How Dumb is this?

 How Dumb is this?

Corey is a student in Baltimore City schools.  (true story).   He is 19 and has been out of school with virtual learning (now there’s an oxymoron for you) for eighteen months.  Now he is back in the building.  The school he goes to is for kids that are at risk.  Class sizes are a bit smaller; teachers chose to teach these students and the principal is equally dedicated.

Like all City public school students, kids use public transportation to get to school.  Kids with special needs do receive school transportation.  Corey takes two busses to get to school.  It is a pain.  Based on his earned credit count, Corey is in the 9^th grade.  He is being raised by his grandmother, along with his brother and cousin.  Corey’s father is incarcerated for dealing drugs.   His mother is in parts unknown and she is a known addict.

Corey may stay in school until he is 21.  He does want his high school diploma.  He also would like to get a CDL license and drive an interstate truck.  Corey says this will enable him to see the world outside of Baltimore.  Corey understands that his chances of doing that will improve dramatically if he has a high school diploma.

Maryland is committed to College and Career Readiness for its high school students.  The new Blueprint for the Future is pouring a ton of money into education.  But the curriculum is not changing.

The point of view for College and Career Readiness is readiness for careers that require college.  There is nothing in the curriculum that prepares a kid for a non-college career.  Our naive belief is that if we upfront recognize that college is not for everyone, it is being undemocratic and denying open opportunity.  Funny how it is easy for us to say only a few kids are good enough in athletics to be varsity or get a college athletic scholarship but we can't admit that some kids just don't want to go to college or lack the ability to do so.

Let’s go back to Corey.  He wants to be a long-distance trucker.  We NEED long-distance truckers as the recent supply chain woes obviously show.  In English class, Corey is reading The Crucible, a play by Arthur Miller on the Salem witch trials.  He can be forgiven if he doesn’t care about the topic.  In math he is learning about evaluating expressions and creating equations.  The curriculum makes no connection whatever to how this work could or would link to what he wants to do with his life.  Exactly what is the point of this curriculum? Oh right, the point is to show that we believe all kids can achieve college preparatory work whether it is relevant or not to the child's life.   Curriculum is supposed to meet the needs of a community.  Corey’s community does not have needs that these skills will meet.  There are people who will tell you that my opinion creates too low a bar for kids like Corey.  I disagree.  Socio-economic events have created a world for Corey that does not include college aspiration.  He does HAVE aspirations and he needs a school program that validates those goals and helps him to reach those goal rather than to respond to the attractions of the street.  How hard is this to figure out?  How dumb is this to keep doing what we are doing?