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short stories - Story about schooling in the future, using video monitors at home


It is about school in the future. In this system, all classes are taught through television and students all learn at home. Students get to decide what classes they wish to attend and teachers get paid by how many students sign up for their courses. As a result, teachers resort to tricks to get attention. One dresses up as a clown, another wears a bikini, etc. There is an older teacher who decides to teach the old-fashioned way. That's all I remember.




Answer



And Madly Teach (1966) by Lloyd Biggle. I have it in The Best from Fantasy and Science Fiction, Sixteenth Series (1967), edited by Edward L. Ferman.


Returning to earth from the primitive Mars colony, experienced teacher Mildred Boltz applies for a teaching position. When she meets the school officials, it is recommended she retire, but she refuses. The superintendent says,



"Classes begin next Monday. I'll assign you to a studio and arrange an engineering conference for you immediately."
"A -- studio? "
"Studio." There was a note of malicious satisfacion in his voice. "You will have approximately forty thousand students."
From a drawer he took two books, one a ponderous volume entitled. TECHNIQUES AND PROCEDURES IN TV TEACHING, and the other, mecha-typed and bound with a plastic spiral, a course outline of tenth-grade English, Northeastern United States School District. "These should contain all the information you'll need," he said.



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