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Not less and less education. More education that suits the student as an individual. Some trades need hands on learning. This is where we are failing. We need to provide for ALL students. If they need a more hands-on learning experience, they need more time to do it.....not more Shakespeare and Chaucer.
There's nothing wrong with learning as much as anyone can. But there are only so many hours in the day. And some get fed up with doing something they see no point in.
And YES, if a person is able to only do a menial job for the rest of their life, so be it. It's all that some are able to do. Let's set things up so that they can do the best they can. Sitting for years in High School and not being able to keep up, hasn't helped. We need a new way.
I think kids should be in school long enough to learn to read; comprehend what they are reading; do math up to level one algebra, statistics, geometry(?) and calculus; understand rudimentary world history across multiple cultures; understand how the american government works as well as american history; be able to write a decent short paper; get exposed to classic fiction; know the basics of biology/chemistry; and become familiar with logic and critical thought. Maybe a little media savvy and life skills (balancing a checkbook, basic finance) should be covered as well. I'm sure I'm forgetting something, but you get the idea. Whatever age that is. I could see maybe age 16 being enough, maybe.
Society benefits the most if a critical mass of the population has the ability to become informed voters, as well as the ability to become employable. I don't think it's a matter of "well these kids are hard to teach, so we shouldn't". It's not about them, its about all of us, and we're better off figuring it out rather than walking away.
I think rather than kicking them out early, schools should have more flexibility to figure out what works best with their particular population of children. Some schools will need a lot of social services from jump, some won't. Some will need longer school days, some won't. Some will benefit from strict traditional structures, some will do better with alternative classroom settings. There is no one size fits all when it comes to education. As long as you get the desired outcomes, it shouldn't matter anyway IMO.
What does that have to do with graduation being required? So they work 67 years??? You haven't said why they need to graduate in order to do that. So what if they CAN graduate. Why do they NEED to graduate?
I think there is a certain percentage of students who would be better served with on the job training after a certain point, say 10th grade. I think the classroom environment for the remaining students would be improved by sending these kids to apprentice programs. IMO, this would be a win-win.
Because employers require a diploma for entry to most jobs. Talk to the business community.
Because employers require a diploma for entry to most jobs. Talk to the business community.
Given that we are pushing college prep on everyone, this is a problem. It wouldn't be so bad if we still had a tracked system but we're making everyone take classes like algebra II and chemistry when that's just not necessary. I'd love to see the business community wise up and I think if we offered a different track where kids finished with the skills they need to do jobs that don't require a diploma, they would.
Education does not always have the effect of making someone who is not intelligent smart. Look at politics in general- They are all educated and institutionalized in their thinking- and what have they accomplished as of late? What should be drilled into kids is not education but the love of learning and the avoidance of ignorance.
Education does not always have the effect of making someone who is not intelligent smart. Look at politics in general- They are all educated and institutionalized in their thinking- and what have they accomplished as of late? What should be drilled into kids is not education but the love of learning and the avoidance of ignorance.
ITA on all counts. My dad was one of the smartest people I've known. He never finished 6th grade. The only thing I'll fault him for is not realizing the value of an education for someone suited for formal education. Two of my brothers are like him. They work with their hands and can figure things out (one is a HS drop out BTW who repairs and programs robots for assembly lines). I'm not like him. I'm good at academics. I love to learn. I wish education today was about learning. Unfortunately, it's about grades.
Why would I recommend something that will do them no good?
Careers that do not require an education:
Construction....plumbing...mechanic...garbage collector (doesn't pay bad and boy do we need them around)...sanitation worker...road paving...lawn care (you can be self employed here)...snow removal...stock boy (dss#2 worked his way up to management in the grocery chain he works for without a HS diploma)...merchandizing (setting up store displays for new products)....delivery driver...truck driver (though this one requires going to driving school)...
There is a long list of jobs that do not require anything beyond a 10th grade education.
And what do you think will happen to the wages of these occupations when thousands of more kids who make a 15-year-old decision that they don't want to go to school end up in the workforce? The labor pool for unskilled labor will grow, and the wages will shrink. But, you went to school and I am sure that you learned that things like this happen.
Plus, how many of these jobs are becoming more and more automated? The garbage trucks of my youth had a driver and two guys riding on the back who jumped off and threw the garbage in the truck. The truck that picks up my garbage now has a driver and an automated arm that grabs the standard-sized garbage bin and empties it into the truck.
Lawn care in many parts of the country - especially the arid west - will dry up as water becomes too scarce to have bluegrass lawns. Many people, businesses, and schools are actually putting in artificial turf to get rid of the expense. Several driving ranges where I live have already made the switch.
Concrete roads are being paved by machines like this. Notice that it is operated by only one person.
Mechanics, plumbers, electricians, etc. all need vocational schooling (which I believe should be offered in the public schools) and will need the ability to learn new systems as many of the products they will work on evolve.
ALL children need to know HOW to learn. Many of the subjects taught in school seem like a waste of time, but where else will children learn the history of our culture? Where will they learn how government works or why geography is important? Those subject are taught to people because it is important for our culture that the population knows them. More importantly, the list of skills (reading, writing, math, making and supporting an argument, analyzing and issue, spatial awareness, how to recognize patterns, and on and on) learned in those classes will enable that person to be a life-long learner.
