Posted on 11/26/2006 3:40:47 AM PST by shrinkermd
It's more than that. Even students who hate school say they are going to college. They all say they going to college because "smart" students go to college and "stupid" ones don't, so they want to look smart -- or maybe they don't want to portray themselves as stupid.
As one who works in the area of adult education, I see the results of poor scholastic preparation in the job training programs I develop for industry that desires to hire and train in today's low unemployment. Programs include screening tests to identify those most likely to succeed within the established training protocol at the best cost. Even though the tasks are mostly manual (think welding as an example), the ability to do basic math and geometry is missing in a great many potential employees and must be addressed in the training program.
I especially appreciate your posts and commentary on education as being exactly on point as to what I experience on a regular basis in my job. I would like to understand how you would approach a solution to this comment in your post #1:
"an educational effort that includes pre-John Dewey direct moral tuition"
I ask this given the aversion to linkage of the moral to the spiritual within the government schools today.
Actually it was Canute giving a lesson to his courtiers and syncophants.
They'll probably all major in education.
Most school district budgets that I've seen maintain two separate accounts: The 'operating budget', paid with annual tax income, generally doesn't include the 'infrastructure costs', paid with long-term bond measures.
Doing this understates the true total cost but does make some sense from an accounting perspective. You still own the building for many years after you've pi$$ed away each year's operating budget.
Thanks for the reply -- I am in agreement with your thesis and proposed methods. I note that you also understand that the toughest part of your plan is:
"IMHO what is missing in many inner city children are concepts of what is right and wrong."
Schools cannot overcome in 6-7 hours per day the environment the child experiences from birth. But, I also believe that a start must be made somewhere rather than just throwing up our hands in disgust and giving them over to their base nature.
Here is one possible solution to the resistance to the values education needed: http://www.characterfirst.com/
This is being used at the secondary level in the vocational/technical school where I work. It has varying levels of success but at least establishes the conversation.
That is why I mentioned the capital cost, which might amount to several hundred dollars per month per student.
Thank you.
Translation: jobs are leaving the cities, and the high-IQ professionals are leaving with them, which drags down the mean IQ of the population that remains
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