Background: My mother was a teacher, my late husband was a teacher; I switched from a Spanish to a Science major when Sputnick flew; I was a voracious reader. I came to the conclusion that for me the only necessary classes were Science, Language, and the Arts. All else was reading and thinking. My husband and I were college graduates. Our 2 sons are not. Number 1 son did 3 years of ROTC and entered the Army at graduation. He left after his 4 years in 82nd Airborne. Worked but not very happy for a few years. I asked him what the problem was. He said, “I like to get up at 6 am and run 5 miles.” Well, I guess that explained it. He reenlisted and has now finished 20 years, currently in Special Forces. His father, he, and his son were all restless, can’t sit still types, like many people especially young men who are not well suited to routine sedentary work. My other son was dyslexic, dropped out and was doing nothing. I helped get him informally apprenticed to a young man (orphan) I had helped, and he became a good worker. He is now married, 2 children, and running his own construction business.
A significant problem with modern education and catch all solutions like “No Child Left Behind” or Common Core is the focus on “College Education.” At Harvard it was stated that the Common Core State Standards were intended to set a common high standard for student achievement all across the country. … The goal is to set standards at such a level that virtually all students who graduate high school will be both ready to do successful college work or to enter a 21st-century high skill/high knowledge career and be successful in that.” from: https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2013/11/core-objectives/
Have these educated idiots forgotten that while 1/2 the population is above average and should be able to be successful in college or at some detailed technical trade, the other half of the population is below average and while able to work successfully at something, needs to be specifically helped to learn working skills. Thus for half the population the stated goals of Common Core are impossible to ever reach. Thus large numbers of our students are neglected for those who can reasonably be expected to measure up to the “common high standard for student achievement.” Schools used to have decent programs of technical and practical education. Sixty years ago the courses in sewing, cooking, and home nursing have proved to be some of the most useful for my entire life. I taught my sons cooking, light sewing, and health maintenance which they have used successfully. They also helped me with carpentry, brick laying, and electric line running. My father taught my brothers auto mechanics and light home construction.
One result of of the total failure and neglect of technical and trade education in our schools is that large chunks of population especially, for example, black people in our cities have left school totally unprepared to do needed non collegiate work. As a result, developers and contractors have been happy to hire undocumented labor coming in from Latin America, the Caribbean, and Africa. Now we have both urban blacks and small town and rural white people furious at the system which has so shamelessly neglected their legitimate needs with the elitist fallacy that all you need to succeed and have a successful society is a college education or education in a 21st-century high skill/high knowledge career.
When I got my BA in 1959 I discovered I could not advance in science without at least an MS or PhD, or get a white collar job until I had shorthand and faster typing. They never told me that in college, and this lack of useful information seems equally common today after almost 60 years. I recently spoke for 20 minutes with a successful restauranteer running for political office about vocational education for the restaurant field. I asked his opinion of our city’s culinary arts program. “Not very good.” When I asked him what was the most important thing these students needed to learn. He said, “to smile.” Ah, yes, service with a smile, how novel!