We need career technical education and well-trained career counselors in every middle and high school in California. Columnists in local and national print media agree based on what I read Sunday, Dec. 4. Let me explain.
After I read the Sunday New York Times and San Jose Mercury News, the subject of this column changed. Scott Herhold of the Mercury News personalized his thoughts on college education by writing, “Over the years, I’ve occasionally loudly declaimed at parties that if I knew I wanted to be a journalist from the start, I would have skipped college.”
What is implied in Scott’s rant is the absurd disconnect between the college study sequence and the experience of students with their eventual career pathways. It’s a very true but sad indictment of our current system of schooling.
I don’t always advocate for more money for schools, but for using the money we currently allocate for preschool through college education (P-16) more wisely. We waste too much taxpayer money on very poor results. We need educational systems that are more results driven, particularly as it relates to career pathways.
One thing that is essential for us to implement with urgency is connecting our middle and high school educational systems to the world of careers and the skills/education needed to fulfill entry-level requirements. As a former middle school principal, I strongly believe career connections must begin when children are enrolled in middle school. The formative ages of 12-14 are incredibly important years in either advancing toward a life filled with promise or one with doubts about personal success. Middle school is the place where the seeds of dropping out are sowed. It is also a place where some students dream of career pathways different than their parents (e.g. first in the family to go to college).
When teachers can legitimately answer the question of “why are we learning this?” from inquiring middle school minds, then we will know we are on the right track. And the answer cannot be “because it’s on the test.” The NY Times Editorial Board’s piece, “Where Schools Fall Short,” said that “[m]illions of students attend abysmally weak school systems that leave them unprepared for college even as more jobs require some higher education. The states have an obligation to help these students retool.”
Yes, the NY Times editorial board is correct. However, by taking the issue on, the board must also insist that those students attending expensive public-funded community college systems are prepared to enroll in either a two-year associate of arts degree in a field of their choosing, certificate program and/or transfer after two years to a four-year college/university.
Gary Hart, former secretary of education in California, wrote a special op-ed to the Mercury News the same day as Herhold. “Research has documented that only three in 10 community college students complete a certificate, two-year degree or transfer to a four-year college within six years,” Hart wrote. “There is widespread consensus that community colleges are failing to meet the educational needs of large numbers of students.” This is horrific and a costly drain on the state budget. We need much better results from this public expenditure.
Mr. Hart goes on to opine about the importance of adopting core recommendations that have the potential to be transformative from the Student Success Task Force. The Community College Board of Governors will review the recommendations in January. Unfortunately, Hart believes the community college establishment will oppose the recommendations in their current state. The status quo is our enemy and elected and appointed leaders must be bold enough to act in the best interest of this state and its future in order to alter a system that doesn’t work for so many, even if that means losing the next election or not having their contract renewed.
My plan would include a reduction of community college funding, while putting the savings in developing career technical education programs and career counselors in both middle and high schools. The result would be that the community college and university programs would spend a lot less on remediation. The effects of their temporary loss of funding would be made up by not having to remediate so many students who were unmotivated to learn in earlier years of schooling. Students are motivated to learn when they see that what they are learning has an impact on their future life success.
In this model, high school graduates not moving on to a four-year college would be much better equipped to earn middle class wages for technical jobs right here in Silicon Valley. Perhaps, if not done at the state level, new leadership at the Santa Clara County Office of Education can build on the good work that has been done by Dr. Weis and Alyssa Lynch, coordinator of CTE, to make our region a model P-16.
Not everyone needs a 4-year college degree, but everyone must have requisite skills for the jobs of the 21st century in order to enjoy a middle-class income. Our public education system must reinvent itself to address the problems Sunday’s columnists identified.
> I don’t always advocate for more money for schools, but for using the money we currently allocate for preschool through college education (P-16) more wisely. We waste too much taxpayer money on very poor results. We need educational systems that are more results driven, particularly as it relates to career pathways
Someone alert the authorities!
I suspect that Joe is being held hostage somewhere and is being forced to write this against his will.
> My plan would include a reduction of community college funding, while putting the savings in developing career technical education programs and career counselors in both middle and high schools. The result would be that the community college and university programs would spend a lot less on remediation. The effects of their temporary loss of funding would be made up by not having to remediate so many students who were unmotivated to learn in earlier years of schooling. Students are motivated to learn when they see that what they are learning has an impact on their future life success.
