Most college students I know personally have told me they prefer college rather than high school. Now, I'm not sure if the same opinion applies to the majority those receiving their post-secondary educations, but this sort of response got me thinking, what characteristics of college are more favorable than those we witness in today's primary and secondary schools?
There are various ways I think that America's education system at the primary- and secondary-school level could be improved. First of all, I think schedules should be adjusted as to allow more room for classes students are actually interested in.
One complaint I've seen among many students this past month has been regarding classes deemed requirements for graduation. I'm not personally against having these sorts of courses, classes such as those concerning health or the arts; as a matter of fact, I think it'd be fine if these courses remained graduation requirements if we gave students the space to have another class they'd much rather take, whether that be another elective, science, art class, anything. Doing so might require that schools adjust to a sort of block schedule (in which the length of a class varies by day of the school week), but a change such as this is, in my opinion, quite feasible. I've seen it work at other schools, though I think a major obstacle here would be satisfying teachers, especially because they'd be the ones teaching more classes (i.e., they'd be the ones having to devise more lesson plans, grading more assignments, and keeping track of a larger quantity of students).
I think getting to take courses you're truly interested is one of the factors that can make college life more appealing than that lived in a high school environment, but another factor seems to be that college students have more to do the things they enjoy separate from school.
I think in this nation, we put too much stress on academic performance and don't regard enough the importance of leisure time. I know we have extracurriculars to keep us occupied in a non-academic sense, but more and more I've seen students think about extracurriculars in regard to how colleges will perceive them. I know this doesn't apply to everyone, but I think it would be better if schools didn't focus so strictly on college preparation (though I don't mean to say that keeping the future in mind is by any means negative). Not everyone wants to go to college, and that's okay.
Even so, I do think that American schools have become somewhat toxic environments given how they promote a strict standard of academic excellence.
We stress the idea of success when the word's meaning is not constant among individuals.
We emphasize grades rather than retention.
We care more about numbers than actual learning.
To many, "learning" has simply become a cycle of binging and purging information. We jam ideas and concepts into our skulls, take tests, and then forget most of that same information right after an assessment.
That's not effective learning.
I know a lot of people have suggested this already, but I think American schools should also begin assigning less homework. It's been proven that homework is only effective to a certain extent, otherwise being a bit of a waste of time. I think we should focus less on homework and more on improving the quality of teachers. We need more individuals who can effectively engage their students, bringing them to utilize the skills they teach in realistic situations.
On that note, I do think that classes such as "home economics" should become more available to students; these are the sort of classes that teach students general life skills, and that's another skillset I feel has been overlooked in recent years.
For today's kindergarteners, I just hope they don't have to go through the rest of their academic lives with such an emphasis on numbers. Test scores aren't everything. I don't think they're even close to an accurate measure of one's true intelligence. In general, I'm certainly hoping that schools can be made more effective learning environments for this incoming age group--and more enjoyable environments at that.
- Sarah Kernal
I definitely agree with much of what you said, but a lot of the underlying points that many of us have been making is that there are not enough hours in the day for what we do and what we want. I have often wondered what life would be like if we had 36 hours in the day and what we could do and accomplish. School work, including homework, takes up much of our day, and many of the extracurricular activities that many of us have along with life in general, are overlooked because of our busyness with school. I know that I have certain things that I wish that I could do that I am unable to do because of the burden of schoolwork. My own older brother has stated before that, in the case of work and jobs, he thinks that you shouldn't bring your work home and that you should endeavor to finish it all at your actual workplace, which is similar, I think, to how many of us feel in regards to homework. Home Ec is something that I also wish still existed in school in order to teach certain life skills, although, even if Mayfair did have it, I would be unable to take it because of my busyness and the plethora of other things that I wish I could do. I feel that this is an example of how school is focused more than ever on teaching you things instead of actual life skills that will be useful for the thing we all go through called life.
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