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Our culture has changed. Those blue collar jobs are not as highly respected anymore, largely because the wages have stagnated. People work to earn a good living. Nobody wants to work just to scrape by. Sure, some make good money, but young people have been pushed into the college track because it is viewed as more secure path to a good living.
Also, illegals have been taking over some of those trades. Who wants to compete with that?
My advice to the America of today... Don't get into a major war. You need blue collar people to effectively produce in a time of war. Bean counters decided these people and professions are not worth preserving, so we shipped much of that off to China. They will rule the world, as a result, so long as things continue this way. Bow to your new masters. You did this to yourself folks. Pointing the finger and shifting the blame will never fix the problem though.
What do you do about it? Stop doing the same thing and expecting different results. That's a good start.
From this person's perspective it is the home school and private schools that are excelling in quality students.
If there is any hope for the future it is in them.
Public schools were failing 50 years ago it's only getting worse.
Democrat/liberal influence is best at tearing down, not building. fact
Yet the AFT, and NEA control schools and school spending.
The Unions do not run the teaching schools. They do not write the text books for teachers or students. They do not decide policy, what will be taught and how.
IMO, part of the issue is the kids are not taught how one thing relates to another. They take math, science. social studies, language arts, yada yada. But they have no clue how these subjects relate to each other in the real world.
If I were going to lay the lack of teaching trades on a union, iI pick the plumbers and electricians.
How can they control the number of licensed plumbers and electricians if a kid can learn that trade in public school. Having a hundred or so new plumbers working in your territory in a medium sized city would drop the pay really quickly
As others have posted-we only provide any exposure to the trades in a small percentage of schools. No HS program is really going to prepare anyone for a career in the trades, but it will give them an idea what such work is about and let the kids know there are opportunities. We spend all kinds of money teaching "hobby" classes in high school (art, music, foreign languages) but have been far too quick to cut useful ones.
So tell me. How many systems exactly are we talking? What percentage?
How much money do we spend on "hobbies" as opposed to career type of classes. Please be close to specific and provide where you got your information.
The Unions do not run the teaching schools. They do not write the text books for teachers or students. They do not decide policy, what will be taught and how.
IMO, part of the issue is the kids are not taught how one thing relates to another. They take math, science. social studies, language arts, yada yada. But they have no clue how these subjects relate to each other in the real world.
If I were going to lay the lack of teaching trades on a union, iI pick the plumbers and electricians.
How can they control the number of licensed plumbers and electricians if a kid can learn that trade in public school. Having a hundred or so new plumbers working in your territory in a medium sized city would drop the pay really quickly
The unions have veto power. If they do not like a decision made within the education establishment, that decision will not get made. At least here in Washington State, the teachers' union (WEA) is widely considered the single most powerful political player in the state.
In my opinion, public sector unionism is the single biggest reason for decline in the quality of both education and law enforcement. It's why we have cops doing life for murder, collecting their police pension from a prison cell. It's why we have teachers collecting a salary after having been caught dead-to-rights sexting with high school students. It's why we have incompetent teachers sitting in 'rubber rooms,' collecting a full salary.
We didn't have that before the rise of public sector unions starting around 1970. The Janus case, which made public sector union membership voluntary, may change this, but it's too soon to tell. Public sector unions were never willing to reform in the face of some of their absurdities, so the courts did it for them.
As a former teacher, the problem begins in the home. We usually didn't have trouble back when kids were taught to behave and to be respectful. Now you get a class full of kids who talk back to you, swear at you, threaten you, threaten the other kids, etc. The teacher has to spend most of the time trying to get these kids to sit still, let alone to learn anything.
The administration will not back up the teachers. The teachers are on the front line, like fighting a war with some of these kids, and yet the administrators do nothing. They are so afraid of the parents and getting sued by them.
There are still some good school systems but they are usually in the rich towns where the parents are well educated and set a good example for their kids. Other towns with parents who seem to be afraid to discipline their kids and let them get away with anything--those kids don't do well in school and they also spoil it for the other kids who are trying to learn. Teachers spend much of their time trying to control the class--not much of a chance to actually teach anything.
In 2019 it is not people's desire just to "get a job". People rather get minimum wages to do something they like, instead of working as a plumber to make 15K a month (if they do not have that aptitude).
There are also many jobs that require long-term training (not necessarily formal college). For example, if you are a software engineer familiar with some AI techniques, it is very easy to find a $100K job. The demand is big. However not everyone can do that.
Those jobs used to hire and train students. It is not the education system that has failed. It's a well placed spin though for business to avoid these costs.
Funny one of my good friends is partner of the biggest electrical contracting company in the are and they PAY for the new hires to go to apprenticeship school at night WHILE they work during the day
"it's a well placed spin though for business to avoid these costs"
What has gone up is the fraction of dysfunctional one parent homes. Kids from normal two parents home do incredibly well.
"What has gone up is the fraction of dysfunctional one parent homes"
True AND MOST public school teachers are liberals think a college education" IS the only answer no matter what the courses the kids take.
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