Dewey states, "The great thing to keep in mind, then, regarding the introduction into the school of various forms of active occupation, is that through them the entire spirit of the school is renewed." Does anyone feel that increasing vocational courses in school systems would help renew spirit in schools and also prepare students for jobs?

More options for students certainly would not hurt. I am strongly in favor of vocational and trade programs in high schools.

I think it would be great to see students actively participating in more vocational activities. I think it would be even better if these activities were integrated into the traditional academic curriculum.

I agree with you DJ. I think that the key would be meaningful integration into the curriculum. That way all students would benefit and lines wouldn't be drawn in the sand and maybe the "pathways" would seem more similar.

I agree that more vocational classes would be a positive change in high schools. I know some high schools let students leave campus and take vocational classes at a community college. I think this is a great program when a school can not afford the salaries and expenses of having the actual classes at their school.

I am in total agreement with the integration of more vocational classes into the schools. Students need options and need to feel confident about choices they make. I think incoroprating more vocational classes would give them a way of doing this. Just as Cindy and DJ said meaningful integration would be the more positive way to incoropate them and give experience to everyone.

I agree with all of you that vocational studies need to bemore visible in the schools. People often think that we need "vocational classes" to fix the problem and often times money is an issue. I like what DJ said about intergrating vocational studies into the traditional curriculum. We can accomplish the same task by integrating the vocational studies in the the core subjects, just as if we had seperate vocational classes. Am I making sense? Teachers need to be little creative and open to new ideas, but I think it would be a simple endeavor to incorportate some of the past vocational curiculum into the math, sciences, social studies and english classes. It take good team work and planning amongst the teachers and staffs at schools.

I believe that having a meaningful vocational curriculum would give certain students a reason to stay in school - the ones who are most prone to drop out, because school has so little value to them.

I also think that exposure to the world of "real work" would be helpful to 7th and 8th graders - to help them see the possibilities, and gain some useful adult skills. Other than keyboarding, kids don't learn many job or home skills in K-12. Many children learn their mathematics better when they can see the real world use of the concepts!

I agree with Daphne that at all ages we can better cross-educate in the core subjects with creative practical shop like activities included. Yes, it would be more work, but I think the children would be more engaged and the knowledge could be applied in real life applications later with an overall longer retention and depth of understanding.