Friendly debate: A single academic track or multiple tracks?
I had an interesting conversation today with John Konop, who is the CEO of a financial services company, a former candidate for Congress – he lost a GOP primary challenge to Tom Price in 2006 — and a frequent commenter on education issues.
Should a high school diploma mean different things for different students?
A Cherokee resident, Konop was one of the early critics of the state’s new math curriculum. He sees the math reforms as a symptom of a larger problem: Forcing all students into an academic track that is not relevant to their dreams, may exceed their abilities and pushes them to drop out.
As a CEO who monitors job trends, he questions the mantra that high level math skills are essential to most future jobs. He advocates options outside college prep for students so they are not done in by early failure and give up on school.
He and I agree that the dropout rate in Georgia is a problem. However, we depart on the solution. He wants a non-college track, saying that a lot of students in Georgia – including those only learning English — could be better served by a track that leads them to technical training and certification rather than to college and a bachelor’s degree.
Konop agrees that people change their goals – what someone wants at 15 may not be the same thing they want at 25 – - but says that’s why we ought to make it easier for people who obtain certificates to resume their education.
“A lot of those kids would be better served in junior high by getting into a certification program. To expect a kid having a hard enough time grasping the language to go on a certain track to college is irrational for them and for the teacher. At the end of the day, no matter what we do, a certain amount of people will fall through the cracks,” he says. “If kids do fall through the cracks, what can you do to change it? I recommend giving these kids a chance to go to junior college. The guy who is the CIO at my company got his first IT degree from IT Tech and now has a MBA.”
Konop says many older workers went to college assuming they would learn everything they needed for their careers. Their college degree marked the end of their education.
“We don’t live in that world anymore,” he says. “Now, if you study something it gets you in the door, but you have to keep studying. I am a CEO, but I keep reading every day. I don’t look at education as ever stopping.”
Here is my counterargument in brief: The attitude that students need an academically less demanding “vo-tech” track fails to consider the dramatic changes in the 21st-century workplace that can make a manufacturing manual tougher to comprehend than a college text. Strong literacy and math skills are vital.
As Kati Haycock of the Education Trust told me: “Young people today who don’t have those skills are not becoming auto mechanics; they are the ones sweeping the shop floor.”
Konop argues that the single college prep diploma will drive more high school students to quit, but history doesn’t bear out his predictions. The national movement to higher standards that began in the 1970s did not inflate dropout rates. In fact, dropout rates fell between 1973 and 1990, especially among black students. The key is to ensure that additional academic rigor seems relevant to future employment. Students who understand how physics is applied to careers in aeronautics or hydraulics, for example, are more likely to invest the time needed to master that discipline.
In addition, Census data still show that even completion of only two years of college yields higher lifetime earnings than a technical school certificate. Yes, there are high-earning mechanics and welders out there, but we often overlook all the folks coming out of tech schools into low-paying fields with very little opportunity for advancement.
Konop wrote a blog posting about his position and about a bill that he thinks will help: Here it is:
Our high schools are facing skyrocketing drop out rates, declining test scores, and limited tax revenue (because of the recession). No Child Left Behind’s one-size-fits-all education model, with its unfunded mandates from the sate and federal government, has been a massive failure by any measurement.
Georgia has unfortunately followed No Child Left Behind’s lead and established a one-track-fits-all philosophy, which forces all students into a college-bound curriculum. The result: students with an aptitude for vocational/tech curriculum are demoralized (and dropping out in greater numbers) and college-bound students are not challenged by an increasingly watered-down curriculum aimed at accommodating everyone (including students who would be better served by a vocational/tech curriculum).
The solution to these problems requires only common sense and familiarity with an already proven approach. For example, Macon, GA, has developed a multi-track (college-bound and vocational/tech) system based on each student’s aptitudes. By putting vocational students and college bound students on different tracks, the school has realized amazing results.
From Macon.com: “…the immediate benefits from the career academy include lower dropout rates, higher graduation rates, and a more skilled labor pool in the county, [school administrator Carpenter] said. The Newnan school’s web site states the county’s dropout rate has fallen by half since it opened, and the graduation rate for students in dual enrollment programs is 98 percent.”
