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toadstool

Public high schools have to take all comers; not all jobs or students are college material. The presumption that a generic high school diploma presumes college readiness is highly flawed. Any wishful-thinking message or program from the president based on the assumption that every high school student from every high school should be college ready is just plain delusional.

It would be better if the President instead challenged students and schools to identify and send a clear message those students who should head to college, that a generic high school diploma is not enough; don't assume it is enough. It will never be enough. The students need to strive for more. The parent need to demand more for appropriate students. But not for everyone. College is not appropriate for all. Pouring money down the drain to futilely try to raise the quality of every student's outcome is hopeless.

Many public school systems, in Massachusetts for example, are obsessed with inclusion. The very best student are dumped in the same classes with remedial, which serves none. Public school system need to start serving college-capable students as the treasure that they are. Stop one-size fits all classes and start putting money into college bound students rather than pouring 25 to 40% of funding into the very least likely to succeed students.

MHC2011

It's so true. People think of these courses as only being offered at community colleges, but the reality is, they're offered all over the place, particularly in math. I was even flipping through Smith's catalogue recently to find info for someone and saw some listed there.

I was a teaching assistant in our English department while I was at my community college. We had students who had gone through some of the most exceptional public school systems in the country, not to mention students who had gone to name private schools and were enrolled at the CC for financial reasons, who couldn't write a college-level paper to save their lives. When we'd try to explain to them that the silly 5-paragraph format is NOT what you do in college, they'd complain that that's all they were taught in high school. And forget any expectations of them knowing how to do MLA or APA citation format. It was awful. College papers are not book reports, nor do they expect you to write a thesis paragraph backed up by three specific points. And don't get me going on the complete lack of understanding when it comes to being able to understand, much less execute, literary analysis and criticism. But there's something really wrong when students like myself who never went to high school can get perfect scores on Accuplacer, while students who went to exceptional, competitive high schools get placed into the developmental courses.

Edit to add:

That doesn't solve anything. Aside from the fact that all students are entitled to a quality education, some of those students "least likely to succeed" are still going to pursue higher education, and if we provide less funding to prepare them, we're just going to make the problem worse. I agree that it makes sense to separate students out and provide different levels of instruction, but you can't abandon the goal of making all students prepared for college in some manner. If you start having dramatically varying degrees of high school rigor, you're just devaluing everyone's diploma.

toadstool

A single, universally bad diplora is not the answer either.

kayf

What the New York State Regents has done is horendous. They are in the process of watering down the traditional Regents diploma, and eliminating the "local" high school diploma. Children who can not meet the Regents standards will have to get a GED. Not every child is meant for college, but this doesnt mean they should not be able to obtain a high school diploma.

Every child should have the opportunity to pursue a Regents diploma, but there should be options available. A high school diploma signals more to an employer than a GED, things like showing up regularly and following directions.

hudsonvalley51

Kayf -- I agree with you, but I would also note that the NYS Regents exams have been "dumbed down" considerably over the past 15 years or so (with a few exceptions) in order to accomodate the goal of graduating 100% of NY high school students with a Regents diploma (in other words a college prep diploma). In addition to lowering rigor for the academically stronger student, this policy has had the effect of driving up drop-out rates in some districts.

rsxwheeeeee

I agree with this. If you aren't ready for college, you aren't ready.

(I sure hope I'm ready lol 0_0)

Centh

It's been a gripe of mine for a while that we spend plenty of money bringing the exceptionally challenged students along but we don't spend much money to develop the exceptionally talented to the academic levels they are capable of achieving. It would do our country well to give strong support to both groups.

kayf

Hudson -- you say dumbed down, I say watered down -- lets say it is the same thing. At the end of the day, 100% of students should not be getting a college prep diploma, it isnt working.

sybbie719

Kay, I totally agree with you. I think that one of the worse things that the NYC Dept of Ed has done was get rid of vocational high schools. You are right every one does not want to or need to attend college and the state is wrong for trying to implement a one size fits all mold to send each kid to college.

I know a bunch of kids who are graduating with local diplomas and are not remedial free at the CUNY CC.

kayf

One of the districts near me has started a program in connection with the county trade school, but the kids will only get a GED. There is no way they can get a regents and heavy concentration of trade courses. It stinks. The NYS regents are not accountable to anyone. I doubt they even know how someone becomes a plumber or an electrician.

Of course the kids with local diplomas will need remediation -- we end up with the worst of all worlds -- watered down regents diplomas, kids who will need remediation and no kids getting trained in trades.

They closed a trade school near me. It was heartbraking -- there was a wl to get in. The principal said, "Internet, shmidenet, you'll alwys need a guy who can install a toilet"

Take3

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.

thinker88

Maybe the answer is to stop expecting every single American to have a college diploma. The fact that there are remedial classes at a community college came as no surprise to me since the best and brightest students don't generally attend these lower level schools of higher education. We should really only spend our time educating the brightest and let the rest go to vocational schools or go straight into the workforce. Someone has to work in those low-income jobs, right? And by saving money by not going to college, these people could have more money to supplement a lower income (or at least not start their careers with large debts).

It may seem very impersonal, but perhaps using a test such as the SAT could determine whether or not a student is eligible to attend college. A cut-off could be made at, say 1550 or 1600 (out of 2400), and those students below the cut-off are not allowed to pursue a college education. I am open to comments on this, however, because I am not sure if less able students attending college affects others that much anyway.

kayf

Take3 -- your thoughts are noble, but I think unrealistic. What we have now is kids leaving HS without EITHER the ability to go to college or fix a toilet.

~Tigerlily~

Obviously, not every student will need a college-prep curriculum as not all will attend college. However, I think that taking it will benefit many students in the long run. Not everyone will enter college right after high school, but they may eventually decide to, and without that preparation, it will be much harder. And as Take3 said, many choose vocational tracks for the wrong reasons. In my school, students often shy away from harder classes because they mistakenly think that they won't be able to complete the work or because their friends aren't in the class. Some students are even pushed to attend these vocational schools, even if it's not what they want to do. One boy in one of my classes was pushed by a guidance counselor (who told him it was the best thing for him) to follow a vocational path even though he later admitted he didn't like it and wasn't even sure why he was there. Now he's taking advanced classes and wants to be a teacher. It worries me that that he was so close to losing this opportunity.

Not everyone is destined for college, yet I can't help but feel that this failure is a reflection of poor high school preperation. I am a good student and do well on standardized tests, however, I worry that even I won't do well in college. I take all the hardest classes my school offers, but many of them are ridiculously easy. There's so many homework assignments, make-up work, etc, that good grades are no longer a representation of a student's readiness for college. In one class, for example, I forgot to turn in one half of an assignment and received a 50, yet my average in that class still rounded up to a 100. As a result, lots of people don't ever bother to learn important lessons. Why bother? You can still get respectable grades without them. Students are falling behind and no one knows.

As for using a test to determine one's eligibility for college, it's just wrong on so many levels. The ability to gain a higher education is one of the greatest luxuries available to students today, and it would be wrong to take that opportunity away from people. Additionally, standardized tests like the SAT can be taught, so they're not at all representative of a student's ability at the college level.