It’s good from time to time to step away from the edge of precipice of the news and briefly focus on something foundational that will really make a difference – and not just in the next month. Call it an investment in the next decade or generation. Consider high school for a moment. We could talk endlessly about the failures of present educational doctrine, particularly with the inclusion of all things woke; however, that’s the bleeding edge I’m trying to avoid for a moment. We could talk endlessly about the functional upheavals of public education, the quality of education or lack thereof. We could talk about the dangers of home life, social life, hyper-sexualization or its opposite, drugs, violence, fear, or the great Covid-inspired depression. We can’t talk about everything so let’s just narrow it down to one thing: What should be taught in high school that isn’t currently being taught (or at least not system wide). Here are a few things is short supply:
- Money. Money, not math. Money, not ‘business math’. Some, a few, learn this at home. A rare one occasionally figures it out and outshines even many adults. Math is a tool that quantifies money. ‘Business math’ is a dropout class for those that can’t cut real math – I was one of them in high school. Money has properties that go well beyond math. It touches on psychology, dreams, planning and executive action skillsets, and personal discipline. Money is also a function of wealth, a further concept that evades many, some for their entire lives. I suspect that no curriculum exists to teach a public high schooler these dynamics. Most young people will get tossed into the money waters upon graduation or much later: sink or swim; most will fail a lot before they succeed. Some will fail over and over again their whole life, even if they’re brilliant in book-learning. High school needs to teach money.
- Economics. Economics is OPM, ‘Other people’s money’, everybody’s. It’s how your fortunes are circumscribed by the actions and decisions of others, and laws of natural mass behavior that evade even the most authoritarian rulers. How about taxes? Many kids will graduate from high school and have no idea what taxes are. Economics are at least half or more of the concern of government and yet in civics class, it will get nary a mention. Most college bound kids may get economics but roughly 60% of our kids aren’t even going and of those who are, a striking number of them are not our young men. Presently, our public sector is run with a high and unacceptable proportion of fools who are grossly misinformed with proven failed economic ideologies. Prepare our highschoolers with knowledge of economics basics and they will have a highly positive effect on our society the moment they turn 18, and vote, if not before.
- Horticulture/Agriculture/Growing and preparing food. This subject is taught on a limited basis but has been significantly struck from many schools. Only limited rural schools cover agriculture, biology touches on horticulture via botany, and home economics is an artifact of a by-gone era. One hundred years ago, few if any kids did not know or participate in the chain of food production and preparation. Presently, most people are totally at the mercy of the industrial food complex. In the future, if certain technocrats have their way, most people will have no remaining connection to any real food. This segues to health. Masses that are compelled to eat only industrial food are also compelled toward lifelong dependance on pharmaceuticals for the conditions caused by food ignorance and bad dietary practices. There are considerable powerful corporate and government lobbies that would oppose widespread proficiency in a shorter more traditional food chain. It must be taught before it becomes lost knowledge.
- Firearm safety and marksmanship. This may sound like an outrageous proposal in an age of school shootings, especially compared to the other subject suggestions here, and granted, this would be a short course. My own high school had a shooting range. It was no longer used and fell into disuse sometime in the 60s. There was a time when high school kids had marksmanship training and there were no school shootings. I’m not claiming direct causality here but there is a connection. It was a life skill. Many hunted in that community and a fair number went into the military by choice or by draft and wielded a gun. There was a day when a rural youth at least would be a minority if they didn’t know how to manage and shoot a gun. Presently, places with liberal majorities treat firearms like mythically powerful and sentient demons. Conversely and perversely, they also treat psychotic dangerous sociopaths like poor misunderstood victims. The key word is ‘respect’. Teach young people to respect a gun, and with practice, they will also quickly understand that only an errant human can make the gun harm another human. It’s also shocking how many progressive policy makers have never operated a firearm. It might be eye opening to them as well. If this suggestion sounds alarmingly dangerous, we should seriously ask ourselves why it was not dangerous a couple of generations ago. Frankly, a majority of today’s highschoolers outside of progressive strongholds will eventually own and operate a firearm in some capacity.
- Real history. I know that history is a longstanding traditional topic in all levels of education, and yet, young people have never been so ignorant of our collective past. The inter-webs abound with video proof that the present young generations have had no exposure whatsoever to foundational and relevant knowledge of events like the Holocaust, or even 9/11. Instead, they are being fed fictional ideology like ‘The 1619 Project’. History is now indoctrination class. This is not to say that what came before was adequate or effective with its mind-numbing methodology of rote memorization of dates and focus on a starched textbook. It would take a great effort of collective will to wrest history away from contemporary politization and for that reason, this wish-list item may be entirely too fanciful. I could suggest though, as a place to start, that the first and most essential point of history learning is to show students an overview of the depth of time, to then teach them how to traverse that road back and to take a present and past immersive case study of some such excursions. Along the way, they should be
taught, no, shown, no, personally experience why history is so important. To not do so will leave students rootless, travelling into the unknown at blinding speed to a place they know not. That’s a scary place to be no matter what their ideology is.