College and Career Ready

I was watching David Coleman speak proudly about all of the work that has been done developing Common Core Standards and it led me to think about the different paths to college my husband and I had.

I was raised in a middle-class home. I went to private school for most of my years although I begged to go to public school every year. Finally, when I was a junior, my parents let me attend public school. College was an expectation. It was never something I ever even debated. I had to figure out which college I was going to attend, apply and to see if I could get in. I had no restrictions except who would accept me. Ivy league was out. I wasn't a strong test taker. My SAT and ACT scores weren't anything special although my grades were good.  I ended up studying as an undergraduate at Bradley University and went there because I was going to be a business major. They had a strong business school. Little did I know that I would read Jonathon Kozol's Savage Inequalities in a sociology class and become a teacher.  At that point, learning became interesting to me. School was no longer a chore to get me to the next level. Education became a passion.

My husband had a very different path to college. He was not raised with the comforts I took for granted. He learned to sew as a child since there were 13 children and they had to make their own clothes. (I can't operate a sewing machine.  He can mend our daughter's dresses.) College was never on the radar in his home. His mother became a single  mother when my husband was 8.  They were poor.  He was the only of his siblings to attend college. What was his path? His path was through a vocational program in his high school. It was also in the vocational program that he had the opportunity to work with engineers designing aircraft interior. He learned to draft drawings and had a moment. He can tell you the moment he chose to become educated. It happened working along side an engineer in a vocational program in high school. His journey took longer than mine. No college fund had been established like I had. He joined the Air Force and served our country. Then, he went to Cal Poly and became a mechanical engineer. Today, he works in the business field.  He is brilliant. I tell him often that I married a genius. He says, "I know." It makes me smile.

While he was in the high school vocational program, he learned how to work with acrylic plastics.  When he had the idea for an invention to enhance the sound of a smartphone, he knew how to make the prototype.  He had the skills from hands-on experience in high school. Since he was an engineer, he knew how to do the technical drawings for our pending patent and for sourcing our work in the U.S.A.

Everyone's life path is not the same. 


Everyone's smarts are not the same.

It's time to embrace our different strengths and rethink standards.