Back to School: Why Everyone Deserves a Second Chance at Education

With a bountiful philosophy of (p. 140) and courage to stand against rationing of educational opportunity (p. 141), Mike Rose (2012) challenges notion of community colleges and adult education programs--so-called second-chance institutions--as purely economically driven. He states that this economic rationale for postsecondary education is based on assumptions that in u0027new economyu0027 requires more literacy, numeracy, and computer skills as well as so-called u0027soft skillsu0027 and that there is a u0027skills mismatchu0027 between many Americans and labor market (p. 26). However, is a political u0027charadeu0027, to push job training as solution to unemployment (p. 27). Rose calls upon philosophies of Jefferson and Dewey to challenge this strictly economic vision of higher education, arguing that American educational tradition includes goals of intellectual, civic, social, and moral (p. 77). Rose envisions a democratic philosophy that affirms the ability of common person and humanistic, aesthetic, and ethical of an occupational (p. 141). In addition to training towards future employment opportunities, Rose believes that second-chance programs provide a number of other personal, social, and civic benefits (p. 28). Moreover, Rose espouses minimizing academic-vocational often found in second-chance programs, instead focusing on the curricular-ideological, structural-economic, and social class and symbolic dimensions (p. 140) of higher education. Rose grounds his arguments for reforming higher education in ongoing conversation regarding industrial model of education and academic-vocational divide. Dewey had predicted problems would create, and reformers have been trying to undo them: artificial compartmentalization of knowledge, suppressing of rich cognitive content of work, and limiting of intellectual development of students in a vocational course of study (p. 78). In Roseu0027s opinion, fact that many second-chance students return to school to improve employment situation does not exclude possibility of academic pursuits. In fact, their vocational commitment ... gives rise to ... liberal impulse (p. 79). Second-chance programs need to strike a balance between practical and theoretical knowledge, creating a vocationally oriented program built on cognitive content of work that also provides strong education in literacy and mathematics, history and economics, science and ethics that can emerge from world of work (p. 61). In 1990, Carl D. Perkins Vocational Education and Technology Act funded attempts to increase academic content of vocational education, but yielded mixed results. As Rose indicates, ways in which subject areas and disciplines are organized and compartmentalized within schools compound challenges facing this type of reform. In some notable exceptions, visionary faculty in places such as Hi Tech High and Big Picture Schools used vocational education reform as occasion to reimagine very structure of schooling itself and with it academic-vocational divide (p. 136). Recent programs are linking English or math courses to occupational courses so that students develop academic skills through a meaningful context. Rose promotes enhancing liberal studies in vocational curriculum, expanding academic coursework by engaging with world beyond classroom. …