School administrators often seem to have a primary goal to make the school (or their little part of it) run smoothly. To be fair, I too find it easier when the things I am in charge of run smoothly. But I also think we mostly learn by trying new things and making mistakes–which is pretty much the definition of “not smooth.” The purpose of a school, it seems to me, is to help students develop into thoughtful, responsible, creative, caring, and disciplined people. Most of that development is messy. But if you just tell people what to do and insist they do it, then even if you’re good at that, all they’ve learned is how to do what you’ve told them to do. It’s like teaching math algorithmically: “whenever you see this kind of problem, use this set of steps to solve it.” As long as you never get problems that are unlike the ones you’ve practiced, you’re fine.
But while algorithms are useful, how many times outside a classroom when you’re facing a situation that needs addressing is it clear exactly what “model” you’ve learned fits? Worse, most real-life problems have a degree of complexity and fuzziness that an algorithmic approach simply cannot deal with. So, while you might devise an algorithm to tell you the fastest way to get to work or how to cut the yard most efficiently, for most problems they’re not all that successful.
And hence, they are not really a great preparation for big parts of life….