No Child Left Behind

I'm not sure what No Child Left Behind even is. It is in the news every five minutes. It gives me a headache. I hear things about baselines and improvement, stringent rates, and every other buzz word until I'm nauseous. I can tell it costs me money. I can tell I'm going to run smack in to it with Elle's education. I remember I was a fly in the ointment when it came to the school's numbers. I was one of the special ones. It is bad to not fit the mold. More now than before I think.

For all the rhetoric about being ourselves and creative, we are now more than before herded into molds of standardized tests and form fitting degrees. No one is told to be an artist, novelist, photographer, ditch digger. We are told to be productive and find a niche that makes money. Not everyone should go to university. Not every job should require it.

In Briton, the apprentice system is making a comeback. They are actually figuring out that a society needs plumbers. If you don't train local people to be plumbers and such you will have to import them. It is simple really. It is good for business and for people taking the training. It is good in the way that it stalls the reason for mass immigration. I keep hearing that US immigrants do jobs citizens do not want to do. Maybe it is just because no one is trained to do those jobs any more.

They mentioned in the BBC report that some kids deliberately acted up because the only way to get an apprenticeship was to be referred out of punishment. That is ridiculous. I hope it is not like that anywhere in the US.

The people who need education are sitting at the top of the education mechanism.