Education impacted
by cuts
By Phil Brumley,
SJFB President
Fall is here,
harvest is well underway and the kids are all back in school.
Most kindergarten- through high-school students started a month
ago and most colleges have resumed classes over the last two or
three weeks. For those of you who have children in school, it is
an interesting time.
Education at all levels is being
impacted by the California budget woes. Local school districts
have to make hard choices regarding programs, class sizes and
extra-curricular activities just to name a few. The community
colleges, state universities and the University of California
are all having financial difficulties as well. New enrollments
are being limited at some campuses and they are also looking for
ways to trim costs that in the end will ultimately affect the
student population.
The Legislature needs to come up
with a plan to equalize the funding to our public education
system that eliminates the massive budget cuts that are being
made across the state just to keep the doors open. As a member
of a local school board, I have seen first hand the havoc that
the lack of leadership in Sacramento has created.
These problems are then compounded
with both the state and federal education departments regarding
curriculum, programs and “No Child Left Behind.” With all of the
supposedly well meaning interference, the ability of teachers to
do what is best for the student is lost. Every teacher must now
teach to a specific set of standards for the child’s grade
level. If they are unable to keep up or need additional help it
must be done out of class because in order to teach to the
standards they must keep moving on and going back to review a
prior years curriculum is impossible.
Now you ask, how do they determine
if the standards are met? Guess what, it is through standardized
tests. We are in effect teaching our children how to take
standardized tests, which for the most part are true/false or
multiple-choice tests. The ability to effectively communicate
either in writing or verbally is a skill that is missing in many
of our recent high school graduates.
In the old days, the 1980s and
1990s high school was a time that many students had the
opportunity to take vocational classes. These classes included
agriculture, metal shop, wood shop, drafting and auto shop just
to name a few. Some schools are still offering a portion of
these types of classes but many vocational classes are being
eliminated in favor of additional remedial classes for language
and algebra so that the students can pass the High School Exit
Exam. Remember it is the standards that are dictated by our
state and federal bureaucrats that must be taught regardless of
the career path a student may want.
In my opinion, the system is
broken. The creativity of teachers to influence individual
students is stifled, districts are relegated to a one size fits
all program so that they meet the test scoring goals set by a
group of “Experts” and we have graduates who in many cases can
not communicate effectively, read a tape measure or use critical
thinking to solve a problem.
What can we do? Well for one we can
support candidates who are willing to think outside the box and
change the educational system to allow more local control with
less reliance on state mandated standards. Another thing we can
do is support programs like the one on the governor’s desk, SB
147, Career Technical Education. This bill will allow high
school students to take vocational classes that can be used for
credit when applying to college.
Like it or not, not every high
school graduate is going to attend college. Some will go to a
four-year university, some will go to a community college and
others will go on to a technical school. It is those students
who do not go on who we need to be concerned about. It is some
of those students who would benefit most from vocational
classes.
Our children are our future. Let’s
keep working to make sure they get the education they “need” not
the one-size-fits-all approach that is in vogue with the
bureaucrats.