As an educator, it may surprise you to hear that I view most of American education as a scam that drastically needs reform. No amount of debt forgiveness will get to the root of the problems in our education system from high school, all the way through graduate school.
As a high school history teacher, I can assure you that our students are not receiving the education they deserve. While some of us do try to teach life lessons such as taxes, how to get the most tax breaks, investment strategies, and how to start their own small businesses, most teachers do not. Furthermore, we do not teach students critical thinking skills AT ALL, you know this if you went to American public schools where students are expected to blindly listen to their teachers OR ELSE! In my class my students know that they are free to question me, in fact, I encourage it, as why should they merely accept what I have to say? After all, we only met at the beginning of the school year... We teach kids not to talk to strangers, yet we expect them to blindly follow teachers whom they just met, or deal with repercussions?
Another problem with high school is that we do not get students involved in technical schools soon enough, and make ridiculous requirements for them to do so. For example in my school the students must maintain a certain grade level to get in, and if they do not meet this requirement they cannot go until they do. Essentially trapping them in a liberal arts education, when they would thrive in a technical educational setting, but we make them prove it in the setting they struggle in? Anyone with a functioning brain can see the issue with this, yet we maintain the idea that students must do at least one year of high school even if we know for a fact that environment is not good for them. Then we force them to stay in that bad environment until they can supposedly prove that they deserve a chance to pursue learning that actually interests them. We justify this by saying we want them to be well-rounded, but this seems to me to not pass scrutiny.
Now onto the issue of college, which has become the ultimate scam in education. The first problem with college is that we in education have convinced young people that college is necessary for success in life, which could not be further from the truth. For the vast majority of our students, college is a giant waste of time and money. I try to tell my students that they should only go to college if the degree they are pursuing is a requirement for entry into their desired field, AND the financial reward is far greater than the cost of the degree. If the degree they wish to pursue does not meet those requirements then I recommend they think very carefully before spending money they could put to better use. Far too many students are going into college to either drop out in debt, or get a degree in something that they did not even need to do what they end up doing, however, this is only the beginning of the issue with college. Lets talk about the first two years of college, which may be the most insulting aspect of the undergraduate degree.
All of you reading this who attended college know that the first two years are almost entirely useless. Because you would know that the first two years are almost entirely of prerequisite classes (I.E. Intro to Psych, Intro to Sociology, College Writing, and Civilization). The colleges claim that this is to ensure that students can show they belong at the college level or the ethereal notion of ensuring students are more well-rounded. The more you think about these arguments, the less sense they make, until you realize it is all nonsense used to justify forcing kids to spend money they do not have on classes they do not need. We all know that the real reason for this has nothing to do with bettering students and everything to do making more money off of them. Eliminating the first two years of prerequisites would not only help young people, in the long run, it would help colleges with enrollment because more young people would see college as attainable. Perhaps the deepest issue with higher education at the root of all of this is the corporate ideals of credentialism and professional development, or in simplest terms, barriers to entry.
As a soon-to-be graduate of a masters program in educational leadership, it may puzzle you as to why the author of an article so critical of higher education would pursue one themselves. On the surface, this would seem hypocritical, however, I assure you that it makes sense when you consider the earlier requirements laid out for attending an institution of higher learning and the unfortunate reality of credentialism. In my profession, a masters degree is required whether you wish to advance or not, thus a choice had to be made. Slowly acquire credits to maintain my license as I head slowly for a masters in my subject area, or bite the bullet and rush through a masters in educational leadership to pursue a promotion to administration. As mentioned earlier, I would not recommend someone to spend money on a degree without doing a cost-benefit analysis. To me, the benefit of an administrative masters was far greater than of one in my subject area. Even if I do not get promoted, I get the same pay increase for a masters regardless, so it only makes sense to get the degree with more upside. When people wonder why so many young teachers leave for administration, this is a big reason for that. For all the lip-service about teachers deserving better pay, we hardly talk about eliminating these archaic requirements for teachers to maintain their license. I can assure you that I have learned FAR more from actually teaching than all of my education classes combined, and I am certain that I will learn more in the first month of being an assistant principal than the two years of my masters combined.
So what can we do about it? How can we take this knowledge and use what we know to be true to make our education system better? After all, as my favorite President Theodore Roosevelt once quipped ¨Complaining about a problem without posing a solution is called whining.¨ Thus it would be out of character for me to gripe about all of this without making a few suggestions for improvement. The first is to fundamentally re-think how we construct our classrooms. Students should have more opportunity to collaborate with teachers to shape their learning to meet their needs. Expecting students to blindly accept what we say while offering them little say in their education does not teach them the critical thinking skills needed to thrive. Second, we need to consider whether high school is even needed for many of our students, whether it would be better for them to immediately attend a vocational school or an apprenticeship if that fits their needs better. Finally, we need to end the idea that college is required for a good life, and warn students away from pursuing degrees that are not actually required for them to do what they want. These things may not address all of the problems with education in America, but at least they would be a start.
(I am posting this here for critique from my fellow educators) What do you think the biggest issues with education in America are? Do you agree or disagree with my points and why? If you disagree, please elaborate on how you think we could best serve our students and communities.
Thank you in advance!
Submitted April 24, 2024 at 06:02AM by No-Site7083 https://ift.tt/5asOoFK
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