Posted on 03/21/2005 11:12:45 AM PST by JZelle
Bill Gates has declared American high schools "obsolete." In a Feb. 26 speech to the National Education Summit on High Schools, he said "our high schools even when they're working exactly as designed cannot teach our kids what they need to know today." These criticisms are not new, but the fact that America's most successful businessman is concerned about how America will survive in a world that requires educated workers should cause people to take notice. Mr. Gates went on to say he was "terrified for our work force of tomorrow."
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
Public schools should EDUCATE! Parents should do the 'preparing.'
High schools ceased to be effective once they phased out trade schools. Everyone cannot go to college, our society does not work that way. Reality is that we still need carpenters, auto mechanics, etc...
Exactly right.
I'll second that on Voc-Ed.
Oh no!
Hide this from public school advocates!
Quick before the tag team arrives!
In California last Tuesday, the annual test results were released and only 21% of the schools here passed.
Course only one paper I read even covered it.
The large local paper seems more interested in covering up school failure then letting the tax-payers know where their money is wasted.
Those are some of the jobs that Americans won't do so we need to keep importing illegal aliens.
The article suggests that home schooling in high school is a potential solution to the problem, but for sports programs and cooperative teaching of various subjects. But the thing high school kids are missing is the hard work that kids need to do. As colleges and high school classes protest hard assignments and demand free weekends, their education suffers. I suspect many home school parents are not up to the task of assigning loads of homedwork as well.
High schools are also off track with the concept of group assignments, these allow weaker students to coopt the grades of stronger students, (I'll do the artwork). Also group activities are an opportunity to mix work with play. Not a way to get lots of work done.
I agree too that high schools are spending a lot of time brainwashing the next generation to vote democrat, normalize homosexuality, socialize the economy, and blame capitalists for the state of the environment.
I don't see the article having the solution, of course home schooling is better than public school, but is it tough enough?
High schools could win back these kids if the teachers would assign high levels of work and the schools would bring back tallented coaching to afterschool programs. This won't happen, but it is worth a thought.
The most amaxzing thing is that Gates, an ardent supporter of liberal causes, and a funder of racist scholarship programs apparently sees that the present system is failing. I wonder what he thinks should be done?
They're also too busy preparing people for college when 75 percent won't go.
She has thoroughly enjoyed the freedom with homeschooling. She's taught herself Japanese and Digital Video Editing as well as Biology. She's lazy doing the work she NEEDS for college acceptance, but I've put that on her. She knows that if she doesn't finish it, she doesn't get into college. She's just now, halfway through her Junior year wrapping her mind around that. I have no doubts that she'll get all the work done. She's a voracious reader and will be able to do all the work she needs to do pretty quickly.
She's also giving more thought these days about what it is she thinks she'd like to do as an occupation. Some of her class choices at the Community college will affect that. If she takes Intro to Psych. this summer, she can take a course in Cognitive Psych at Harvard in the Fall. That will go a long way toward letting her know if THAT'S what she'd like to do. Japanese language is another possibility, but she's already doing that.
Most kids don't think about much but just getting those high grades to get into the big name schools, without a thought about whether or not those schools truly offer what the kids need to further their lives along.
I would be satisfied if, at a minimum, our public schools could guarantee that every high school graduate would be able to read, write, and count.
Well, it almost took a rocket scientist to figure it out.
1) Dismantle the public school system.
2) There is no 2.
That one can be implemented very simply: Pass a law that says anyone claiming a Doctor's degree do original research and write and defend a thesis. That would make asswipe out of 90%+ of D.Ed. and Ph.D. in education degrees.
Postgraduate degrees in education are a fraud.
Bill Gates has been one of the big boosters for open borders and illegal immigration. He is a big part of the problem.
Just two decades ago, California's public schools were the pride of the nation. Now they are ranked 48th out of 50.
And something like 90% of the students in Los Angelos are English as a second language basket cases. Do you think their might be a relationship between failing schools and mass immigration?
I thought we did this on FR years ago?
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