Whether you call it Vocational Education or Career/Technical Education, it's simply education designed to prepare students to get and hold a decent job. My personal definition of a decent job is one that is rewarding, both financially and in the warm and fuzzy way. You make a living wage doing something you like and that you are able to take pride in. Pretty simple actually. In years past and currently with all of the educational reforms, those who have the power and authority to make policy keep listening to the wrong people. Doug Stowe at the Wisdom of the Hands put this
link up the other day. It's a newspaper article describing the shortage of skilled workers and the effect it's having on manufacturing. It's a very well written article and makes a compelling case for the policy makers and the educational leadership to pull their collective heads out and start doing the right thing by today's young people. You should read it.
I attended my meeting today about the new Career Pathways as well as other issues dealing with teaching CTE. It wasn't really much help when it came to shedding light on what the future will bring with the new pathways approach but I had a real nice time sitting on the Group W bench playing with the pencils.
The more I hear, the more I'm convinced that everyone is going down the wrong path. I also know that I'm not going to be able to change it. But I did see this someplace on the Internet: Stressed is Desserts spelled backwards. From now on, instead of worrying about what the knucklehead politicians and educational leadership are doing to screw up little Johnny's education, I'll just have a cookie. I might end up being 400 lbs. by the time I retire but I can't let it eat me alive. I'll eat the cookie instead.
The weather was pretty nice around here Sat. afternoon and terrific Sunday. I made a grand total of $19.00 at the scrap yard Saturday from my sheet tin and got my feet all muddy in the process. I got some conduit run in the barn afterwards. The bottom is pretty much ready to pull wires. I worked on the top on Sunday until I ran out of supplies, then did some cleaning around the joint. I knocked off a little early due to the Super Bowl. As nice as it was, that was probably a mistake, today was pretty much a turd. I've got nothing urgent pending on the project front for the week, so with my shotgun approach to planning I'll just see where I end up after I pull the trigger.
4 comments:
It sounds like you just had a great time with all the Indian Trails CTE folks today :-)
It was more of the same. We evaluated our programs and developed the action plan for improving. My 5 year plan is to be gone 4.
Sounds a lot like what happened at my high school growing up. My senior year they changed to a "CTS" program- career and technical something or other. 15 years later- there is NO shop program- woods, metals, auto, or otherwise. I'm also pretty sure there isnt even anything Tech related other than assorted computers classes. Talk about shooting yourself in the foot...
This might actually end up being a good thing. By taking the vocational approach, the schools will receive additional funding which is always in short supply. That should help keep "shop" programs in the schools. However, since no one seems to know exactly how this is all going to be implemented or what exactly the results will be, I'll remain a little suspicious of the whole thing, particularly when it comes to the licensing of the teachers. If the licensing requirements stay as they are, I don't know how they are going to find enough people to teach these programs and will this force other good teachers out? Interesting times now in education.
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