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It's not that every student will eventually attend college. We do in fact need people who can install a toilet.
Instead, it's about giving every student the skills they need to succeed in college if that's what they choose to do at any point in life. Besides, the skills learned in a college-prep curriculum are valuable in and of themselves.
Many people who choose a vocational track do so for the wrong reasons. Various factors discourage children who grow up in working-class families and environments from following a college-bound path. Many such children are repeatedly given the message that the college-bound path, and the careers it leads to, are unattainable or even undesirable. Such children are also likely to be influenced by peer pressure to follow a vocational path instead of preparing for and attending college. These reasons may cause a student who would have wanted to attend college not to do so.
For someone who doesn't complete a college-prep curriculum and later wants to go to college, it's a long, hard road. Indeed, for someone in this situation, developmental classes in a university setting may be part of the answer.
By contrast, if someone studies a trade after completing a solid high school curriculum,
they still have the option of studying for a career requiring a college education
in the future.
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