste system is in Great Britain. 
Also, recall that we see things mostly through the eyes of Harry, who is 
interested in practical applications of magic, but has little use for 
theory. OWLS also appear to be based on practice rather than theory; it 
is really only in Slughorn's class in HBP that we get a peek at the sort 
of theoretical knowledge the students get. We are as in the dark as 
Harry is when trying to find an ingredient that will allow antidotes to 
multiple poisons work together, much as a more modern advanced high 
school chemistry student would figure out which catalyst will enable a 
certain chemical reaction to occur. But the fact that Harry appears 
clueless belies the fact that there ARE methodologies to figure these 
things out.

    In the New York area, before the Europeans came, the people had a 
lifestyle which considered of an annual trek from one food source to the 
next. It required what would be, by European standards, a very sparse 
population in which to work, but work, it did; although the people had 
to make their living circumstances very portable, the population 
remained stable, and the workload was very light; people had a lot of 
leisure time that was spent in creative pursuits, and war was rare, and 
most of what we consider to be crimes were almost non-existent, due to 
lack of motives.

    Now, this lifestyle certainly had its own problems; it was very 
sensitive to global climate change (such as the little Ice Age in the 
14th century), and also, due to reasons outside the relevance of this, 
the population was almost disease-free; European diseases virtually 
wiped them out long before European weapons were used on the remnants.

    The people of the Wizarding World seem much like this. Many of the 
careers are more avocations than vocations. Consider the Weasley's, a 
"poor" family. Although they can't buy many luxuries, they have a 
spacious house with enough land for the kids to play Quidditch, Molly 
doesn't have to earn a salary to make ends meet, there's plenty to eat, 
and, to all accounts, the food is good, and it seems the worst thing 
they have to deal with is buying things second hand rather than new, and 
Arthur works at a job he loves (and it has been stated he could earn 
more if he was willing to switch to a less enjoyable job).

    Now, there is a dichotomy between the Potterverse and the world in 
which the reader lives. Although the WW in the Potterverse is supposed 
to be secret, there does seem to be some crossover between the 
Muggleverse and the WW (we do not see, for example, the problems 
involved in a mixed marriage; from a WW point of view, a Muggle spouse 
is severely handicapped). We don't know how Hermione's parents learned 
about the WW. However, I would suspect that the attitude of Muggle 
parents in finding out that their children are going to be welcome in 
the WW is similar to what their attitude would be if they found out that 
their child was member of the aristocracy, and was offered a position 
and education befitting a member.

    Bart


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