Select states are implementing a new plan that allows gifted students the opoprtunity to get out of High School in two years and enroll in college. This is AWESOME. This is part of what I have wanted for a while - now they just need to add a similar program to help get other less "gifted" students out of high schools and into trade schools at the same time and I'll be satisfied. Good step to reverse the "dumbing down" of the USA.
A step in the right direction. Only problem I see is 16 year old kids not being responsible/mature enough to step out of K-12 schooling.
Kurt Vonnegut said: [rquoter] The arts are not a way to make a living. They are a very human way of making life more bearable. Practicing an art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow, for heaven's sake. [/rquoter] Educating people with respect only to their careers is a bad idea. If you look closely, the number of al Qaeda bad-guy types who are engineers or doctors is disproportionately high. The reason is that in most of the world, engineers and doctors are very narrowly trained in their vocation, much more than in the USA. They are smart and relatively effectual people who have skills and the will to change the world; they are very well prepared to make a living but at the same time they have no grounding in how to be alive and understand and deal with the human condition.
But are our high schools accomplishing that? I have a feeling our increasing reliance of standardized test scores nudges the system in a different direction.
Have you ever been to community college? I have and was able transfer to a pretty good university and graduate with very little debt. Its arguable that some of the education at the community colleges is better then what I received at the 4 year college. Class sizes are a lot smaller, which allows professors to have better relationships with their students and thus allowing them to not have to rely on indifferent TA's. Plus most of them were there because they wanted to teach, not because they had to teach in order to do research.
Honors/AP kids are already tacking on Community College classes for college hours, I had to cuz I transferred in from out-of-state and had to make up some History credits. My only concern is increased homogenization of the school populus, but at least it's for a legitimate academic reason; and your fate is pretty much sealed by junior year anyways.
The best ones who don't have $100k in cash or the post-meltdown credit score to get that much in loans. I kinda think that's where all the ath-a-letes should be going anyways: not sure wind-sprints and year round lifting since puberty is great preparation for Comparative Lit or Vector Calculus.
Please. Savings account, flash cards, library, SAT practice book. Plan early, don't spoil and make sacrifices.
Puleez. I was DIRT poor my whole life. my mom helped out with a total of about $600 during my entire college-life. My first down-payment in college was about $1000 from my personal savings from working jobs (at one time - 2 jobs at a time) in the summers during high school. I took out student loans and worked 35-40hrs a week & still graduated with a 3.3 (3.6 in my major)GPA & graduated only 1 semester late. I had friends who were so poor they were actually homeless and in college. I had another friend that lived for a while in a 1 room shack/storage shed behind a restaraunt. Anyone can go to college...IF THEY REALLY WANT TO.
I agree this is good news and will help those who are more gifted not be bored in high school. I am sure the student will still have the right too choose to stay in high school if he or she wishes. I personally loved high school and thought the 4 years was a great experience and would not want to go to college early. Like someone else mentioned there are a lot talented students already taking college level AP Courses and community college courses in the summer which transferred to college credits. Based on credits I was already a sophomore in their computer system when I entered my 4 year program.
