Russell Coker <russell@coker.com.au> wrote:
I think that the current system of giving all secondary schools the same goals is a bad one. The needs of kids who are destined to drop out at 16, the kids who will finish school but not do university, and the kids who are going to university are very different and would be best met by different schools.
Some systems separate children into these categories quite early. for example, apparently the German school system has separate curricula. I understand and appreciate the benefits of such a model; the question is whether people who are misclassified have the opportunity to overcome their educational disadvantage and move up into the more intellectually rigorous stream destined for higher education. There will always be people who are pushed into the wrong stream, and the real problem is for those who are "downgraded" inappropriately.