Georgia State Representative Steve Davis has proposed a bipartisan bill (HR-215) to promote this multi-track concept. The bill will provide separate tracks for high school students (a college-bound track and a vocational/tech track) using joint enrolment programs with local colleges and technical schools to support honors and vocational programs.
HR-215 would 1) increase graduation rates, 2) provide our local economy with work-ready students who will increase tax revenues, and 3) decrease the money governments spend on welfare and crime. It will also lower the overall cost of education by better utilizing college and technical school resources, many of which have surplus capacity.
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131 comments Add your comment
jim d
January 28th, 2010
10:06 am
Math teacher,
excellent point
teacher/parent
January 28th, 2010
11:33 am
@ whose choice- You act as though offering an additional program of study is eliminating choice. The reality is that the current one track program is what takes away any choice from student, parent, and teacher. Right now, the legislators are the ones who chose to force all students onto the same track. The decision makers should ultimately to be parents and students, who consider the students’ academic success to that point, the students’ interests, and the recommendations of teachers. That’s how ‘college prep’ kids get into advanced classes, and although it doesn’t work 100% of the time, it generally gets students into the courses they are both capable of doing well in and want to be in.
john konop
January 28th, 2010
1:03 pm
Sorry about the typos!
john konop
January 28th, 2010
1:07 pm
teacher/parent
Very good point!!!
chuck
January 28th, 2010
1:46 pm
Maureen, your argument makes no sense. You act as if forcing kids to take a college prep program in High School means that these students will be going to college. That could not be further from the truth. Instead what they are doing is not even finishing High School. They don’t have the ability or the desire to pass those math courses and they CANNOT graduate without them. What do you expect them to do?
There is absolutely NOTHING WRONG with going to Tech School and learning a trade. Certainly they will make less than if they had gone on to college, but they will make decidedly MORE than they would have if they had instead dropped out of High School. I quit college in my junior year. It was 8 years later that I came to my senses, and went back to finish.
Many of these kids will figure it out at some point. Taking a vocational track program will not prevent them from going to college later. They may have to take some remedial courses, but they will be MUCH BETTER students when they mature a little bit. Expecting them to pass a college prep course of study when they have no ability or desire to do so, is NOT BASED IN REALITY.
Maureen Downey
January 28th, 2010
2:11 pm
Chuck, I believe that kids need the same rigor whether they are on a career ready and college bound track. Here is the view of the National High School Alliance on the issue:
Maureen Downey
January 28th, 2010
2:12 pm
Chuck, Sorry, here is the source of that information. It is from a long report on this very issue:
http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:Yqt816hn5-4J:www.hsalliance.org/_downloads/news/June22NNCORigorPaper.pdf+merits+of+a+single+college+prep+diploma+in+high+school+research&hl=en&gl=us&sig=AHIEtbRGex_IxYZrZYKAdWtLIofeZ-PpRQ
john konop
January 28th, 2010
2:36 pm
Maureen Downey
In all due respect the issue is defining “academic rigor”, is the issue. For me math and logic are simple via my aptitude and skill sets. Yet if I had to make a living doing anything mechanical I would have been a failure.
The one size fit all one track solution does not take into considerations that all of us have strength and weaknesses.
The IQ test was designed for aptitude to place people in the proper job not to force people into doing a job not geared toward their skill set.
My wife and I had a bad week with home repairs and trust me the guy who does my work is not hurting for money. And trust me; I feel like an idiot sometimes when he explains what needs to get done.
Somehow many of us get the sense that you think that the skills learned by tradesmen are somehow have no “academic rigor”.
I would argue they are merely a different strength. As a parent I see it in my own kids. My son is very strong in math and my daughter is strong in English. Why not let them focus on their strength?
Tonya
January 28th, 2010
3:24 pm
Maureen is coming from a very liberal-minded perspective. I have seen destitute poverty, and the lack that no skills or education can bring first-hand. Everyone IS NOT college material, and forcing every square peg into a round hole will never work, no matter how much you try to force it in. A good vo-tech program IS rigorous, as it is generally a preparation for some type of testing or apprenticeship. Every tried doing your won wiring? Or being your own draftsman?
