There is a huge gap between what students want for their future and what their schools are offering.
Interpretation
Students' aspirations often do not align with the education they receive.
This quote emphasizes the disconnect between students' ambitions for their future and the educational programs offered by schools. It suggests that the current educational system may not adequately prepare students for the realities of their desired paths, leading to a misalignment between student goals and available opportunities.
In practice
In a speech at a graduation ceremony, a speaker could use this quote to highlight the need for educational reform.
It's not that our high school system was not designed well, but that it was designed in 1906 when the country was just out of the industrial era. There hasn't been a substantial systemic change the way we do high school since then.
As a parent, you have to be good coach and bad coach, and I think in the college-application process, I didn't want to be bad coach. 'This is amazing! I'm so proud of you!' That's the role I wanted with my kids.
Regardless of zip code, talent and IQ are evenly distributed, so we need to make sure that opportunity is evenly distributed, too.
Teachers have told us across the country that what's severely outdated is the teacher at the front of the classroom as the font of knowledge, because as we know, access to knowledge and information is now ubiquitous. So instead, teachers want to help students learn how to think so that they can be lifelong learners.
You aren't learning anything when you're talking.
Traditionally, psychology has been the study of two populations: university freshmen and white rats.
Support your libraries... or else!
My father paid for my education; then he made it clear that I was on my own.
Emotional 'literacy' implies an expanded responsibility for schools in helping to socialize children. This daunting task requires two major changes: that teachers go beyond their traditional mission and that people in the community become more involved with schools as both active participants in children's learning and as individual mentors.
My contention is, first, that we should want more from our educational efforts than adequate academic achievement and, second, that we will not achieve even that meager success unless our children believe that they themselves are cared for and learn to care for others.
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