Hello, my friends,
Today’s message came through to me as I sat in a coffee house along with one of my neighbors and we were joined by a young fella who graduated from our local high school, had Denise as his elementary school counselor, and today owns and operates his own business less than two miles from where I live.
Four of us at the table started to discuss the current state of education especially the ‘New State Tests’ to be given to students starting this year. This test is reputed to be harder, more demanding, and includes ‘end of year’ exams for potential 2012 graduates. The results of the ‘testing’ will make up about 15% of the student’s final grade in the class. The discussion also moved into a consideration of the need for graduates to take four years of mathematics and four years of science during their educational trip. Since this young man had come through the system, I prompted him to speak about his experience and did my best to keep my own opinions to myself except that I had to say that I thought we were neglecting that portion of our high school population that would probably not go on to college after graduation.
This young man came from the worst kind of family – alcohol mis-use and abuse, mental illness, divorced parents, kids being embarrassed by behavior of parents, and some really severe learning problems himself. I think it would be fair to say that this school saved this guy. Someone suggested that maybe we should start some kind of work/study program whereby kids could go the the regular schools for a time in the morning, and then leave the proper school to go to work in a field of interest for the rest of the day.
Listen to what this young business man had to say when that was suggested: “That’s exactly what I was doing – going to Smithson Valley in the morning and then going off to work for the rest of the day. Then we had to take more classes at the high school and we were told that we’d have to take these tests. When someone found out what I was doing, my program was dropped and I had to stay in school all day just studying things that had nothing to do with what I wanted to do as an adult. So, I quit going to school – I just went to work. Someone found out after five days that I was doing that, and I was brought back to school and put back into that old program. I didn’t need the money but I needed to learn how to do some mechanical things and my boss taught be a bunch of things that I use every day now.”
Today, this young man is married, has an eighteen month old son (that he absolutely worships), owns his own business and is doing very well; he is even considering running for the office of County Commissioner. He pays attention to the ‘goings-on’ at the sheriff’s office, the fire department, the home owners’ associations and his business. He’s teaching his son to speak English and Spanish during these developmental years and loves both his boy and his wife (he’s very open about those things!).
As I listened to him – and as I watched my neighbor listen to him – we both agreed that there are probably many kids who will never use advanced mathematics concepts nor even advanced science concepts. They will fix our cars, they will own businesses that pay taxes, they will perform services for many of us if only we’ll open some door for them to walk through. Why, you know, these kids might someday hire people to work for them – one of this student’s employees joined us for breakfast.
As I drove alone that short six miles to my home, thoughts of this fella ran through my head and I became even more convinced of some thing: 1) I believe in ‘Education For All’, but this does not mean the same education for all of our kids. Some need all of the high academic work we can pull together for them, others need clear instruction and experience in working with their hands and doing jobs that will not demand knowledge of highly abstract mathematics or science. I have a valuable Mustang in my yard which refuses to run consistently and I’ll need someone to pick it up, deliver it to my mechanic down the road, and he will diagnose the problem, probably install one or two new parts and this Mustang will run again. The driver of the tow truck, the mechanic, the parts delivery person, the secretary for the mechanic all need to know how to do their jobs efficiently and properly. How can our schools help them learn the latest techniques and at the same time keep their interest high in important jobs? 2) I believe we need some measurement of one’s abilities, but that does not suggest in any way that we should be giving tests with multiple choice answers and bubble-in answer sheets which can be easily graded by a computer. These tests measure nothing but memory – the lowest of the identified ‘intelligences’. If we could but listen to young people such as the guy I’ve described above, we could certainly devise some method for him to let us know that he can successfully repair a car which is not working properly. and, 3) We’ll need to recognize the values of the contributions to society by all. Just when we think that ‘ . . the least of these . . are not important, someone brings to our attention the role of two people in a simple story (I’ll be the person to bring this to your attention today):
“A world renowned organist was performing a recital at a concert hall. During the intermission, he took a break behind the organ and came upon the old man who pumped air for the pipes.
“‘Some concert we’re giving them,’ remarked the old man, wiping his brow with a handkerchief.
“‘WE??’ questioned the organist indignantly. ‘The last time I checked, I was the only one giving this concert.’
“The organist returned to the stage and began to play his next piece. But when his fingers struck the keys, no sound came through the pipes. The musician excused himself from the stage and rushed behind the organ to find the old man just sitting there!
“‘It seems I was mistaken, my friend,’ said the musician nervously. ‘WE are most certainly giving this concert.’”
At tonight’s school board meeting I read the school motto. It stated clearly that the mission of this school district is to give every student the opportunity to learn so that they could become productive citizens in society. I think that means we’ll educate some to ‘pump the bellows’. What do you think?
Have a wonderful weekend, and I’ll be back with you next Friday, and if you find time to drop me a note, I’d like that!
