Hey @liber excellent article. What you mention about how the Germans changed the face of education for a reason and with a purpose is very interesting. One has to understand that when they did it, it made sense.
There was no education per se as we see it today. Fathers basically trained their kids to continue with their trade and the family business, be it whatever it was. Then the industrial revolution came and, again, it made kind of sense, to have an educational system that prepared the majority (the minority had mentors and learned many different things through life experience) to work in the big factories of the time.
Then the information age started. Oh, and everything related to the standard compulsory educational system started becoming obsolete. The problem, in my opinion, is that it has become a tradition and the majority of people believe that it has always been that way.
The only solution is to take education into your own hands...yes, I do agree that kids should get some basic and fundamental education, reading, writing, math and other basic stuff like that. But, to be successful in a very fast evolving world, we cannot "just depend" on the government for education. We must use other means at a personal level and, more importantly, we need to develop a mentality of becoming a "lifelong learner". Only so, we'll survive in this modern world.
For instance, everybody should be learning and educating themselves about the blockchain because it will affect all our lives sooner or later.
Thanks @mrbock
The history of education is very very interesting, those that created it treated their children to ivy league exclusive educations that were closer to the older methodology, they read this historical series called great books of the western world that has a lot of philosophy and psychology. Originally the classical education was grammar logic and rhetoric which gave you the ability to learn.
The website www.tragedyandhope.com talks about it in length in their second podcast which changed my life.