Education vs. Schooling

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Last 5 posts in View from the Crew

• Significance over Seniority - May 19th, 2010
• Setbacks of Social Networking - May 13th, 2010
• A Night to Remember - May 5th, 2010
• Looking Back At Allatoona - April 29th, 2010
• A Sea of Trouble - April 23rd, 2010

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April 23, 2010 • Lauren Gourley  
Filed under View from the Crew

          Mark Twain once said, “I will never let my schooling interfere with my education”; yet, here in the Cobb County School District, we’re left with no choice.  Budget cuts are increasing class sizes, degrading teacher’s pay, and worst of all causing students to steer clear of any interest in the field of education for a future career choice. Students will now have a 4×4 block schedule next year which will drastically affect AP course participation.  With so many changes occurring in our school and in Cobb County I must ask: when will the actions of education officials reflect the needs of the students?

            Recently at Allatoona, Cobb County, and in other Georgia state schools, budget cuts have caused resentment in the education institution.  Certain schools throughout Fulton County are now eliminating their music program, while others are contemplating cutting all “non academic” classes. But here is another question I pose: what is defined as academic?  Is preventing students from playing their instruments (most of whom have been playing since they were twelve) really worth ensuring them one credit of required physical education? It was even recently rumored that next year at Allatoona High School there will be no newspaper class.  Students currently enrolled in Journalism may have two options; one, they will completely drop the class or two, they may have a chance of continuing their writing if they’re willing to also work on yearbook.  Due to budget cuts students will now have to sacrifice their ambitions to keep up with county’s and Allatoona’s current and future decisions. High school is supposed to be the time of our lives and the time where we decide what want to do with it; having only core classes will never prepare us for such a major decision.

          Reports on NPR and CNN have claimed that there is a major decrease in doctors and that our nation is in dire need of younger and newer professionals.  What happens to our way of life when no one desires to become a teacher?  Why would anyone in their right mind want to pursue a career that is so unstable and is subjected to such painstaking salaries?  The sheer idea shocks me that soon teachers who obtain their Master’s Degree will receive the same salary as educators who did not.  Currently there is an overabundance of students who have spent the past four years of their life trying to receive a degree in education.  With so many new teachers and so few jobs, individuals that could change students’ lives forever are being cast out.

            Focusing on a more local and personal level, confirmations have quickly been spreading throughout Allatoona’s halls regarding the 4×4 block schedule next year.  This decision will put AP students at a strong disadvantage.  Each year the AP course exam is held in May during second semester; any student that takes more than one AP class first semester will go a whole eighteen weeks without that class and will therefore have to attend morning review sessions in addition to their spring classes.  This basically means that any student who chooses to have rigor on their college application is automatically penalized for striving for a challenge.

            I’m not blaming our school, nor our educators because I realize that just like students, they have certain parameters to respect.  Yet even though they do have to “play by the rules,” some still share our sentiments. A teacher at Allatoona allowed me to interview him or her, but wished to remain anonymous. When considering the incredible pressure on students to receive high testing scores he or she stated that, “Curriculum should be formed around kids, not tests.” However, the same teacher expressed sympathy for Fall AP students on the 4×4 schedule who will have to miss a whole semester of their AP class before they take the college credit exam. Later on in the interview we discussed the annoyance of policies that expect children to learn large amounts of information in only one semester, “When did education become about ‘beating the clock’?”   Some teachers do believe that the 4×4 schedule will have a positive impact on students because it will help them retain information due to classes meeting every day opposed to meeting every other. However, the situation still harms AP students because of an entire Spring semester without their course.

          Towards the end of our interview I then learned that certain schools are offering difficult classes such as economics and U.S. History to freshmen and sophomores so the Georgia High School Graduation Test failure rates will lessen dramatically. As a junior, I question the legitimacy of fourteen and fifteen year olds being able to grasp the concepts in classes that some of our very own politicians cannot seem to handle. Schools in Georgia are “planning on students’ failure” as one of our very own indicated.

            This article is by no means a demand for change.  I’m not encouraging students to rally up, or disrespect educational policies.  I’m merely pointing out that so many decisions regarding our education are made without considering our perspective.  However, I do applaud our school for keeping up a survey that requested students’ opinion on scheduling options. If anything, I hope this article gives insight to those who read it; whether you agree or disagree with what I’ve said please keep in mind I’m merely a concerned student; a student who realizes how much discontent there is in one school, and I fear for the time when no one like myself, or those I’ve written this for, decide to express their opinion about it.