Fla. Votes to Require High School Majors

<p>Interested in your thoughts on the below.</p>

<p>"TALLAHASSEE, Florida (AP) -- The Florida Legislature gave final approval to a bill Thursday that requires high school students to declare a major, similar to college students.</p>

<p>The measure now goes to Governor Jeb Bush, who pushed the requirement as part of a sweeping education overhaul approved by the House 90-24. The Senate passed it earlier in the day 39-1....</p>

<p>The bill also requires that high school students take a fourth year of math and that middle school students receive career planning instruction....</p>

<p>A major area of interest could include a traditional academic subject such as English, a foreign language or math, or a vocational field such as carpentry or auto repair.</p>

<p>The goal is to encourage students to strive for better grades and prevent them from dropping out...."
<a href="http://www.cnn.com/2006/EDUCATION/05/05/high.school.majors.ap/index.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.cnn.com/2006/EDUCATION/05/05/high.school.majors.ap/index.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Thank you so much for posting this! I hadn't seen it and I'm very interested in this subject.</p>

<p>"The goal is to encourage students to strive for better grades and prevent them from dropping out. The majors plan was suggested by a task force of educators that examined the state's high schools."</p>

<p>There are many paths to improving student-centered learning in high school: yet one more graduation requirement (i.e. h.s. "majors") is truly not one of them. How ridiculous. It's seems to me the initiative was trying to address high rates of dropout - it's hard for me to believe that a "task force of educators" could imagine this window-dressing would be truly motivating for underachieving students.</p>

<p>I'm torn between thinking this is ridiculous (why ask students to narrow their options early?) and a great idea, (a la some European countries which offer a sound, trade-worthy vocational education to students who don't want a college education).</p>

<p>I guess I'd want to see research that suggests that having a goal and a "relevant" education is motivating to high school students and prevents drop-out and poor attendance. If there's evidence this will really make a difference, then I'm intrigued. If it's just someone's vague idea that this is a good paradigm for school reform, then forget it.</p>

<p>High school students are too young and inexperienced to choose and dedicate themselves to one area. It narrows the educational breadth a student would receive and limits their views of potential future educational and career options.</p>

<p>I am a student, by the way.</p>

<p>I don't like the idea of a significant change in high school approach being required as opposed to being optional, or implemented at some schools on an experimental basis to see how it goes -- a wholesale change seems to me to be one of those things doomed to failure. Easy the legislature, a lot harder on the schools that are supposed to be implementing the new curriculums. </p>

<p>That being said, I have two observations:</p>

<p>1) When my daughter attended high school overseas, the first thing she was asked was whether she wanted to be a liberal arts or a science major. She chose liberal arts. </p>

<p>The next thing that happened is that she discovered that liberal arts majors took algebra AND geometry AND trigonometry AND biology AND chemistry AND physics all at the same time, while also studying history and languages and literature. I think she had 14 classes. Apparently the science majors either had even more math & science courses, or more advanced & difficult courses. I don't know which - just that the idea of a major didn't stop the kids from having a very broad education. </p>

<p>What it did do, however, was separate the boys from the girls. When my d came home with pictures of her class, I noticed it was almost all girls - she explained that most of the boys were science majors. I think the state of Florida is going to have to be very alert to gender-based or racial disparities that might arise with the new system.</p>

<p>2) Here in the US, my daughter attended a magnet public arts high school where she DID have a major -- she was a dance major. Two periods of every school day was devoted to her major. It did impact the availability of other courses -- not only was the academic day shortened, limited to a maximum of five courses, but students in one art discipline had almost no opportunity to study in another artistic discipline unless they changed majors. However, overall it was a good experience -- it did not limit my daughter in the long run because she still had a good, basic college-prep foundation and she is certainly not tied to her major in college. I think overall there are advantages to that approach - the kids at my daughter's school tend to be highly involved in their arts and have a positive attitute toward school. But these are kids who chose to go to the school because of their pre-existing high level of motivation in their chosen discipline-- I'm not sure if it would work so well outside of the magnet school setting.</p>

<p>career planning for middle schoolers? if i had to declare a major for high school, my major would change every three months. some days i want to go into math and some days i wish i could spent all my time in ceramics. i think the point of high school is to explore different things, not limit it to a certain area.</p>

<p>::sniff sniff:: </p>

<p>Mmmm, I smell a disaster on the horizon. :) :p</p>

<p>Our school district has had a career planning quarter in 8th grade for years. The students research different careers, pick one to concentrate on and do a paper on it that includes interviewing someone in that field. It ends with "career day" where students dress nicely, pretend they are a college graduate interviewing for the job/career they have researched and then attend a big career presentation in the gym where a few dozen adults are set up to talk about their jobs/careers. I think each child gets to hear about 3 presentations. They even put together a fake resume. Of course, when they graduate from college 8 years later, the resume is not something that they remember....</p>

<p>When these eighth graders sign up for hs classes they are supposed to pick a track- humanities,math and science or arts. The joke is that because of the rigid requirements there is only one elective anyway and if you play an instrument your elective is band, orchestra or choir. Same is true for sophomore year. Junior and senior year there is usually room for the music kids to take maybe two electives!</p>

<p>This is horrible. Kids in high school need to be exposed to as many subjects as possible, not be able to focus into one subject and avoid problem areas. I mean i have been able to take every subject possible in my 4 years in high school and it has definitely caused me to become interested in fields that in 8th grade i wouldnt have ever dreamed of enjoying.</p>

<p>reminds me of Gomer Pyle's constant refrain to the Sgt....Stupid, Stupid, Stupid....</p>

<p>Just talked to a lady from Brazil, where majoring is common. It wasn't a generic liberal arts, science, etc., but more specific as in college, but what they did was add one extra period a day with an additional class in that field. If this is what they are thinking for implementation, then where does the $ come from for the extra teachers? At this time, we really don't know what they are planning for implementation. Once we know that, we can truly analyze it. But what happens should a kid find out that this isn't the area they really like, or thought it was? Can they change? And if so, as in college, would it extend the number of years a kids would have to go to fulfill the requirement? Or will they be able to announce a diffeent major each year, and still meet the requirement?</p>