Does High School Prepare Us for the Future?

What are the rules to high school? Is it just one big game; each student a game piece trying to make it to the end and win? According to Theodore Sizer, author of What High School Is this is how high schools are worldwide; nothing more than an unenthusiastic, bored student going through their everyday given routine to finally complete their four year high school career. But is he entirely correct? Is this how it should be? In order to test this, Thomas Reeves delivers a different perspective in his article College Isnt for Everybody and Its a Scandal that We Think It Is. The rhetoric of high school purpose has been uniform and consistent for decades. A California high schools general goals, set out in 1979, serves equally well for most of Americas high schools. Its goals included: fundamental scholastic achievement, meaning to acquire knowledge and share in the traditionally accepted academic fundamentals, to develop the ability to make decisions, to solve problems, to reason independently, and to accept responsibility for self-evaluation and continuing self-improvement; career and economic competence; citizenship and civil responsibility; competence in human and social relations; moral and ethical values; self-realization and mental and physical health; esthetic awareness; and cultural diversity. High school is to touch most aspects of an adolescents existence: mind, body, morals, values, and career. Not one of these areas is given especial prominence. (Sizer, 262) Sizer stresses on the fact that high schools across America are uniform in this way and each one these areas of goals are given the equal amount of time and importance, instead of more stress on one idea over the others.

Sizer begins his argument by stating that the basic organizing structures in high schools are familiar where students are grouped by age, being freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior and are all expected to take precisely the same time of 720 school days over their four years of high school. A students school schedule is a series of units of time where the clock is king, not only to the students but to the teachers as well. Each of these classes are, on average, around fifty minutes long and are mandated to five specific areas: English, Social Studies, Mathematics, Science, and Physical Education. With this being said, A students school day is compared to a kaleidoscope of worlds, going from algebraic formulas to poetry to French verbs to Ping-Pong to the War of the Spanish Succession, all before lunch. (Sizer, 266) In short, the student goes about their day-to-day routine this way and sees five or six different teachers per day. Each and every teacher has their unique teaching styles and expect different requirements. Some teachers will teach by lecturing for the whole class period, while some would rather give you work to do independently. Every class is different by the various subjects being taught and have certain requirements within themselves. For example, in a speech class you would be expected to participate and deliver speeches, while a computer class might be much more on your own. Students are expected to pick up these different teaching styles and environments and then accomplish what is expected of them. Reeves, a well-published U.S. historian, on the other hand, writes, The well-documented proliferation of stuff and nonsense for academic credit in large part stems from the admission of masses of ill-prepared students. Why take a lab science, a foreign language, or (for real diversity) the history of foreign countries if these courses arent required? Why take classes with written examinations and term papers when most do not? Basically, Reeves is saying there is no point

in taking particular classes when they are not required or beneficial in the long run for the student, while Sizer is stating these classes are merely part of the students day to day routine. Sizer then states, How one gains the ability to make decisions, to solve problems, to reason independently, and to accept responsibility for self-evaluation and continuing selfimprovement without being challenged is difficult to imagine. One certainly doesnt learn these things merely from lectures and textbooks. (Sizer, 266) In other words, students go to school and are lectured and taught to rely on textbooks to learn materials and once out of high school, such things as the ability to reason and to solve decisions and problems, cannot be taught by such things; proving that the way school is set up might not actually be beneficial in the long run. Thomas Reeves, similarly, believes this to be true. Reeves introduces his perspective by stating that going to college has become a national fad, a rite of passage, millions hope, into the world of hefty salaries and McMansions. (Reeves, 346) According to Reeves, college is the trek to academia, but he questions if the crush for diplomas is necessarily a good thing. To this idea, Sizer would disagree immediately. Sizer suggests that getting the diploma is the most important part of high school; its what every student is striving for. Reeves, on the other hand, would argue that the great majority of high schools continue to require little exchange for their diplomas. Similarly, Reeves further explains even the most well-intentioned professor cannot educate those who refuse to be educated and all too often, such students demand that they be passed through the system and awarded a diploma, as they were in high school. Students are so used to this, as Sizer states, that they have the same expectations after leaving high school and attending college, which Reeves would find unrealistic.

Reeves continues by asking himself how many students arriving college have the intellect and the intellectual preparation to be serious and successful. He explains that ACT scores are continually declining nationally and the ACTs chief executive, Richard T. Ferguson, urges for better high school preparation. Consequently, about four in ten students last year scored well enough on the test to suggest that they could earn at least a C in a college-level math course. Reeves acknowledges that hundreds of thousands enter the campus gates without a clue about the intellectual challenges awaiting them. Millions of dollars are spent annually in remedial education and the rate of failure is still extraordinarily high. Even more important is the impact of intellectually unprepared people on the educational process itself. Anti-intellectualism is the Great Enemy of the educator, and with a classroom full of people who do not read, study, or think, academic standards inevitably suffer. Reeves makes a valid point that needs emphasizing. Many people are stuck on Sizers claim because this is how school rhetoric has been for years. By focusing on the high school routine, Sizer overlooks the deeper problem. Is this exactly right? Reeves make us question just this. Though Sizer is correct, Reeves has a better perspective. Thinking through his thoughts brings forth the idea that high schools need a change. Instead of the day-to-day routine, high schools should base a students class schedule on what will further them in life and be beneficial to each individual student. Like Reeves stated, why take a class if it isnt required, such as a foreign language class, unless it is something you will use in your future education. This would also help solve the solution of boredom thousands of students are experience every day; the students would be taking courses that they would be interested in. This change would allow more stress on certain classes unlike how Sizer was describing each one getting the same allotted time.

Not only could this change take place, but education itself could be improved. Reeves reports that ACT scores are continually decreasing and this is something high schools need to focus on. High school is made to improve a students mind. The greatest achievement in the students mind, along with Sizers, is to get the diploma; but that is only a piece of paper if you do not possess the knowledge behind it. Students need to be prepared for college life and the trade to be successful. This is something all educators need to consider. We need to change and better the education of our future leaders. So as an educator, ask yourself, What is high school and how should it be?; Should we continue to follow this rhetoric?; and What can I do to better my students education? Taking in consideration to what Reeves brought forth, some light is shed on each of these important questions. Taking away from Sizers ideas of this uniformity might just be the change that needs to take place and it is going to root from each and every educator. High school should no longer be a game; students should no longer be a game piece trying to make it to the end; no longer something we forget after four years, but something that will truly leave a mark for our future. This is what high school should be.

Works Cited:
Reeves, Thomas. "College Isn't for Everybody, and It's a Scandal That We Think It Is." (2003) 346-347 Print. Sizer, Theodore. "What High School Is." (1984) 259-267 Print.