Jonluw said:
I go to a public school.
The system is different in Norway, you see:
We have mandatory education until year 10. During those ten years, we do not get to choose what schools we go to. Between years 7 and 8, we change from elementary school to lower secondary school. It is common to change the actual school you go to at that time, but some facilities combine elementary and lower secondary.
At the end of year 10 we have to apply for upper secondary. You get to choose between all the upper secondary schools in Norway, but if the school is further than a set amount of kilometres from your current home, your chances of getting accepted are lowered significantly.
You also get to choose between different lines of study. You can do as me, and do a course that prepares you for further studies at a university, or you can do a course that prepares you for a certain job. For example, there is the electrician course and the carpenter course, the elevator-installer course, and several others. At the end of many of these courses, you will apply for apprenticeship. If you take a course like this you can't study at a university afterwards, unless you stay for an extra year to build up the necessary theoretical knowledge.
You can also do one of the courses that let you do music, dance or media. If you do these you will still be eligible to study at a university afterwards.
People turn 16 during the first half of the first year in upper secondary (where I am now). So that might explain why the students are giving some more responsibilty there than in high school (where, as I understand it, there age of students ranges from 12 to 17).
I see. Well, my high school had a building next to it that had vocational classes, like child care, metal work, and auto repair, etc. But students still had to take all the, math, English, science, and other courses too, they just dropped having a study hall period, and took one vocational class a semester.
Here is how school systems work in the US, I believe most of them do any way. K to 5th grade is elementary school, 6th to 8th is middle school, 9th to 12th is high school. Then students start the application process for colleges and universities.
I don't know how choosing your line of studies works over in Norway, but I can't stand how the US treats learning, especially learning for leaving and becoming a part of society.
In the US, K through 12, has a curriculum where you have to take classes from every major subject. The US has this idea that people have to be knowledgeable in everything, not just basic but more than basic. I am okay with that thinking, in K to 12, but it even continues on into colleges and universities. I went to one university, graduated and transferred to another. The both have the same you have to know more than the basics in everything. (To the young US high school students on this forum: Don't think like I did, that once you get to college, you will be able to narrow your classes so that you can just concentrate on what you want to be. That curriculum you had in High School will follow you to college.)
When I went to my first university, I thought I will declare my Major right away so that I only have to take classes within my Major. Even though I am an English Major, I have had to take 3 math classes, 2 lab science classes, History, Sociology, Psychology, Philosophy, Humanities 1(had nothing to do with English), a physical education course that includes one health class that goes along with one activity, I chose weightlifting.
So, in the US, there is no true narrowing in studies, oh and all those extra classes, were exactly the same as the equivalent of them I took in high school, just more work, but not different work, just extra of the same old work. Seriously, they expect me to be able to come out a proper and knowledgeable English Major, when I have to fill my head with useless information that a lot of times makes me forget things I need to remember for my important English classes? Of course I got a stupid answer to that question, from one of the worst English professors I have ever had. He told me that the reason we have the core curriculum is that even though certain classes don't pertain to my English Major, they help me to become disciplined as a student. That is a bunch of bull; what it does is distract me and make me a worse student. The core is the reason I'm getting a B.S. in English Rhetoric and Writing, instead of a B.A. in Creative Writing, because the stupid core in the Creative Writing B.A. makes taking four semesters of a foreign language a requirement.
I have nothing against trying to learn a foreign language, I took three years of German in High School, not that I remember enough of it to speak properly. I have problem with it is just something that gets in the way, because it has nothing to do with being a creative writer, I right creatively in English, not some other language. I seriously believe that this whole discipline stick that colleges and universities have going, isn't because the think taking all these random classes will make us more disciplined, it is so that their professors in certain fields, have enough students to teach each semester.
I took my college education slow and easy, so I will be graduating this fall with my 4 year degree, which took me six years to get. I'm actually above the US average, the statistics show that a normal college student takes 7 years to get a 4 year degree.
If I owned and ran a college, I would throw these core curriculums out the window, and when a person selects a Major, they would only be taking the course that actually help and pertain to their Major. Students would finish college in half the time and have more time to actually live, instead of wasting it on stuff that is useless to them. Taking it slow, I would have finished in 3 years instead of 6. Seriously, what would you give to get 3 free un-wasted years back in your life.
Sorry about that, it's just that I have a huge problem with the way school works in US colleges and universities.
