"College will still be a significant milestone for many, of course, but embracing a paradigm of opportunity pluralism requires many additional routes to adult success." I harken back to many decades ago when I graduated from high school (1970), 100 people in that graduating class and probably no more than 20 or so going to college includ…
"College will still be a significant milestone for many, of course, but embracing a paradigm of opportunity pluralism requires many additional routes to adult success."
I harken back to many decades ago when I graduated from high school (1970), 100 people in that graduating class and probably no more than 20 or so going to college including me. We had folks who had trained to be carpenters going straight to work at good paying jobs, laughing at the rest of us as suckers still in school. We had women who would go spend a couple of years at secretarial school to have secure jobs, we had a woman who became a flight attendant and one a fingerprint expert for the FBI. Some that became auto mechanics and plumbers and farmers (did I mention this was a rural area). At our 40th reunion the fellow who had accumulated the most wealth was a farmer. None of these careers I mentioned required a bachelor's degree. I ramble all of this because there is ALWAYS honor in honest work and in the scheme of things plumbers, electricians, farmers, trash collectors are more important to the smooth running of society than say engineers. And for the most part make a decent living at it. We need to make sure the people who go the non college route are not placed in some sort of second tier because they aren't.
Maybe more important than literature professors or pundits -- and certainly more important than the "sensitivity readers" of Inclusive Minds, for example -- but not more important than engineers, I think. Not if you like your bridges to stay up as you cross them.
"College will still be a significant milestone for many, of course, but embracing a paradigm of opportunity pluralism requires many additional routes to adult success."
I harken back to many decades ago when I graduated from high school (1970), 100 people in that graduating class and probably no more than 20 or so going to college including me. We had folks who had trained to be carpenters going straight to work at good paying jobs, laughing at the rest of us as suckers still in school. We had women who would go spend a couple of years at secretarial school to have secure jobs, we had a woman who became a flight attendant and one a fingerprint expert for the FBI. Some that became auto mechanics and plumbers and farmers (did I mention this was a rural area). At our 40th reunion the fellow who had accumulated the most wealth was a farmer. None of these careers I mentioned required a bachelor's degree. I ramble all of this because there is ALWAYS honor in honest work and in the scheme of things plumbers, electricians, farmers, trash collectors are more important to the smooth running of society than say engineers. And for the most part make a decent living at it. We need to make sure the people who go the non college route are not placed in some sort of second tier because they aren't.
Maybe more important than literature professors or pundits -- and certainly more important than the "sensitivity readers" of Inclusive Minds, for example -- but not more important than engineers, I think. Not if you like your bridges to stay up as you cross them.