Imagine growing up in the 1920s with long-outdated technology, cranky old cars and completely different fashion trends.
So much has evolved in the past century, but one thing has failed to change and adapt to its new environment: the education system.
If you look up a picture of a classroom from the 1920s, it won’t look too different from the one you grew up attending. You can look up a picture of almost anything else from 100 years ago, and you’ll see a big difference.
However, the format and content of education has mostly stayed the same. Why is that?
“I believe the purpose of education is to prepare students to be participants in communities post-high school and post-college. That includes employment. It includes higher education. It includes their ability to be civically engaged in the communities that they live in,” said Belinda Davis, an associate professor in LSU’s political science department and a former member of the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education.
These communities, however, won’t be the same for all students. Not everyone goes on to attend college after graduating high school, yet they receive the same education. The education system needs to prepare students of all backgrounds and career plans, not just those who take the conventional route.
“Do I think that we are doing a good job of fulfilling that mission? I think that we are doing a good job with some students for preparing them for higher education; we could be doing a better job preparing students to leave high school and enter the workforce,” Davis said.
About 20 years ago, Louisiana adopted a college-for-everyone approach to high school education. As a result, high schools switched gears and shut down their vocational education and career tech training, Davis said. In wake of that mistake, those programs had to be re-geared, and there has now been an increased emphasis on career and technical education in the state over the past several years, she said.
“Change like that doesn’t happen overnight, and it requires reinvestment of dollars in programs that have been shut down. I think that we are moving in the right direction when it comes to that,” Davis said.
Although change may not always come from the top down, it can start with one student, teacher or parent. After all, we all participate in the education system in one way or another, and its effects have lasting consequences on your lives.
There are many aspects of the system that different people want to change, whether it’s the inequality of resources that some schools get over others, the shortcomings of disability services or post-high school career preparedness.
According to Davis, there’s always a possibility for change to take place.
“Those kinds of policy changes have to come from either the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education or the state Legislature, but that doesn’t mean that educators or parents or even students are powerless,” she said. “If enough educators are reaching out to local school board members, then the statewide association can make that an issue where they pursue legislative change. They should advocate to both their local school board as well as the state school board.”
If everyone involved in education, in one way or another, voices their concerns and promotes change, we’ll see the system make progress toward meeting students’ current needs.
It’s up to the parents to speak up in local school board meetings, up to the teachers to see what’s happening in the classrooms and demand change and up to the students who go through the system and leave feeling something was missing.
We may not see drastic change happen in two or 20 years, but with positive, constant change, the system will hopefully be substantially improved and unrecognizable when the next century comes around.
Isabella Albertini is a 23-year-old mass communication junior from Lima, Peru.
