Significant Curriculum Issues

THE CURRICULUM WORKER in American schools and colleges encoun ters many complex and difficult issues. This situation results from the opera tion of several factors which it is im portant to recognize and understand. Highly significant is the fact that conflicts in philosophical, sociological, and psychological theories, when ap plied to education, take on practical significance in relation to the curri culum. Ideas about the purposes of education, the nature of learning and of the learner, and the role of the school in the community must l>e in terpreted into courses of action by those who develop the curriculum. Where differences in these basic theories exist, curriculum issues arise; and the sharper the differences, the more critical the issues become. Ours being a time when many such differences exist, the curriculum worker is beset by prob lems. Another contributory factor is the ever-increasing burden of responsibility placed upon the schools. Year after year needs of the young, once met largely by the home and other com munity agencies, have pressed more heavily upon the schools. Excessive ac cident rates on the highway call for driver training by the school, rising divorce rates call for education, in sex and family relations, a rising tide of