Hello? What? ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
> Not everyone needs a 4-year college degree, but everyone must have requisite skills for the jobs of the 21st century in order to enjoy a middle-class income. Our public education system must reinvent itself to address the problems Sunday’s columnists identified.
O-MY-GAWD!!!
We need to get Joe into protective custody or the witness protection program before the teachers unions get to him!!!!
For the most part I agree with DiSalvo’s assessment, but I would change one aspect. I think that we should allow high school students to enter the work force while still attending high school. Many of the students are not intending to pursue a four year degree, let alone an AA degree and would be better served by allowing them to enter the work force earlier. Those students would enter identifiable trades or occupations that would provide a marketable skill (plumbing, automotive, electrician, etc) and would still attend school 1 day a week. That day would focus on life skills that they would need to understand to function in the real world. This would include banking, investments, contracts (home, auto), health, etc. This serves the purpose of providing a pathway to obtain skills to students not interested in school, reduce the class sizes in high school and also remove those students who tend to be disruptive. If those students who leave school early to work and later decide to go back to school, then the path would travel through the Junior College System.
Joseph,
Thank you for your thought provoking words. However, your suggestion to shrink community college funding further is absurd. If you believe community colleges should reduce the number of pre-college-level courses, that’s an argument to consider. Or perhaps you support the Student Success Task Force suggestion to prioritize community college registration of students who have committed to a course of study that will end in a certificate or a degree.
But the fact remains that a majority of high school diploma receipients are not able to walk onto a community college campus and take zero basic skills courses. Those are students who passed the CAHSEE, earned a HS diploma and walked in gown at graduation, yet who are not prepared for college freshman English and/or mathematics.
And, please remember that state law forces community colleges to count counselors on the other side of the 50% law that requires colleges to spend half of funding on classroom instruction. That statute results in less and less counselors as the faculty workforce decreases.
I continue to encourage the County Board of Education to convene a gathering of local community college trustees and local school board trustees so we can begin a sincere discussion. Education trustees of all levels want enhanced student success. Working together, K-12 and Community College Trustees can co-champion the changes necessary to help our society to thrive.
Chris Stampolis
Trustee, West Valley-Mission Community College District
State Board Member, California Community College Trustees
A collage education is always that a mark of a person who has transitioned into society as an adult. However times are changing . Education is now at the long and winding road to having young people in having some skills and knowledgeably. 100 years ago the ABC’s were the basic , now with the Tech field , it seems everyone is gun hoe on competing with countries like China, which has 85 million illiterate . Our country is pushing for 100 % literacy . In the end we have High School Drop outs with no skills , we also have many Collage grads with PHd’s that are out of work and flipping hamburgers. First we need to bring back all those “jobs” sent overseas and put people to work to do them here . I am sure that there will be a boost to education and the economy . adieu.
> First we need to bring back all those “jobs” sent overseas and put people to work to do them here .
OK. Lets suppose your solution is correct.
Here are two strategies for bringing back all those jobs sent overseas and putting people to work to do them here:
Strategy #1: Raise taxes on the rich and make them pay their fair share.
Strategy #2: Cut the taxes for bringing business profits into the U.S. that businesses have earned overseas.
Which strategy do you think would work better for putting people to work in the U.S.?
Joseph,
After a few weeks of reflection, I still am perplexed at your suggestion to transfer funding from Community Colleges to the K-12 system as a means to solve CC funding challenges.
You suggest “developing career technical education programs and career counselors in both middle and high schools.”
If high schools take on the responsibility for CTE programs, what path will lead to “The result…that the community college and university programs would spend a lot less on remediation”?
You seem to suggest the achievement gap primarily is caused by lack of student motivation. Am I reading you correctly that by adding CTE courses in high school that currently-lower-achieving public school students not only will thrive in CTE courses but ALSO then will find heightened success in basic math and English so they no longer will need remediation?
Further, quite sincerely, to what types of “middle-class wages” for “technical jobs” would training reasonably transfer from community colleges to middle or high schools?
And, with congratulations for your re-election as SCCBOE President, I do hope the County Board this year will convene some joint discussions between Community College Trustees and School Board Trustees for the K-12 system. Students will benefit if Trustees from all education levels find common ground.
Happy new year,
Chris Stampolis
Trustee, West Valley-Mission Community College District
State Board Member, California Community College Trustees
408-390-4748 * [email protected]