My husband is a teacher. He could make more money putting his handyman or computer skills to work than what he W-2 for 2009. But he loves teaching and it is why he does what he does. But he has been offered as much as $50 hour with NO formal vo-tech training to help friends with their homes and electronics.
SallyB
January 28th, 2010
4:13 pm
Ms. Maureen…..RIGOR/ RIGOROUS ??? Do you mean difficult and rigid???? Perhaps
thorough…complete…comprehensive…in-depth…assiduous might be better descriptors for diploma programs. One does not have to take Bio-Chem or advanced Trigonometry to have comprehensive curriculum to prepare students for a career path that does not include college.
Does anyone know what percentage of jobs require a college degree????
jim d
January 28th, 2010
4:27 pm
Ms. Downey,
you may find this well written article of interesst.
http://www.epi.org/analysis_and_opinion/entry/college_graduates_supply_and_demand/
jim d
January 28th, 2010
4:30 pm
Sally,
not sure of that one but it has been reported than 20% of college grads are not finding work and just moving back in with mom and dad.
Dr. Suess
January 28th, 2010
5:09 pm
Whose Choice?
“You have brains in your head.
You have feet in your shoes.
You can steer yourself in any direction you choose.
You’re on your own. And you know what you know.
You are the guy who’ll decide where to go.”
Maureen Downey
January 28th, 2010
5:18 pm
jim d, While the job market for young workers is terrible, consider:
Among 20- to 24-year-olds, the jobless rate was 16 percent in November. However, when you look only at college graduates in that age group, the rate drops 10.6 percent.
Maureen
SallyB
January 28th, 2010
6:55 pm
Maureen…RE the jobless rate you quoted…Not sure about those stats….ANd perhaps, if those non c college grads had a high school that offered other that college pret diploma….Well…just saying…maybe there wouldn’ be so many unemployed….
…My statistics professor made a very impressive point…..CORRELATION DOES NOT MEAN CAUSATION…..In the group of non college grads, included all kinds of folks, including those not even looking for a traditional job…
SallyB
January 28th, 2010
6:57 pm
So why am I in the AJC OGRE filter again…….????NO RHYME OR REASON….!!!
john konop
January 28th, 2010
7:10 pm
SallyB,
You are right which is why studying multiple variables against different sub set group gives you a better view. Also that is why we weight variables because most times it is never a 1 size fit all solution to most problems.
ScienceTeacher671
January 28th, 2010
7:38 pm
Maureen, a couple of anecdotes. First, back when we had woodshop and better vocational courses, I had a young man in my science class who was classified as Mildly Intellectually Disabled. Although he was a nice young man, he didn’t do too well in his academic classes, in part due to his disability and in part because he didn’t sit still very well. All the same, he was magnificent in carpentry classes, and made some beautiful furniture. After high school, he went to work for a cabinet maker, and after a while, even earned a supervisory position. He is happily, gainfully, and profitably employed.
Second, a current 9th grade student. At first glance, he might remind you of the earlier student: very polite and friendly, very active and energetic, but not very strong academically. As a matter of fact, this student is reading at a fifth grade level, and doing math at a 3rd grade level. Student B did not pass the CRCT but was committee promoted. For some reason (maybe the RTI process?) Student B doesn’t seem to have ever been tested to determine whether his math and reading deficits result from a learning or intellectual disability, so he probably hasn’t ever received the intensive assistance or remediation that might have helped improve his reading and math skills. He currently is not on an Individualized Education Plan.
Maureen, do you think Student B will be ready for college any time soon? Do you think he will pass the GHSGT? Do you think some vocational training might improve his employment prospects?
The idealistic side of me would like to see all our students prepared for college, whether or not they choose to attend. The realist side of me has four classes full of Student Bs.
Cere
January 28th, 2010
8:50 pm
Maureeen, you said, “Finally, our foundation has learned that graduating from high school is not enough anymore. To earn enough to raise a family, you need some kind of college degree, whether it’s a certificate or an associate’s degree or a bachelor’s degree. So last year we started making grants to help more students graduate from college. Our focus will be on helping improve community colleges and reducing the number of kids who start community college but don’t finish.”
