The Failure of Our Education System
We need to chart a different course both educationally and politically
A tradesman in my local community posted a ‘letter of apology’ to community members who were unable to get service from his company due to a shortage of skilled workers and tradesmen. This is my response to his wonderful post on Nextdoor.com. His actual apology was carried on Fox News: https://www.foxnews.com/video/6323589992112 and is something you need to watch before reading my response to bring everything into context.
Chris,
Thank you for your wonderful message. It is a message that rings true on so many fronts. Allow me to offer a brief narrative regarding this very topic.
As a teenager in high school in suburban Long Island, I was also a victim of the “Ivy League syndrome” that seemed to be prevalent in guidance counselors. That was in the late 1950s. My guidance counselors had me in a Regents (full academic) program and I was doing horribly as far as grades were concerned. In the middle of my 10th year I was ready to drop out of school and enroll in a vocational program. Well, that would not have looked good on my guidance counselor's record-somehow I convinced them to drop some of the full academic courses and allow me to take some industrial arts courses. It was the best thing I ever did. My grades improved markedly-I wasn't an honors student, but the grades were considerably better, and I found renewed interest in learning.
Following graduation, I enrolled in college to study advertising technology. I still remember everything they taught me, but unfortunately I was not ready for college and I dropped out after one term. A year and a half later, After working in a machine shop, I returned to college to study electrical technology. That was during the Vietnam War era and college lasted two years with the military draft hovering over my head. I decided to drop out of college at the end of my second year and work in the aerospace industry where I thought I might have a better chance of avoiding the draft. Seeing deferments being cancelled, I called a friend who was a Sergeant in the National Guard and somehow Was accepted quite rapidly. This was probably the biggest change to my life, and even though I did not see combat, I thank the army for helping me to grow up quite rapidly. My time in the aerospace industry continued for approximately five more years concurrent with my National Guard service.
In mid-1969 the New York City Board of Education announced a need for industrial arts and vocational teachers-my 5 plus years in industry qualified me to take the exam for industrial arts and in September 1970 I began my teaching career. Out of the 37 years of teaching, I spent 23 1/2 of those years teaching all of the shops that were taught in the New York City high schools. The following 14 years were spent as a teacher assigned in the School to Career office at Department of Education headquarters. During my final half dozen years I had the pleasure of being an assistant director for a nationwide educational program for marketing and entrepreneurship.
While employed as an educator, I developed and operated my own pest control company for 28 years. Nobody ever scorned me- I often got more respect as an exterminator than I did as a teacher in many instances. I was able to speak with auto mechanics, contractors, plumbers, builders, and even doctors and lawyers on a professional level. All of this was possible because I had convinced my high school guidance counselor that I love to work with my hands. They never seemed to understand that if you're going to work with your hands, you must have an educated mind to direct them.
Strangely, nothing has changed. During all of my years of teaching, I watched as shop programs in the schools were being shut down and shops were being converted into academic classrooms. The reasons? All budgetary. The shop programs required less students per class, equipment upkeep expenses, and expense for supplies. Our shops became expendable and the only recourse for a shop teacher was to study and test for a general science or mathematics license, or a special education license.
Without delving into the current political situation which has completely distorted everything related to education, it was easy to see this disaster coming. We now have a nation full of white-collar workers who know little more than how to press the keys on their keyboard or talk to their cell phones. We have politicians, lawyers, doctors, teachers, et cetera- all worthy pursuits and necessary jobs. We have created the demise of American ingenuity and industrial progress. We have a standard of living now that is based on dependency. Nobody knows how to fix anything-not even politicians! We have survived much of the damage created by Common Core and New Math.
What is even worse is that we now have a government that wants to pay you off student loans for all of those who chose to attend college and study meaningless programs that didn't prepare them for anything in the real world. What we have instead is one or two generations of useless idiots who have been programmed by useless teachers and professors who teach them what to think and not how to think. They have been taught the dangers of climate change without any basis in science-what has changed is the political climate. They believe that banning the use of fossil fuels and making everything electric will prevent climate change and create new environmental security. Well, I hate to burst their bubble, but climate change is cyclical and unpredictable. In addition, forcing the United states to obey oppressive environmental regulations will not change the fact that the rest of the world is still polluting the atmosphere, especially communist China and other underdeveloped nations. They proposed a green new deal where everything will be electric. Of course they have not even figured out that we do not have an electrical grid capable of supporting even half of what they want to do, and the fact that it is totally susceptible to any kind of EMP attack by a rogue nation or even a solar flare, something that could wipe us out in a matter of minutes if it happened on our side of the sun.
In closing, we're going to have to face two realities- one of them is educational, and the other is political. They are both intertwined, and if we don't address the political mistakes that have created our current economic crisis while simultaneously addressing our educational shortfalls, we are doomed to a rapid decline of our lifestyle as we slide into oblivion. The signs are all around us- I pray that it is not too late for us to recover and redefine our course.