Parents in Indiana got quite a shock last week. The results of the spring ILEARN exams showed that only 28% of elementary and middle school students passed both the math and English portions of the test. It’s not surprising. In some cities and towns, children had access to classroom learning. Other school districts were forced to on-line classes 90% of the time, due to the Covid-pandemic. My own grandchildren out in Washington DC never saw the inside of a classroom for most of the school year. Next year is going to be a struggle for everyone, but especially the teachers. What will happen to these children? Will they every catch up, go on to college, or achieve success in life? As someone who attended high school with World War II refugees, I believe the Covid generation will do fine.

Covid Generation Will Do Fine. World War 2 children caught up quickly in the US.

Covid generation will do fine. If refugee children could catch up in school after World War II, our kids can, too.

My brother went to high school with a Jewish boy from Germany. When he was 15 years old, his mother pushed him from a death march, and urged him to hide out in a nearby barn. I’m not sure how long he stayed there before he was found by a US Army officer, and brought to our city. When he entered high school, I don’t know how many school years he had missed, but I’m sure it was more than one. At the same time, he’d lost his mother to the gas chambers in Nazi Germany. He finished high school, graduated from Purdue, and became a successful pharmacist.

I went to a parochial school with two sisters who’d escaped from Poland. When they started school, they could barely speak a world of English. For whatever reason, both of them were in my sophomore class. One of them was two years older than the rest of us.. She had probably not gone to school for a long time. Both were very bright, but had a lot of catching up to do. And guess what? They graduated high school, which meant they could have gone on to college if they so desired. I’m don’t know what happened after that , as I went away to college and lost touch.

I’m not sure how these refugee children caught up with their fortunate American classmates. As foreigners, they were outsiders who didn’t enjoy a normal, 50’s social life. No double dates, hanging out at the drug store, or attending private parties. They were serious, vastly more mature than we were, and determined to succeed. I would imagine they spent a lot of hours studying at home on weekends. There were thousands of youngsters like them, spread throughout the United States after World War II. But they caught up in their studies faster than anyone would have dreamed. So now, instead of worrying about our kids’ dismal test scores, let’s have some faith in their youthful resilience. With our support and understanding, the Covid generation will do fine.

When I graduated from an all girls high school in 1953, it cost $15 per semester hour to attend the local state teachers college. If you lived at home, you could pay for that with baby sitting money. Strange as it may seem, only 10% of my class went on to college. Why was that? What happened in the old days when college was cheap?

college degrees are losing their luster — Free College May Not Make Much Difference to High School Graduates

Young women weren’t motivated to attend college in the hope of getting a better job. In those days, most girls got engaged to be married before they were 20. Why bother with college at all? And for those of us who scrimped and saved and slogged our way through college, it didn’t really pay off. A good secretary who learned to type and take shorthand in high school made as much as a teacher.

Girls who went on to college were accused of looking for an “MRS degree.” It was assumed they were only interested in finding a well educated husband, who could provide a better life than a truck driver. . And it must have worked. If you read the obituaries of octogenarians who were prominent in society, it often says they met their husbands while attending such and such university.

Back then, most women who did graduate and entered the work force got married in a couple of years, had kids, moved to the suburbs, and became stay at home wives. Their hard earned college degree wasn’t nearly as helpful as reading Dr. Spock.

The birth control pill in 1960 marked the beginning of the women’s liberation movement. “Good” girls didn’t have to get married in order to enjoy sex. And they didn’t have to have kids unless and until they were good and ready. Employers began hiring women to fill traditional male occupations., and paying them better salaries. Their college degrees paid off if they studied accounting, engineering, or medicine. As more and more women attended college, tuition and fees went up. That small teachers college in my home town became a State University. Enrollment multiplied five times over the years.

Now, I see the pendulum swinging the other way. A college degree is beginning to lose it’s luster. Enrollment is declining. With salaries rising for skilled trade jobs, and the $15 an hour wage looming on the horizon, it hardly seems worth it to pile up half a lifetime of student loan debt. https://livingwellafter80.com/why-some-bright-kids-drop-out-of-college/

And, let’s face it. We’re heading toward socialism. When health care and a college education are free, then there’s less incentive to spend four years of your life in a classroom when you could get a good skilled trade job, buy a house, and start a family before you’re thirty. As a matter of fact, waitresses and bartenders now make more than many college grads.

I’m all for a free college education as proposed by numerous presidential candidates. Just don’t be surprised if a lot of young people aren’t interested in taking advantage of it.

Tag: education

COVID GENERATION WILL DO FINE

WHAT HAPPENED WHEN COLLEGE WAS CHEAP?

I’m all for a free college education as proposed by numerous presidential candidates. Just don’t be surprised if a lot of young people aren’t interested in taking advantage of it.