Dr. Medford Evans served as an administrative officer on the project to build the first atomic bomb and authored the book The Secret War for the A-Bomb in 1953. As a teacher and professor, Dr. Evans was a strong supporter of the liberal arts tradition, but saw first hand the decline in quality liberal arts instruction in America. A conservative critic and author, Dr. Evans wrote frequently for American Opinion magazine, frequently on the subject of education. One of his most important essays on the subject was entitled "What Are We Teaching Our Children." His observations cast light on the development of trends in education since the 1960s. American Opinion Foundation is proud to present the unabridged text of Dr. Evans' important essay.

What Are We Teaching Our Children?
By Medford Evans

The Children referred to by my title include those of college age. In fact, I shall give them my chief attention. This is, first, because I know more about what is going on in the colleges than elsewhere. But it is also because what is taught in the colleges determines what will be taught in other parts of our educational system. Some of our lower schools plan their course and courses with a careful eye on college entrance for their graduates. Virtually all teachers in these lower schools come out of our colleges. So, while all parts of the system are interdependent, I believe that the character of our elementary and high schools, and also the character of our professional and graduate schools, depend even more on the character of our colleges than the colleges do on them. However, I shall not belabor the point, for this article will deal to some extent with all levels of education.

In trying to answer our question, I suggest, to start with, that inevitably we are teaching something of the arts and sciences, and that we are teaching certain attitudes. Therefore, in order to make comparisons, we can break down the question as follows. Are we teaching the same arts and sciences as elsewhere, or formerly? Are we teaching as much, or more, or less, of those arts and sciences? Are we inculcating the same attitudes? Are we more thorough or less thorough in that inculcation or indoctrination?

By the arts I mean skills. Painting is an art. Reading, writing, and arithmetic are arts. Woodworking and car-driving are arts. You will observe that I have listed three kinds of arts—usually called, respectively, the fine arts, the liberal arts, and the practical arts. In architecture the three would all be combined.

By the sciences I mean areas of knowledge. Astronomy and botany are sciences. So are history and geography. Many of our most important subjects of study—including, I believe, the subjects of all of the professions—blend art and science. Those disciplines which we think of first as science, such as physics and chemistry, depend to a large degree on the experimental method; and the formulation and conducting of experiments is quite an art. On the other hand, we can hardly imagine anyone's practicing the fine arts, or even the practical arts, in a significant or useful way, without the background of some more or less concentrated fund of knowledge—which means some degree of science. Most strikingly, in the liberal arts like mathematics or the languages, it is impossible to draw a hard and fast line between the knowledge of them, which is science, and the ability to use them well, which is art.

With these definitions to stand on, therefore, let's now restate one part of our question. Are we teaching less or more of the arts and sciences than a generation ago? In answering this question it is customary for conservatives and eggheads (who agree on nothing else) to say that we are teaching less; and for organization liberals, especially those representing teachers' colleges, to say that we are teaching more.

Quite often, the organization liberals will admit that the average level of teaching in the college or high school today, or even in the elementary school, is lower than formerly. But they will immediately point out that the benefits of some kind of education are reaching so many more people that the total quantity of raw education is bound to be far greater; and that the modern system is more democratic. Frequently, even the conservatives and the eggheads will somewhat grudgingly concede that there is something to this analysis. But they mutter under their breath that they are not at all sure that so much democracy is a Good Thing. This heresy threatens to throw the organization liberals into such a state of shock that the conservatives and even the eggheads themselves tend to panic and to retreat from the whole discussion.