Resistance to change

I have some questions.

Why are schools so resistant to change?

Is it because of the entrenched patterns of institutionalised social relationships in schools? Is it due to the separate culture that grows within a school, binding personalities together and separating the school from the surrounding world? Is it because almost every aspect of our work lives reinforces conservatism? Is it because prior to taking up our first teaching post, we have already been encultured for sixteen years in traditional patterns of thought and practice via our own schooling experiences? To what extent does indifferent teacher education and the abrupt, isolated introduction to the classroom lead us to fall back on the long apprenticeship of observation that we undertook as school students?

Why do students accept the mass custody of the current system and view it as a rite of passage? Why is going to school an important democratic ritual? Why is there a contradiction between the structure of schools and the espoused purpose of schools? Why are schools so passive, and why do they protect the status quo? Has a mechanistic emphasis on reductionist science progressively developed schools into more and more unhealthy institutions? Is the obsession with attendance rates, dropout rates, test scores, and suspension rates an unpleasant parody of Vietnam War body counts? Are accountability, standardisation, and bureaucratisation the only means of controlling the unwieldy structure?