this post was submitted on 29 Oct 2023
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I dislike the not-so-subtle assumption that "some education or training after high school" should be equated with "college." He's failing to acknowledge that many of those jobs are skilled trades that are best approached by apprenticeship or vocational school, not college.
In fact, he wears his bias against the skilled trades on his sleeve later in the article:
He -- like many people in recent decades -- was done a disservice by guidance counselors etc. treating trades as second class when they really shouldn't be. As an engineer, one of my biggest regrets is that I was pushed away from hands-on "vocational" classes that in retrospect would've been helpful to me, just because they were for the "bad" students. It's sad that, instead of realizing that problem in messaging, the author is choosing to perpetuate it.
The bottom line is that, while I get that his main point is poor and minority students need to be encouraged to go to college more, I wish he'd at least spent a little time pointing out the flip side, that privileged white students need to stop being pushed towards it to the point that vocational training is demonized.
I've said many times, in retrospect, I would have been better off if I had persued a trade. No regrets, but numbers don't lie.