About half of teenagers say they don't want to go to college right out of high school, according to a new Gallup/Walton survey, reports Cory Turner for NPR. But most students say they hear "a lot" about college, but little about other possibilities. "Only 19 percent say they hear a lot about jobs that don’t require college."
“The conversations that [K-12 schools are] having with middle-schoolers and high-schoolers are predominantly about college,” says Zach Hrynowski, a senior education researcher at Gallup. “We're not talking to them about apprenticeships, internships, starting a business, entrepreneurial aspirations or jobs that don't require a college degree.”
"In the name of educational equity, to make sure they’re not limiting children, schools today have doubled down on the idea that college can be for everyone," writes Turner. However, "students who don’t want to go to college say their schools aren’t listening or talking with them about anything else."
More students feel disengaged and unchallenged in school compared to last year's survey. The collegebound are more motivated than those without college plans, but still reporting less interest in school.
"Many young people are worrying about how they’re going to discover the right career, gain the right skills and make the right connections to actually thrive out there," writes Mark C. Perna on Forbes. "That’s why earlier career exploration is becoming a priority for Gen Z students with an anxious eye on the future."
My two favourite education systems are those of the Danes and the Swiss. The Swiss think the Danes counsel teens too much in the collegiate direction, making vocational education & training look like a plan B, whereas it's the first choice for most of their young people; a better solution would have a Copenhagen basic school's study counsellor invite in a Swiss professional career counselling provider midway through Secondary 9, the last year of basic schooling in the Nordic nations, and systematically present the career options available in the state, beginning with the classes of youth most in danger of ending up not in education, employment, or training, but eventually getting to everyone in that year level, since even the…
The Educational Establishment (if you'll excuse the expression) killed the vocational programs, much to the detriment of the middle class. It's the same old culprits, it seems, with every problem that comes up on this blog.
One of the issues is that every teacher and counselor is a college graduate. And many of them studied easy majors so they look back at college as a great experience.
And if one wants 20-somethings to start a business, why not bring someone in who is with a government agency such as the extension service to explain to students what it takes to open a business such as getting a tax number, business license, a bank account in the business name, etc.
Of course they're disengaged. It's hard for any teacher to compete with Tiktok.