Did anybody edit this stream-of-consciousness grab-bag of tendentious and unsubstantiated claims?

This piece seems to be the product of a three-hour session of automatic writing.

The article was pointless, but at least it was long.

One of my favourite teachers at a university level proclaims that he strives to teach his students to think like him. What else can a teacher do? The idea that students must be left to make up their own minds when they have no minds to make up is nonsense. After the teacher teaches students to think like him/herself then they are in a position to strike out on their own and become independent thinkers and learners.

Peter Sellick

It is certainly a revolutionary proposal which may well surprise many conformists passing off as teachers.
Individual personality is a key to keeping students interested.

As an example, consider television as an education medium.
Consider whether one would learn as much of natural science by being educated by one of a number of suitably "trained" and "qualified" "facilitators" as one would by the inherent authority couched in every expression and nuance of a personality such as David Attenborough.

Personality is certainly a "must".

I well remember an inspired Latin teacher who had his students motivated to enjoy understanding what could have been a daunting subject, being one of several mandatory language choices.
Not only did he demand Latin-only conversational content in class for one period a month, many students voluntarily researched and read deeply anything they could find concerning Roman history.
It was his enthusiastic personality which inspired us (coupled with challenges such as how to translate phrases such as "how are you going, mate?")

Our armed sevices, which have roles demanding application of high levels of cognitive and practical skills, use a vertical structure in instruction.
It works

This piece is self-refuting. Whether or not a verticalist society would be desirable, we don't have one, yet the author's recommendations for education presume we do.

Please tell me the author does not teach English. This piece reads like a series of disconnected dot points with the dots removed.

If you're going to put forward a plausible argument on education, shouldn't you at least attempt some kind of coherence?

It's so easy to set up false dichotomies like this. There are two possibilities:
1. The author did not learn to think for himself.
2. The author's purpose is to reduce the issue to a simplistic argument that gets us nowhere.

Fancy falling for the "sage on a stage" vs. "guide on the side" tripe.
It's neither/or; it's both/and.