gkcunn01 wrote:
>What is being proposed is already a reality in many states. It is called
>School to Work or STW for short. It is very scary concept.
This is a delicate and compicated issue. As I experienced the curricula of
the high schools at which I taught, much of the work students did was
directed toward future study. That is nowhere more clear than in the
"college prep" classes, where students from the mainstream (or who have
adapted to it) are trained to go to college. In "non-college-prep"
classes, the purpose of the curriculum is defined negatively. That is,
rather than being offered an independent purpose for their studies, these
teenagers are being told (explicitly or implicitly) that they aren't going
to make it in the academic world, so they'll be given a watered-down
version of the same information that "college-prep" students get simply
because it's what they can handle.
I agree that it's dangerous to divide students into the academically
inclined and the vocational ed. students, especially since many of them are
coping so much with a legacy of schooling that has turned them off to
learning that they don't know where their gifts lie. I also worry that
education oriented towards business ends will contribute to the
anti-intellectualism that already encourages many Americans to deny the
beauty of intellectual activity for its own sake. BUT, I think it's very
important that we support students in finding a meaning for their work in
their own lives. If that means helping them learn the practical skills
that will serve them in business and as participants in a democracy, so be
it.
Just as composition researchers are talking about writing as a recursive
process, I think we need to change our model of education from a model that
imagines students as going through school to become something that they
then remain for the rest of their lives to one that sees students as making
choices to use education in ways that serve the goals that they set for the
foreseeable future. In the late 20th century, we're seeing people change
jobs and careers (perhaps) more frequently than ever before. Such a trend
suggests that on-going education must happen and is happening among adults.
Perhaps we should let the teens in on the adventure.
I sometimes wonder how well high school students would make such choices,
but I think they must be trained to do so, guided in evaluating their
options, and allowed to learn from their mistakes.
OK, enough utopianism.
Nelson Graff