Coconut Thinking School Isn’t Broken, It’s Working Exactly as Designed
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Oct 14, 2025 The discussion dives into the real purpose of schools, revealing their role in sorting and maintaining social hierarchies. It challenges the myth of meritocracy, highlighting how cultural capital often sustains inequality. The podcast questions traditional competency models, suggesting they simply reshape existing power structures. By emphasizing situated knowledge over transferable skills, it proposes a shift towards learning that contributes meaningfully to life and community. Ultimately, it calls for a redefinition of success based on care and contribution.
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School As A Sorting Machine
- Benjamin Freud argues school still performs its original function of sorting and legitimizing social hierarchies.
- The myth of meritocracy sustains consent by showcasing rare individual climbs while reproducing overall inequality.
Change Has Real Costs
- Real systemic change in schooling carries costs for those who hold cultural and symbolic capital.
- Freud warns that challenging credentials, grades, and prestige will disorient elites and society at large.
Reforms Can Reinforce Power
- Competency and mastery models often preserve existing power because someone still defines what counts as mastery.
- Assessment reforms can repaint the same hierarchy if they keep centralized judgment and ranking.