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The academic curriculum is a mirror of broader cultural trends. One overarching trend is the commodification of education, which puts economic gains at the fore with knowledge as a commodity to be exchanged by (1) individuals for chances at high-playing jobs, (2) schools as institutions that offer the kind of knowledge that will bring enrollments (tuitions) institutional rankings, grants, inventions, and mergers with for-profits corporations; and (3) government that will pay for research that produces results for money expanded on behalf of security, health, and economic competitiveness. This trend plays out in the academic curriculum as instrumentalism---knowledge for use. Parent and individual students often see the school curriculum as there to serve their instrumental needs (chiefly economic), not for enhancing the life of the local or larger society or satisfying the desire to understand the world.

Humanists believe that the function of the curriculum is to provide each learner with intrinsically rewarding experiences that contribute to personal liberation and development. To humanists, the goals of education are related to the ideals of personal growth, integrity, and autonomy. Healthier attitudes toward self, peers, and learning are among their expectations. The ideal of self-actualization is at the heart of the humanistic curriculum. A person who exhibits this quality is not only coolly cognitive but also developed in aesthetic and moral ways---that is, a person who does good works and has good character. The humanist views actualization growth as a basic need. Each learner has a self that must be uncovered, built up, taught.