Dwight Morrow High School in New Jersey is requiring high school freshman to pick a major. That's right...a high school....freshman....major. The school claims it is a way to keep troubled teens engaged in the education process.
Um...or it's a disaster, either way.
“I thought high school was about finding what you liked to do,” said Kendall Eatman, an Englewood mother of six who was president of the Dwight Morrow student body before graduating in 1978. “I think it’s too early to be so rigid.”Amen Ms. Eatmen. Amen.
And another good point:
“Today’s economy requires people to be constantly learning and changing,” Ms. Humphreys said. “A lot of jobs that high school students are likely to have 10 years from now don’t yet exist, so preparing too narrowly will not serve them well.”Personally, I think teaching kids vocational subjects in addition to traditional college-prep classes is really the best way to go about it, but the structure that is needed to pick and stick with a major isn't conducive to the best learning environment for 14-18 year olds. Hell, it took me a good two years in college to figure out what I wanted to major in. And if I were to do it again, it'd probably be different.
This just sounds like another way to put the not-so-academically-inclined into boxes where they will not survive and the academically-inclined in boxes where they will suffocate.
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