Democratic Education (An Exploration)

I was sitting in one of my engineering classes, reviewing at the time for an upcoming test. When one of my classmates proposed how to make a problem more interesting, which also made it much more difficult. I called out that said classmate, and later the problem, was "fired". That got me thinking about what it would be like if students could vote on decisions about their educations. What would a democratic education process be like?

Imagine an education system where students could vote on when they took tests, what would be on them, and a system in which they could elect to remove a certain number of questions from the tests. Or extend it even further, to a system where they also decided what they learned at all. Such a system would have to have some checks and balances, with students not having say in who their teachers were, like the original role of senators who were chosen by the governors.

Such a system would be too likely to result in a system not unlike mobocracy, controlled by the popular, like the cheerleaders and jocks, with education determined and catering to those that are often referred to as the lowest common denominator. Peer pressure would take on a whole new dimension, with many of those that might want more knuckling under, for fear of retribution.

Would different tiers arise, the minority that wanted a proper education strongly enough to do something about it having separate classes? Or, would the education system take on a more political feel, with opposing political parties representing the groups already mentioned? For ease of discussion, let's call the first party described the Common Party, and the later the Scholar Party. The Commons would have physical strength and intimidation on their side, but the Scholars would not be without their own resources. With greater knowledge and intelligence comes more tools, and the Scholars would likely display more cunning strategy. Student government would become much more complex.

And like the American political system is dominated by the Democratic and Republican parties, but has its minorities like the Green and Constitutional Parties, would this system have its own equivalent? Perhaps there would be an Authoritarian Party, whose agenda would be to see the control and decision-making power over the education system being given over to the teachers.

After proposing these ideas and posing these questions, I should clarify that I do not intend to promote the adoption of such a system, nor to make veiled criticism as democracy. This is merely an exploration of an idea.