Wednesday, January 9, 2013

A Common Form Of Class Snobbery

“There are no young people going into the trades,” Hall said. “The push for college prep is so prevalent in the high schools that the talented young people who are good working with their hands are being told, ‘You have to go to college to get good jobs,’ and that’s just not the case anymore.”

I always viewed askance the attitude of many of my education colleagues that being an electrician, plumber, carpenter, mechanic, etc. was somehow not a "good job".  Maybe that's because I'm from a long line of carpenters and laborers; or because I wanted to be an auto mechanic when I was in high school and was repeatedly dissuaded from that by my teachers and counselors because I was "too smart".  Clearly, they didn't hear my Jeopardy! answers from last night.