Not The Same Assembly Line, Please

Writing about what needs to be changed in American high schools is a hard task for me—not only because I did not attend high school in United States, I have never attended a real high school.

Since high school was not compulsory in China, there was a national test given to middle-school students to determine who would continue onto high schools—a kind of “up or out” system: the students with the higher scores from that test would go onto high schools and the ones with lower scores would not.

My sister scored very high on the test and was accepted by Suzhou High School—the best high school in town, with a 90 percent college admission rate. Since my family could only support one college student, my parents recommended me to attend nursing school because nursing schools were free and provided a small stipend to their students. Given the fact that I was not sure if I was ready for college at the time, nursing school seemed an ideal alternative for me . So after graduating from middle-school at the age of fifteen, I packed up my belongings and went off to nursing school.

The nursing school I attended in Suzhou, like most small nursing schools in China during the 1980s, was much like a Catholic boarding school. All students lived on campus and in the same building: girls in the west wing and boys (they were mostly in pharmacy or radiology classes) in the east wing, each with separate entry. Students in the same class year lived on the same floor, so we were closer than most high school students—two of my best friends were my roommates in the nursing school.

The curriculum in the nursing school was filled with classes like human biology, physiology, pharmacology, Pathophysiology, numerous nursing classes including the “notorious” anatomy, and a collection of condensed high school courses. Classes started at eight in the morning and finished at three or four in the afternoon. Nightly self-study classes, started at six and lasted three hours, were intended for homeworks. Lights were out at ten o’clock for the entire dorm-room building (now you know why it was more like a Catholic school); however, we spent that time gossiping or reading books (I do not mean textbooks) under the flashlights. At the beginning of the second year, we started our clinical trainings at a nearby hospital.

Though rigid and highly structured, our nursing school came with a bonus—it was free, and with a job offer at the end of the three years. Today, I realized that, in addition to providing us with a professional skill and an employment, my nursing school integrated enough high school courses that I was able to quickly adapt into a college curriculum fifteen years later.

Through a new education experience fifteen years after my nursing school, I found the advantage of the American education system, or at least the education system in North Carolina—the community colleges. The community colleges provide the opportunities for students who pursue their educations a non-traditional way—they offer adult high school courses, junior college courses, or technical training courses for students who want to finish high school, obtain a junior college degree, acquire a technical certificate, or transfer to a four-year institution.

However, when talking with many students from Brunswick Community College (which I started my college) and at UNCW (where I am current enrolled), one message I heard often is that high schools do not prepare students for anything. Many students complained that the high school curriculum was not challenging enough to prepare them for college. On the other hand, many students from the technical programs in the community college said that, for financial reason or simply different personal interests, they were not interested in going to college; instead, they wanted to learn hands-on skills like welding, horticulture, cosmetology in high schools. However, they were told that these programs were not high school programs and they had to wait and take those classes at the community college. Not interested in the normal high-school work, these students often learn to release their boredoms through other activities such as drinking and smoking, bulling, fighting, or even using drugs.

To meet the different needs of their students, I think high schools can design two different curricula—one that prepares students who want to go to college, and one centers on technical trainings with a condensed high school curriculum. By teaching a vocational skill to the students who are not interested in going to college, high schools allow them to secure a job, so they can support themselves, upon graduation. At the same time, a condensed high school curriculum with the existing community college system, these students still have the opportunities to pursue a college degree a few years later if they desire.

Of course, such an approach will require more discipline in high schools because all students will encounter more challenges. The students who want to go to college will be required to take advanced courses that better-prepare them for a college career; the ones in the technical programs will learn a vocational skill of their real interests while still not missing much of the high school courses.

I certainly understand that there is a fine line between a curriculum that is challenging and one that is overwhelming. I also understand that there is, always, the possibility of discrimination when we put students in different groups or classes. However, when students said that they have different needs and expectations in schools, maybe we should listen to the “supposed” beneficiaries of the school system—its students, to find out what their needs and desires are from high school.

Through my own experiences, I have learned that not every student is ready to go to college as soon as he or she graduates from high school; in addition, not every family is able to support their children to go to college shortly after their high-school graduations. By teaching these students a vocational skill and keeping the opportunity to colleges open, many of them may attend college later as they grow and mature. Not making students go through the same educational assembly line might improve the chances for them to achieve success—each on their own pace.