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I believe South Carolina is trying to do the same thing with their STW program. St. Paul, MN, tells kids if they don't have a certain average by the end of 8th grade, they aren't going to pursue an academic track. They'll have to choose a career track based on local workforce needs. If they don't choose or if what they want is no longer available, the school will do it for them.

I don't understand why parents aren't furious over the whole thing, but then St. Paul probably has a large uneducated minority population who can be easily gulled.

If it isn't working in Germany, why do people assume it will work here? Why do parents and students put up with it? It's un-American.

Here's your answer to why South Carolina is following the German education model - it is an important issue for German companies based in South Carolina. The following comes from a SC trade promotion website targeting European firms.

German roots run deep in South Carolina

GERMANY HAS THE MOST PREDOMINANT international business presence in South Carolina, with about 130 companies statewide. In all, almost 22,000 South Carolinians work for German-owned companies.

In the early days, most employees of German companies worked for textile machinery manufacturers. Today, the largest segment of those employees work for the transportation equipment sector (i.e. automotive and automotive parts), followed by the chemical and industrial machinery sectors. More than a third of the 22.000 German-company employees in South Carolina work for the transportation equipment sector.

The oldest German business in South Carolina is MECO Metal Finishing, which came to Rock Hill in 1897. Some of the more recognizable German companies operating in South Carolina are BMW, Robert Bosch, Hoechst Celanese, Lockwood Greene, Bayer Corporation and BASF Corp.

Germany is also the Port of Charleston's largest customer. South Carolina businesses shipped about $796 million in goods to Germany during 1997. When combined with air freight volume, South Carolina exports to Germany total more than $928 million in 1997, 216 percent higher than in 1995.