As one earlier poster mentioned, the many jobs today didn't exist 10, 20, and 30 years ago. Many kids will be working in industries that have yet to be created. They will need to know how to learn to participate in the new ventures.
And what do you think will happen to the wages of these occupations when thousands of more kids who make a 15-year-old decision that they don't want to go to school end up in the workforce? The labor pool for unskilled labor will grow, and the wages will shrink. But, you went to school and I am sure that you learned that things like this happen.
Plus, how many of these jobs are becoming more and more automated? The garbage trucks of my youth had a driver and two guys riding on the back who jumped off and threw the garbage in the truck. The truck that picks up my garbage now has a driver and an automated arm that grabs the standard-sized garbage bin and empties it into the truck.
Lawn care in many parts of the country - especially the arid west - will dry up as water becomes too scarce to have bluegrass lawns. Many people, businesses, and schools are actually putting in artificial turf to get rid of the expense. Several driving ranges where I live have already made the switch.
Concrete roads are being paved by machines like this. Notice that it is operated by only one person.
Mechanics, plumbers, electricians, etc. all need vocational schooling (which I believe should be offered in the public schools) and will need the ability to learn new systems as many of the products they will work on evolve.
ALL children need to know HOW to learn. Many of the subjects taught in school seem like a waste of time, but where else will children learn the history of our culture? Where will they learn how government works or why geography is important? Those subject are taught to people because it is important for our culture that the population knows them. More importantly, the list of skills (reading, writing, math, making and supporting an argument, analyzing and issue, spatial awareness, how to recognize patterns, and on and on) learned in those classes will enable that person to be a life-long learner.
As one earlier poster mentioned, the many jobs today didn't exist 10, 20, and 30 years ago. Many kids will be working in industries that have yet to be created. They will need to know how to learn to participate in the new ventures.
The problem is, you don't change the way someone learns by making them finish high school. What do you think is accomplished by forcing a student who would learn better on the job to finish the last two years of high school over having him enter an apprenticeship program after 10th grade? Do you think he now learns better? Do you think he learned anything during those extra two years? I teach these kids every day and I can tell you they don't learn. They check out. They're in over their heads and they know it. What benefit do you see from putting a child through that vs. putting them into a program where they can experience success?
I do think we'd have to be careful with the numbers of kids trained for each profession but I think that interests are varied enough that we won't have an issue there. Honestly, having more plumbers might bring down the wages of plumbers and the cost of hiring one but having too many plumbers is preferable to having too few plumbers making high wages and other potential plumbers flipping burgers for minimum wage or stealing to make a living.
I don't think a high percentage of kids would opt for these programs but I think allowing the ones who would this option would improve education for everyone. Some kids need to spend their last two years of high school learning life skills and job skills to earn a living because they are not going on to college. Currently only, something like, 37% do finish college. The other 63% don't. Of what value was a college prep high school education to them? I'm sorry but I think practical job training would be a better option for most of them....and they don't all have to become plumbers...there are lots of other options from medical transcription to truck driving.
I'm talking about giving kids a means to make a living who aren't college material. It does them no good to force them to stay in school where they feel like fish out of water because they learn very little. They would learn more in apprenticeship programs that give them a skilled trade. And given what I pay my mechanic, my plumber, my electrician and the construction company that did my kitchen, this is a way to bridge that gap not make it wider.
My brother is a mechanic and everything he needed for his job he learned on his job he makes about $80k/year. My dss is in construction, ditto on learning what he needed on the job...he makes something in the mid $100's. My neighbor is a plumber who does quite well. His uncle does pavement raising (injects something under the pavement to jack it up which saves homeowners the expense of replacing pavement) and makes good money. I know so many people who earn a good living not because they graduated from high school but because they found an apprenticeship and worked their way up. And yes, I think you can identify which kids belong on that track by 10th grade. I can tell you who they are within weeks of the start of the school year in my 11th grade classes. They're the kids who don't fit.
I agree that no one can predict the economy but we will always need construction workers, auto mechanics, plumbers, electricians, sanitation workers, lawn care workers, etc, etc, etc... There will always be service jobs that pay well that don't require a high school diploma. There will be others created by new technology that will require degrees and those will go to those inclined to get degrees. What is going away are jobs like assembly line workers. Those are going off shore or being replaced by robots.
In my engineering job, I watched machine repairmen relearn their jobs as robots came on the scene. They learned that job just like they learned their first job...on the job. They couldn't program the robots so that was the job of the engineers but they could repair them.
EEUEW!!! The manure in here is getting higher and more aromatic by the post.
No manure at all. I'm not kidding on what my brother and dss make per year. They both do quite well and everything they needed they learned on the job. In fact, dss makes more than dh and I put together and we both have masters degrees and they both have more job security than dh and I ever dreamed of because their skills took years to hone and are not easily replaced.
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ITA on all counts. My dad was one of the smartest people I've known. He never finished 6th grade. The only thing I'll fault him for is not realizing the value of an education for someone suited for formal education. Two of my brothers are like him. They work with their hands and can figure things out (one is a HS drop out BTW who repairs and programs robots for assembly lines). I'm not like him. I'm good at academics. I love to learn. I wish education today was about learning. Unfortunately, it's about grades.
