So California, the state who used to create all sorts of tests for us during our childhood is now reneging on the only one that seemingly matters.
This bill would suspend the administration of the high school exit examination and would remove the high school exit examination as a condition of receiving a diploma of graduation or a condition of graduation from high school for each pupil completing grade 12, for the 2015–16, 2016–17, and 2017–18 school years. The bill would, until July 31, 2018, require the governing board or body of a local educational agency, as defined, and the State Department of Education on behalf of state special schools, to grant a diploma of graduation from high school to any pupil who completed grade 12 in the 2003–04 school year or a subsequent school year and has met all applicable graduation requirements other than the passage of the high school exit examination. (from SB-172)
So Breitbart and other sites are considering this yet another signpost on the way to our society’s destruction, but I’ve decided to take another view.
Yes, while it is shocking that CA will grant diplomas to students who don’t actually “pass” high school, their reasons may be completely different that what we expect. The student will still have to pass the courses in English and Math, which means that bleeding-heart leftist teachers (or administrators who need to keep the factory line moving) will summarily pass failing students. Those without adequate education – like illegal foreign nationals, let’s say – can then have a diploma with which to get into college and pursue an advanced degree in social justice, micro-aggression management, safe space engineering, non-white lives matter politics, or whatever the hate-America-first Franklin School Socialists come up with. Probably with minors in community organizing and coercive student debt forgiveness.
Yes, it is leftist stupidity, obviously, but I have another perspective. Consider that high school used to be all you needed, unless you wanted to be a doctor or lawyer or something that required college. Now college is essential for resume checklisting but means nothing when grads still don’t have the skills for the current job market. Then add the skyrocketing cost of education and our country is left with one alternative that I believe has been necessary for some time: occupational skills testing.
Yes, I said it. The burden of proving job-worthiness is on the shoulders of job seekers and employers, not educators.
I don’t want to get bogged down into another “chicken or egg” controversy regarding employers giving up employee training programs in the 1990’s, or the culture of job-hoppers trying to get ahead. It’s an interesting discussion but we should look at resetting culture a little differently…
In this new age, the question isn’t whether you tick off the list of degrees, but whether you can actually function in a job and in our society.
- Do you have maturity?
- Do you have basic job skills: grammar, using the internet, MS Word and Excel?
- Do you have discipline: organizational skills, time management, promptness?
- Are you trainable, or are you a lazy, victim-culture case study?
Clearly the current crop of malcontents with their micro-aggressions and safe spaces are NOT ready, no matter how much loan debt they incur.
How to Reset?
The end is NOT the destruction of society, but a new paradigm that has been brewing ever since the mighty internet and online education began: people will have to take their education into their own hands.
Prove your worth!
Employers want an ever-growing list of skills on that resume. Find out what skill set you need to succeed and acquire that skill. Take the temp agency’s skills test. Ask to take a prospective employers’ skills inventory (it’s better than begging for interviews).
Reject your bad high school education. Reject college if the new economy jobs that don’t require it (increasingly, they’ll HAVE to stop requiring it). Embrace the future and your own advancement with the internet (Khan Academy, ITunes, Code Academy, Udemy, etc), libraries (those are free-standing structures full of what we might call printed media), mentors (concerned and helpful people who are ahead of you), and get your own act together.
Then inspire others, reject the left’s infantilization of society and prove to employers you are competent to handle the weight of adulthood.
And if possible, run your own business. We don’t need another crop of life-incompetent social justice professors. Nor unemployable people.