This time on The Creative Collide, Philip Patston reflects on the state of education and the place of creativity.

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Education. It's been in the news a lot lately.

In New Zealand we've been talking about fining parents for truancy. In the US they've been talking about firing teachers for poor student performance.

The NZ Government has just announced it will stop funding universities and university students when they fail and will no longer give interest-free loans.

Not very creative.

Sir Ken Robinson, an international creativity expert, believes schools fail to recognise — much less cultivate — the talents of many brilliant people. He says schools kill creativity.

Dr Edward de Bono, widely regarded as the world's leading authority in the field of creative and conceptual thinking, says academia has no place in creating the future. It can only analyse the past.

But, in order to create a constructive future, we need to engage design thinking.

Our very own Gordon McLaughlin points out that, if technology had progressed at the speed of education, we'd still be using typewriters (and not electric ones). And this blog would be photocopied.

I think education is in a crisis. At best it's a system of extreme control; at worst it's prison for children. Even at tertiary level it works against creativity and individuality, requiring students to conform to a highly regulated system of theoretical nepotism.

Are the daily 30,000 truants wrong? Or is the system wrong?

I think education lacks creativity. I think music, drama, dance, visual art, multimedia, theatre, comedy and any other creative expression is at least if not more important than the three R's.

Sir Ken agrees with me and articulates it extremely well in the video below, so you can watch him instead of me this time.

What about you? As a creative, do you, like me, shout at the TV every time there's a news item about education?

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