Vision 2020 - education in a mess

I had an interesting email exchange with Raul Bermudez at 3:30 am today. He sent an email referring to a Minister's pronouncement on the Trinidad and Tobago Vision 20/20 plan - supposed to make T&T reach Developed Nation status by the year 2020. Here it is: By the year 2020, Trinidad and Tobago will be a united, resilient, productive, innovative and prosperous nation; With a disciplined, caring, fun-loving society; Comprising healthy, happy and well-educated people and Built on the enduring attributes of self-reliance, respect, tolerance, equity and integrity; in which: Every citizen has equal opportunities to achieve his fullest potential; All citizens enjoy a high quality of life, where quality healthcare is available to all and where safe, peaceful, environmentally-friendly communities are maintained; All citizens are assured of a sound, relevant education system tailored to meet the human resource needs of a modern, progressive, technologically advancing nation; Optimum use is made of all the resources of the nation; The family as the foundation of the society contributes to its growth, development and stability; There is respect for the rule of law and human rights and the promotion of the principles of democracy; The diversity and creativity of all its people are valued and nurtured. So he wrote me that: [This is] Typical back to front thinking. Create a society in which... Every citizen has equal opportunities to achieve his fullest potential; All citizens enjoy a high quality of life, where quality healthcare is available to all and where safe, peaceful, environmentally-friendly communities are maintained; All citizens are assured of a sound, relevant education system tailored to meet the human resource needs of a modern, progressive, technologically advancing nation; Optimum use is made of all the resources of the nation; The family as the foundation of the society contributes to its growth, development and stability; There is respect for the rule of law and human rights and the promotion of the principles of democracy; The diversity and creativity of all its people are valued and nurtured. ...and perhaps by the year 2020, Trinidad and Tobago will be a united, resilient, productive, innovative and prosperous nation; With a disciplined, caring, fun-loving society; Comprising healthy, happy and well-educated people and Built on the enduring attributes of self-reliance, respect, tolerance, equity and integrity; To pretend that it will happen any other way is wrong. While agreeing with the back-to-front-ness of the original post, I had one major complaint. The education portion states: "All citizens are assured of a sound, relevant education system tailored to meet the human resource needs of a modern, progressive, technologically advancing nation;" But They leave out the really important part of education - it's not to meet human resource needs that are dictated by companies, but to educate the population to be ready to learn life-long, to value knowledge, to respect the knowledge of the ages, to contribute in the arts, science; to foster a culture of intellectual curiosity and rigour; to create thinking citizens with an understanding of their role in a democratic society (hint - it's not to call in to the radio, but to understand the issues and work to make our government responsive to and a servant of the people) etc If we only "met the HR needs" - would any school teach Shakespeare or Derek Walcott? What about pure science? What about theatre arts, sports, craft, civics? This distresses me.