學校淪為市場 fw: commercialism in education; Corporate Involvement In Schools:

By the mid 1990s, direct marketing, promotions, and sponsorships actually accounted for 80 percent of marketing dollars.

To entice kids into shilling products to their peers, marketers dangle cash rewards, product samples, or the opportunity to be part of an undercover, trendsetting club. They pitch it as a form of empowerment, telling children “You have a voice that will be heard,” and, “You get cool information before your friends receive it.

Kanner sees advertising as a prime culprit: “Advertising is a massive, multi-million dollar project that’s having an enormous impact on child development.”The result is not only an epidemic of materialistic values among children, but also a “narcissistic wounding” whereby children have become convinced that
they’re inferior if they don’t have an endless array of new products.

Author and Boston College Sociology Professor Juliet Schor finds links between immersion in consumer culture and depression, anxiety, low self-esteem, and conflicts with parents.44 The American Academy of Pediatrics sees a causal connection between increased displays of aggressive behavior and ads aimed at kids for movies, games, and music rife with violent imagery

However, marketers go too far when they use the “parental responsibility”argument to imply that they themselves should not be held accountable for egregious intrusions into children’s lives. Furthermore, marketers are increasingly going out of their way to circumvent parents, seeking out children in venues where parents aren’t present.



Alex Molnar is professor and director of the Center for the Analysis of Commercialism in Education (CACE) at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee. The Center’s website can be found at www.uwm.edu/Dept/CACE.

• Does the board have a policy on commercializing activities in the schools? If not, should
one be developed?
• What criteria should be applied to assess whether a marketing activity is allowed in
schools?
• What impact does marketing in schools have on academic standards?
• Are corporate-sponsored educational materials subject to the same review as other
instructional materials such as text books? Should they be?
• What is the cost of accepting marketing and advertising in the schools in terms of teacher
time, use of facilities, etc.?
• Have the public costs of for-profit management schemes been thoroughly and objectively
calculated?
• What are the respective roles of state boards of education and local school boards in
addressing these questions?
Within the realm of public education, the translation of citizens into consumers and students
into a commercial resource to be harvested for the benefit of private interests would alter
the character of not only America’s schools but American civic culture as well. Whether a
transformation this profound is to be embraced or rejected is a subject worthy of a farreaching
and vigorous public debate. State board members should be key people in
discussing and deciding these issues.