[-empyre-] Can you give us a little more insight?

[Sean Dockray]

Briefly, we say that The Public School is a school with no curriculum.  
Which means that the curriculum comes out of the people participating  
in the school, in the life of the school. Because teachers, students,  
and administrators are constantly switching places, sometimes several  
times in a day, it's not simply the class, but the whole curriculum,  
the entire "institution" that is part of the regular discussions. Lots  
of people make the project. The Public School works by asking people  
to propose classes that they wanted to take (or teach); and then  
others can begin saying their interested, having discussions, sharing  
resources, etc; and then the classes that seem the most vital or  
timely or provocative are scheduled. There is no disciplinary  
framework (the school is not accredited and it has nothing to do with  
the public school system in the US) which means the people involved  
often come from different places and can have significantly different  
investments in the subject matter. Unlike online learning which uses  
the internet to broadcast classes, to disperse the classroom, we're  
more interested in using it as a way of getting people together, in  
trying to activate the radical potential of the classroom.

Although they are independent, AAAARG and The Public School do have a  
relationship that's both conceptual and technical. Practically,  
classes at The Public School can use an "issue" from AAAARG as a  
syllabus. A few examples of this (accessible from the AAAARG tab right  
under the class title):

Kultural Kapital -- http://la.thepublicschool.org/class/1326
UC Strikes and Beyond -- http://la.thepublicschool.org/class/1856
Economies of Attention -- http://la.thepublicschool.org/class/1445
Queer Technologies -- http://la.thepublicschool.org/class/64
Performance/ Performativity/ Enactment -- http://la.thepublicschool.org/class/1515

But this also means that as classes happen at The Public School, the  
people involved with that class will scan and upload readings to add  
to the syllabus. On the AAAARG side of things, if the issue is shared,  
then that means anyone can add a text into it (for example, I made the  
Kultural Kapital issue "shared" and then someone added Jason Read's  
"Micro-Politics of Capital" text). It's a double movement into and out  
of the discussion of the class.

The Public School is obviously localized (in several cities), relative  
to AAAARG. But hopefully the class webpages themselves can be a  
resource to groups of people anywhere who want to do the same class.  
We don't record classes or broadcast them or anything (partly because  
it is usually boring to watch, but mostly because it impedes the  
physical meeting as people futz with technology or hold their tongue)  
but we do try and circulate the class idea itself and perhaps some  
material and organizing discussion. I know that Kultural Kapital has  
happened, or is happening now, in at least 2 other places!

So to respond to your question a little more generally, Renate, AAAARG  
predates The Public School by a few years, but both are motivated by a  
certain tendency towards self-education and engaged autonomy (Charles  
Esche?). They are both collaborative to the point that the each has a  
life of its own.

Finally, I've been thinking more recently about "resources," how we  
might produce them and how their existence might change things. So, by  
resources, I simply mean something that is shared and useful (shared  
with and useful to whom is an open question). Producing resources  
could just be an act of designation; or maybe it rearranges, removing  
from one sphere of life and inserting into another; or by creating new  
knowledge, or making restricted knowledge available. Put together,  
these actions generate common resources. Given some of what has been  
making the news over the past year (at California public higher  
education, Middlesex Philosophy Department, for-profit colleges  
absorbing federal aid, Puerto Rico, just to rattle off a scattered  
few) or the larger financial trends over the past few decades, it  
seems appropriate to think about - resources as a part of strategic  
withdrawl.

Sean

PS: for a couple more days.


On Jun 3, 2010, at 6:52 AM, Renate Ferro wrote:

> Morgan and Sean,  I just read both links and am fascinated by your  
> project.
> Can you explain both the AAAARG and The Public School?  What's the
> relationship between the two specifically.  And the AAARG site is  
> static
> right now?  Renate
>
>