Mark Warschauer wrote:
> I wish I could see it as simply as you. The fact is that, in many
> ways, American schools are failing, and the working class and
> minorities are bearing the brunt of those failures....
This comment will be off-topic a bit, and I'm looking forward to moving on to the
next chapter as Mike suggested, but....if you want to look at HOW American
schools are failing, don't just look within the school system. Take a look
outside -- at the workforce development programs that are being set up to create
workers out of the products of our railed schools.
I'm talking about the Workforce Investment Act of 1998, which is now being
implemented in all 50 states. This act creates a tertiary education system,
entirely for the purpose of preparing people for work. (In what sense is it
tertiary? If we think of K-12 college prep track, plus 4-year colleges as
primary; then K-12 "general" or vocational plus community college or tech as
secondary, then this is tertiary.) It's an expansion of the JTPA (Jot Training
Partnership Act) to ALL workforce development. The way you get into this system?
Go look for a job at your local One-Stop. Or, be an "incumbent worker" at a
company that wants to upgrade its technology but not pay higher wages to workers
who have learned how to operate it.
Here in Chicago, according to the Tribune, 41% of high school students drop out
by senior year. Alongside this, we have a "skill shortage" which we (the US) is
responding to by H1-B visa workers. Into this picture we bring WIA (the
Workforce Investment Act) and it's employer-run councils which will fund
"training providers" who can be of any sort -- private for-profit, CBOs, public,
community colleges, you name it.
What we've got here is simply the transfer of our education system's role in
preparing people for work into the hands of local Workforce Investment Boards.
The kicker will be when you take a look at the "skills standards" to which
"training providers" are supposed to teach.... They're on line, actually -- just
do a google search for "Illinois skill standards". My favorite is the Office
Skills standards.
Helena Worthen
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