“The bottom end jobs that used to allow our kids to avoid STEM subjects”
I have to laugh at your words above!
All the professions I described have always required special technical skills and advanced subject knowledge.To advance in those fields, has always meant continuous upgrading of skills and knowledge.
It also requires an ability to apply all that knowledge!
I’m certain you must have experienced faulty GPS guidance, software glitches,or sporadically unreliable sensors.
Did your tech support/engineering staff let the entire company shut down for days, while analyzing the glitch, or did your facility manager just reboot the system and carry on?
The entire world benefits from the research efforts of savants in science, technology, engineering and math.
All the STEM research in the world is wasted, unless it can eventually be applied by generalists, to actual physical functions.
Basic science, technology, engineering and math has always been taught in western societies, who value education for all.
I would no more force my child towards becoming a scientist if she had exhibited no aptitude for the specialty, than I would encourage her to become a dancer, if she had no interest in that direction.
I did make certain she was exposed to every possible field and to understand that everyone is capable of expertise at something, it is merely a matter of finding your own niche, and building upon it.
I’m not sure how recently you have seen our public school system but do you really believe that we are teaching those children adequately in math and science?
More often, the class sizes are too large and thanks to lawyers, encumbered with various mental issues, deficiencies and often students incapable of speaking English. I have family who are teachers and I am overwhelmed with stories of the nightmares in our classrooms and being required to teach to the standard tests.
This is not the formula for our children’s and our nation’s success. Our only hope of keeping pace with the rest of the world is to break the logjam created my lawyers, the teacher’s unions, and liberals to get our technologically-inclined youth into schools that can hone and perfect those skills.
There isn’t any room left for just cruising through school and majoring in parties.