What is Robert Gagne

In recent years, politics have become more and more intertwined with education, often leading to non-academic curriculum control. This is most apparent than in the fields of high school education in subject matters such as science, sex education, and racial studies, but is not limited to these subjects nor limited to the high school level of education. Furthermore, this influence-seeking is not just limited to politics and politicians, but can also be found in the form of money and donors seeking to influence specific curricula or programs. This form of influence-seeking threatens the entire nation's intellectual freedom as it can happen entirely outside of the democratic process. Developing programs requires instructors to take several factors into consideration, and politics should not be one of them. These factors can be viewed as critical components of program development for education instructors. Without adequately addressing critical components such as program history, curriculum theory, curriculum philosophies, curriculum processes, as well as program and curriculum implementation and evaluation, education instructors will fail to develop sound/meaningful programs. This chapter will shed light on relevant information about program and curriculum development on its history, theory, philosophies of development, processes, implementation, and evaluation. The value of such as review is to assist those individuals seeking a teaching credential in education to have confidence to blend program development with their prior occupational knowledge and skills. The chapter will also examine caveats and dangers when social and political constructs are overlaid in comportments.