If the current constraints on schooling were removed, I would completely revamp our education structure. It is ineffective and only contributes too many of the problems within our society. The main problem with our educational structure is that by the time student's reach high school, they have already learned most of the core skills they will need to be successful in the "real" world. High schools and colleges in today's educational system teach redundant curriculum in an unintuitive format that loses many students or quite frankly, wastes their time. The primary function of high schools and colleges should be refocused in order to give students an opportunity to develop more specialized skills related to the careers that they wish to pursue. Upon reaching high school, each student should be allowed to choose most of the curriculum they are taught, from as wide of a variety of provided subjects as possible. In a day and age where our students have learned all of the basic math, science, history, and language arts skills that they will ever need by 8th grade, general education requirements at the high school and ESPECIALLY the college level, are almost entirely obsolete.
While this idea may seem outlandish, there are three principle arguments in favor of this redesign of America’s public schools. First, this would be one of the best ways to cultivate student interest in school and make students more interested in their own education, while also eliminating some of the redundancy in today’s educational system. According to the Alliance for Excellent Education, only 72% of Americans graduate from High School. Common responses to this problem have been calling for increased standards for teachers and larger budgets for education. Why are we not focusing more on the students? The main reason students drop out is because they are disinterested or unsatisfied with their schooling experience. Why not try to cultivate more interest by allowing students to pursue their own educational interests by the time they reach high school, instead of holding them to rigid “general education” standards.
The second argument in favor of this design would be that it would align our education system more along with the way humans tend to learn. Daniel Quinn, an award winning author, points out that for hundreds of years “children have managed to learn the things they want to learn and need to learn. They haven’t changed”. It is a well known fact that students are most likely to learn a lesson if they are genuinely interested in what they are learning about. Why go against this natural and simple fact about human nature? If a student isn’t interested in learning calculus, but wants to learn about how to fix automobiles, why should we force that student to take calculus?
Now the main detractors of this format will argue that by allowing students to have more freedom in what they learn at the high school and college levels, we would prevent them from becoming educationally well rounded. When examined closely, however, this argument is clearly absurd, for it implies that all learning stops at a defined point in a human being’s life. Any teacher, however, understands that learning NEVER ends. If a student chooses a specific profession early in their life to focus on, it does not mean that they will not pick up a wide variety of general knowledge. We live in the “information” age. Knowledge is more accessible now then it ever has been in human history. To say that by allowing students to have more freedom in what they learn at the high school and college levels would be to prevent them from becoming well rounded students is to demonstrate a general lack of knowledge about how learning actually occurs.
Finally, our society does not value a “well rounded” worker more then we value specialists. America’s economy depends on a highly specialized work force. So the question must be asked, if indeed our school system is responsible for creating a well rounded student, is that necessarily be a good thing? This entire point leads us to the final argument in favor of this type of school system design, which is that it would speed up the amount of time in which American students would be eligible to enter the work force. By allowing our students to pick a trade and master that trade at an earlier age, America will see an influx of young adults fully equipped with the highly specialized skills which companies desire. This will only make hiring American educated workers more appealing to businesses, which would help our economic problems and lead us into a new age of American innovation.
