Well-rounded education mustn’t be minimized

In a land far, far away, known as Florida, the governor has a strange idea on how to reduce the state’s student dropout rate.

Gov. Jeb Bush wants Florida to become the first state to require incoming high school freshmen to declare a major, just like college students. Bush said the plan would help prepare students for the real world and would reduce the dropout rate by making school more interesting.

It seems the way to make school more interesting is to make classes more interesting, but that would put the onus on teachers and administrators, not the students. Letting students focus mainly in areas that they are interested in may, in fact, make school more interesting to them, but it also totally blows to pieces the idea of a well-rounded, liberal arts education. Students (or anyone) can’t know if something is interesting to them until they are actually introduced to it. Good teachers can make literature interesting and relevant to the would-be engineer.

High school and college should still allow for lots and lots of sampling, and changing of minds. Helping kids focus on careers is important, but it’s wrong to put it above learning for learning’s sake. And it’s wrong to pressure students into feeling like they are in college, when they are not.

Perhaps Florida should learn to SayWASL.