Sorry to chime-in mostly blind, but I think there is a middle ground here.
Louise Yarnall writes:
>I've been a bit surprised by the XMCA members who so strongly oppose
>"school to work." Far from being a plot to force young people in
>subservience to The Man, I think that -- if done right -- and there's the
>rub -- it may represent an opportunity to breathe real world relevance into
>the perennially dull, oppressive, sheltered, unrealistic, infantilized K-12
>educational environment. This issue becomes particularly important to
>teen-agers who are hungry for grown-up roles and responsibilities and tired
>of being talked down to by surrogate "mommies" and "daddies" in school.
>One of the things that school so utterly fails to prepare young people for
>is the real world. Why? What's wrong with injecting reality into school?
I think this is really preaching to the choir. What is probably
underestimated is the real benefit that "fresh blood" provides to
industry. When I interned for a structural Engineering firm, I ended up
teaching a fair amount of FORTRAN programming style to employees who had
picked up the language on their own. Everyone stands to benefit from the
mix - the problem seems to come with the institutionalizing of the
practice.
In France, students are required to spend 6 months working in industry as
part of their B.A. A wonderful idea - in theory. Unfortunately, good
old free market capitalism utterly destroyed it. Employers, mandated to
hire a flood of students, were free to pay them next to nothing.
Students were utter destitute and miserable during those 6 months.
Hardly a sympathetic transition to their life's work.
France is somewhat unique in that unemployment is high, particularly
among young people. Also, I haven't been in France since 1990, I don't
know if this program has been reformed. However, France was recently
rocked by nationwide strikes in which teachers, students and parents all
participated. So it doesn't look like promising case.
Yet personally, I found my own internships very valuable. Basically, I'm
earning a living on those skills, and felt that I learned unique things
not available at the academe. Yet sadly, I think my own experiences
benefited from the comparative rarity of such internships in the U.S.
Free market forces even played to my advantage when I worked in France in
1990. Americans willing to work in France are rare - thus I got a decent
stipend for what was an internship.
Peace, Edouard
P.S. Louise, you might want to fish out any translated articles on the
French program. It was at the very least widespread and existed for
quite a few years. Also our European participants might have pointers to
references on similar programs. I don't think this was originally a
French idea - another Scandinavian innovation?
============================================
Edouard Lagache, PhD
Webmaster - Lecturer
Information Technologies
U.C. San Diego, Division of Extended Studies
Voice: (619) 622-5758, FAX: (619) 622-5742
email: elagache who-is-at weber.ucsd.edu
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: That perspective implied emphasis on comprehensive understanding :
: involving the whole person . . .on activity in and with the :
: world; and on the view that agent, activity, and the world :
: mutually constitute each other. :
: :
: Jean Lave & Etienne Wenger, _Situated Learning_, 1991, p 33. :
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