OPINION:
There is an expanse as wide as the Grand Canyon between what Is taught to our students and what their future employers want them to know. Missing is a documented and externally audited process for surveying students, parents and employers.
However, “When you get a teaching license, then I’ll listen to you” is what you’ll often hear if you dare express an opinion to an educator on what should be changed in curriculum. Try it sometime. Education majors will tell you the very first year after graduation what needs changing — and after that, other priorities take over. No one wants to waste a single hour learning something they’ll never use again when they could be learning something that will help them land a high-paying job.
As a participant in after-school sports as a student, I want back all the hours of high school physical education I did when I could’ve learned another language. I want back the thousands of hours I spent sitting in a class and taking notes when the teacher could’ve published them. I want back all the hours I spent memorizing formulas. After all, Elon Musk never told his SpaceX engineers to figure out how to land a first-stage rocket on a barge in high winds using only the formulas they’d memorized.
I want back the time I spent learning calculus from a professor who barely spoke English. What I never want back are the 2,900 hours I spent making sure my kids were experts at reading. Those were my most precious and rewarding.
BEN FURLEIGH
Port Charlotte, Florida
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