Online Encyclopedia
John Taylor Gatto
John Taylor Gatto is a retired school teacher of 30 years, and author of several books on education. He is an activist against compulsory schooling.
Biography
Gatto was born in Monongahela, Pennsylvania. In his youth, he attended public schools in Swissvale, Monongahela, and Uniontown, as well as a Catholic boarding school in Latrobe. He did undergraduate work at Cornell, the University of Pittsburgh, and Columbia, then served in the U.S. Army medical corps at Fort Knox, Kentucky, and Fort Sam Houston, Texas. Following army service he did graduate work at the City University of New York, Hunter College, Yeshiva, the University of California, and Cornell.
He worked as a writer and held several odd jobs before becoming a teacher. During his career he was named Teacher of the Year three times. In 1991, he wrote a letter to the op-ed pages of the Wall Street Journal announcing his retirement, saying that he "[did] not want to hurt children anymore". He then began a public speaking career, and has received several awards from libertarian organizations. He promotes homeschooling, and specifically unschooling.
Works
- Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Schooling (1992)
- The Exhausted School (1993)
- A Different Kind of Teacher (2000)
- The Underground History Of American Education (2001)