Are we to interpret this to mean that those who don’t attend college cannot afford to raise a family? Is the ability to raise a family tied to income? How about this instead – how about we create a country where those in the working class are able to earn a living wage and enjoy “life” – aka – “family”… Geesh – have we really gotten this focused on money in this country? What a bunch of snobs we’ve become.
Maureen Downey
January 28th, 2010
9:24 pm
Cere, I think Bill Gates said that. That’s from his annual letter, a part of which I excerpted under his name.
Maureen
Cere
January 28th, 2010
9:38 pm
Oh – sorry. Didn’t mean to infer that we are a whole country of snobs… it’s just Bill Gates!
In the words of Emily Litella – “nevermind!”
jim d
January 29th, 2010
7:46 am
Bill Gates doing more harm than good?
http://philanthropy.com/blogPost/Gates-Foundation-Investments/12711/
john konop
January 29th, 2010
8:05 am
Maureen,
We all see tend to see the world through what we experience day to day. Bill Gate view is tainted by being in the software business. The more people that use software for work, games……..the more money Bill Gates makes!
But it would be somewhat irrational to think everyone should be a high level programmer. Also life is about balance. I am sure Bill Gates like me this week has someone fixing things around his home and offices! Also the majority of his workers like mine are moving data not creating high level programming solutions.
Also if you ask employers like me in large office settings the skills we look for starting jobs you may be shocked. A technical college or temp service would know. What we generally look and test for is speed/accuracy on keying, familiarity of software, general math knowledge………
Finally, in my shop many of my employees are going to school part-time to seek a 4 year degree. And they are thankful they have skills that can earn them money while enhancing their education. I have other employees who are just thankful they have a skill that translate into a job.
Ole Guy
January 29th, 2010
5:50 pm
Kids need to receive a single-track education for a few simple reasons:
* Vocational tracks are, essentially, a watered-down, dumbed-down
curricula of mediocrity. How challenging can gen math and gen science
be made in order to capture a kid’s drive to keep pushing the envelope
in terms of mental conditioning?
* Armed with a solid grounding in a few advanced math and science
disciplines, the kid who chooses to attend a post hs vocational
training track will, ultimately, be more prepared to advance within
the growth structures of his/her chosen field. In other words,
college-bound kids are not the only group of high school graduates
who will benefit from academic rigor in high school.
* Vocational demands of the 21st Century are not at all of the same
levels as they may have been in earlier times. Sheetmetal workers,
for example, need to apply skills in geometry and math
conceptualizations. If the kid can’t work with minimal supervision
and becomes dependant on others to perform math functions of
moderate challenge, today’s employer would probably find this
totaly unaccepable.
Paint the pictures and scenarios any way you want…subjecting the kid to any but the most rigorous courses of study would be shortchanging, not only the kid, but the future of this Red White and Blue Country.
Ole Guy
January 29th, 2010
9:29 pm
Cere, you are absolutely correct in your observations; in that our collective focus (foci?) is primarily directed toward the almighty buck, we are, indeed, a country of snobs. How many of us purchase far more house than we really need? How many of us drive around in far more car than we need…we insist on commuting in that single-occupant SUV, when carpooling/public trans would work just fine. The rest of the industrialized world, to include the major metros of this country, employ public trans on a daily basis. I have chatted, on public trans, with a well-known nl baseball player, enroute to his “office”, the ball park. The ole American custom of “keeping up with the Jonses” is alive and well, as evidenced by the enormous debt loads incurred by so-called “educated” people.
I am quite certain one of the forces which casts us, the American populace, in lights of global disdain is our penchant for extravagance. While we gain paupership on global markets, we insist on maintaining a facade of well-being. The phrase “elimination of the middle class” becomes, with the passage of time, an unfortunate reality for many, yet we seem to insist on maintaining the lifestyles of “$35,000/yr millionairs”. INDEED, WE ARE A NATION OF SNOBS!
North GA H.S. Math Teacher
January 29th, 2010
9:34 pm
Ole Guy,
You my friend are absolutely correct. But, spend a few days substituting in an average high school and then come back and reply. BTW – It may only take one day depending on the class you sub for.
