Choosing a university is choosing a different type of present and future job

High school graduation requirements should be developed at the school level by faculty and approved by parents and supervisory boards, accepted by students coming to school (which, one hopes! The knowledge you need a youth to be considered an effective adult. These requirements will not consist only of long-earned Carnegie units and / or test scores, but will be based on a system of promotion by performance and by portfolio during the middle and high school years. Although most students will complete faculty expectations by the time they are around eighteen years old, others will progress through the program more or less rapidly. The “fixes” will be the basic proficiency standards; the “variables” will be the time spent you need to achieve them and the ways these skills are displayed.The breadth of the curriculum will also vary by student. It will not be dominated by a rigorous senior seminar, which will include a substantial senior project, possibly including an internship, and which will lead to a Graduation Exhibition that can be described and explained to all interested parties.

A new type of transcript will need to be developed to describe a student’s progress through high school, especially the senior year. If we are going to ask potential employers and college admissions officials to take high school transcripts seriously, we will need to make sure we write in a language that we both understand.

College and work entry requirements need to be clearer. In the case of the university, they must be prepared by the university faculties and accepted by the supervisory boards and the clients of the institution (students, their parents and others who help pay the costs of the university) that establish the knowledge that a youth needs to be able to do entry-level work at that institution.

A second transcript (or a second part of the transcript) will need to be developed collaboratively by college and high school teachers, so that some high school graduates may go straight to college. College entrance will not be an “automatic admission” for those who have completed high school. Those who consider themselves unprepared for doing an entry-level job at the university they wish to attend will need to be told in relative advance exactly what their shortcomings are and will need assistance, including new types of teaching, so they can achieve it. the desired results. If this help is offered and taken advantage of during the senior year of high school, it will surely eliminate the “shore permit” that so many seniors have taken on.

When a student is told that they cannot do entry-level work at the university or in a specific part of the workplace at this time, there need to be several forms of “remediation” available. When the problem is of low capacity, intensive work with the counselors should help the student to decide which are the areas in which he is most competent and promising, and what type of training would be the most appropriate to pursue that future. When poor pre-training is the problem, you can recover, but you must set aside adequate time to do so. Other plans for the student’s time – other courses, work, sports – should be dropped, at least if the student plans to stick to a specific schedule. This is not a trivial problem and cannot be solved with a short course.

When motivation is the issue, it must be identified, accepted, and addressed by a combination of counselors and teachers. (It is not necessarily the teacher’s “fault” that a student is not working in their class. At the same time, the teacher must appreciate the reasons why a student may not be motivated if a real connection is to be made). When maturity is the issue, it should be solved by keeping college prep programs open for the older ages, perhaps in high school at night.

In many people, these four factors are what cause the need for repair. This is the reason why there is no single, efficient and, of course, cheap solution. The best work to help these students will be done through an ongoing performance promotion policy that has led to at least some self-awareness from the start, and by self-respecting teachers in schools who have maintained the burden of their teachers low enough that they can really get to know their students. These teachers are more likely to be able to work with students to analyze the problem and determine the best course of action.

College graduation requirements should be advertised to demonstrate the additional knowledge a person needs to achieve beyond entry level. These should emphasize preparation to do sustained, complex and difficult work, so that the student considering college knows what attitudes and knowledge they will need to acquire and then expand in college. It should be emphasized that choosing college is fundamentally choosing a different type of present and future job. Too often college is seen as a kind of moratorium, which clearly affects both her and the senior year of high school.

It is perhaps naive to insist that every eighteen-year-old is prepared, emotionally or intellectually, for sustained, complex, and difficult work. Some can; some can’t, yet. However, high school seniors need to look beyond the minimum college entrance requirements in order to imagine the roadblocks that lie ahead, both at the upper levels of college and in the workplace. These obstacles are largely one of integrity, perseverance, and a sense of personal responsibility. The ways to measure these qualities have not been developed with any kind of scientific precision, and perhaps that is a good thing, as many students improve on these aspects during their early adulthood.

Still, high school teachers who have gotten to know their students have hunches about these qualities. Progress reports written by teachers and counselors throughout high school may increasingly refer to these qualities as they develop, so that students and parents remember their importance. During the past year, college and workplace writers are frequently asked about their impression of students as potential workers and citizens; They can also be encouraged to cite the evidence behind these prints, in order to draw a more compelling portrait of the candidate. These recommendations are already part of our communication process, but both parties need to take them more seriously.