I do not feel that corporate culture has a place in the classroom. I feel that popular culture can be used to enhance lessons, but that corporate culture should not claim schools as a new battleground to fight their brand wars. If nowhere else is exempt from commercials and brands, then school should be.

Schools already face a battle. They face the battle of how to educate students while competing with brands and logos. Students are obsessed with how they look, how they dress and what others are wearing. Even the most non-conformist in choosing to non conform has to consider what they are not conforming to. Teachers have to entertain the masses that have grown up entertained. It is already hard enough for a teacher to reach their students. For a brand to then come in and offer this entertainment through televisions with mandatory commercial breaks, computers that mean students have to serve the mighty dell god, or sponsors for sports teams that means certain logos aren't allowed in schools, then this makes the job of educating these students so much harder. The three 'r's already have competition from the outside world. To then embrace this outside world and allow it to take over the classroom then we have allowed ourselves to lose the war.

Corporate culture in the classroom provides restrictions. A teacher cannot bring in something of the competitors if they are supposed to only use their sponsors products. This can eliminate learning opportunities if they are not sporting the right brand. And chances are, if something has been sponsored - a sports team, a classroom or drink machines, then there are strings attached. And so time that could be spent in the practice of learning is then spent fulfilling obligations to the company that so 'generously' donated the item. We already have such a limited time in the classroom and such a limited time to impart knowledge, especially with school sponsored fun days and weeks, that to allow corporations to take away more of this time could be considered amiss.

Schools are supposed to be a safe place for students. They are places that students should be able to go to learn about different topics and feel that they are safe when they do this. Yet, it is not just physical safety that has to be protected. It is emotional safety and the feeling that they are their own person. We spend so much time teaching them about not talking to strangers and that their body is their own. We tell them not to take drugs as they will take over your body and your mind and could hurt you. We teach them about striking individuals in history that made a difference. And, if we let corporate culture in, then we are negating all that we teach them. If we allow a corporation to brand our students, dictating that to get money, their sports teams must wear a swoosh, then we are branding their appearance. If we let the cola wars get played out in our hallways, we are letting students know that they can put things in their body if it is in the right can. And, in bring in corporate culture with its strings, we are not allowing for individuality and could be stifling their potential. Just ask the student who got suspended for wearing a Pepsi shirt on coke day. If you fight the corporation then you will get burned. Is this what we want to teach our students about school? I think not.

School is a place that we keep safe. We don't allow in people with guns, we don't allow students to hurt others, or teachers to hurt them. It should be a place where, without corporate distraction, we can allow our students to grow up, make their own choices and find some peace in the busy world that we live in. They shouldn't be penalized for the clothing they wear or the brand of walkman they decide to use. Instead they should be able to come to school and learn the skills that will get them through life. And corporate gratitude and deification is not what will get them through life. Education is. Education should not be for sale.