Ole Guy
January 29th, 2010
10:22 pm
Been there, Teach…like returning from a combat mission, there are many “sea stories”, some rather inspiring, some amusing, and some downright terrible. You remember them all, and one’s got to admire the leaders, the very folks who are tasked with producing inquiring minds.
I don’t know if you ever saw the movie/series “The Paper Chase”…at the very beginning, the venerable Professor Kingsfield entones the class “You come here with a head full of mush, and…IF you survive, you leave thinking like lawyers”. While your task is not to produce legal eagles, but rather thinking beings, I am quite certain both you and the mythical Kingsfield have to deal with “heads of mush”.
Thanks for your comments, Teach, and for what you are doing for future gens.
North GA H.S. Math Teacher
January 29th, 2010
10:50 pm
It can be a lot like a combat mission. The concerning part is that each year it seems to get worse. (BTW- I think I teach in a pretty good school in a really good district). I don’t know if it’s the drugs or what is going on. My best guess is that it is the breakdown of family. I’m afraid their parents are just too busy thinking about themselves to even care about what thier kids do. Unfortunatley, the kids that do care are mixed in with those that dont. Schools are afraid to fall below AYP and the dumbing down begins.
Ole Guy
January 30th, 2010
5:37 pm
Teach, I’ve said it before; I’ll say it again…at some levels, from the stratospheric reaches of government to the family core, we have become afraid of kids. There seems to have evolved a role reversal of sorts…in days past, it was the kid who feared (fear being nothing more than raw, uncut discipline) the world…now the world fears the kid. You have to reconsider any notion of helping a kid who may be traveling solo at the airport, lest you become branded a “prevert”…I need not enunciate the role reversals within the schools; paddles and social stigma were the orders of the day. If one got into a school yard fight (a near-daily occurance), one had better not be deemed as having some sort of advantage in terms of size, ability, etc, and certainly no weapons. If one was deemed, by the ever-present crowd, to indeed have an advantage, well, one just may as well have doned a dress. Bullying…sure, there was bullying, and you know, the bullier eventually got flattened…why? Because everyone (then as now) hates a bully. What’s the difference? As I said, we are afraid of these kids. Hells bells, even kids are afraid of kids. How many kids come to school armed, be it with firearms, knives or whathaveyou.
We’ve seen what happens when our government insists on maintaining ultimate control of everything…when they relagate “ground commanders” to secondary roles of mission execution. I don’t know how many readers are familiar with the govt. micromanagement of air campaigns into North Vietnam; the conditions under which ground commanders were obliged to conduct operations under militarily unfavorable conditions, conditions deemed favorable only in the political sense.
There are many who consider that, had our govt not stopped on Bahgdad’s doorstep in the first Gulf War, today’s situation in that region may well be completely different. The adversary, today, knows that he can seek shelter (political immunity, if you will) in a mosque, compliments of the US Govt’s intent on maintaining political correctness on the field of battle.
So, Teach, we both know that until the govt allows the “educational ground commanders”, that’s you, the teacher corps, to “conduct classroom operations” as you deem “tacticaly fit”, ain’t no amount of educational reform gonna work.
North GA H.S. Math Teacher
January 31st, 2010
11:35 pm
Total agreement.
john konop
June 12th, 2010
5:57 am
In all due respect the problem is NO ONE agrees with this one size fit all No Child Left Behind education strategy that Kathy Cox and Sonny were pushing. Which is why KATHY COX was so unpopular even in her own party, Kathy could not even get 50% of the vote one time statewide in county straw poll across the state in her own party. She only raised 20K to run a statewide race, had personal financial problems, scandal of the day and a poor performance.
The real issue is most people agree with a multi-track system not a one size fit all plan. Your blog even demonstrated my point via reading the comments on our debate. As I told you I think your blog is very good and you bring up many good points, but on this issue you have a big blind spot. I still like you
Friendly debate: A single academic track or multiple tracks?
http://blogs.ajc.com/get-schooled-blog/2010/06/11/wanted-someone-with-lots-of-friends-and-money-to-run-for-school-superintendent-as-independent/#comments