What else would need to change for young people to aspire and succeed in vocational or occupational programs?

QUESTION 1:

Discussion Question: Reading 39, Teaching Suffers, pg. 398
Within this section of the reading, the difficulties of teacher and student success is discussed. It is stated that universities and colleges cannot be entirely blamed for decreased student learning, and instead it may be a response to social problems such as politics, media, religion, and commodification. This leads me to ask the following question: Have social issues instilled students with the idea that college is necessary for success, or did the educational system itself do that? Though schools cannot be blamed completely, perhaps the education system has taught students that college is vital to succeed; teachers may hint at this through the hidden curriculum by making subtle comments, such as how you don’t want to “end up as a garbage collector”. The education system itself may produce decreased student achievement in higher learning by encouraging students to go to college to get a good job, even though students may not have a desire to go. This could lead to low academic performance since some students don’t want to be there in the first place.

QUESTION 2: Beyond the messages sent by high school counselors, what else would need to change for young people to aspire and succeed in vocational or occupational programs? I ask this because we are often told that college and higher education is the only way to make a decent living and often vocational and occupational programs get looked over. My husband is in a mechanical position, and I was a phlebotomist at one time. So, I am curious about what my peers think of other options.

Last Completed Projects