General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: A 13-Year-Old's Slavery Analogy Raises Some Uncomfortable Truths in School [View all]patrice
(47,992 posts)which, in a significant minority of instances, IS to manipulate/game their entire social context. And, given who/what the rest of us/it is, (and despite that fact that in at least some cases their academic skills may even be kind of low) they are intuitive masters at using others.
With the caveat that there are different kinds of power so power positions shift and anyone in any power position bears the majority (by this or that margin) of the responsibility for what's happening - there's blame enough to go around for everyone. However, in the case of learning in particular, learning CAN'T be done TO you (no amount of power makes it happen), you must do it yourself, and the first step is to begin by admitting one's own errors and that would include the error of expecting others to make it happen. That goes for both teachers and students, with the student's degree of responsibility progressing with their maturity.