To the Editor:
We are hearing a lot about “college- and career-ready standards” in the discussion of the Obama administration’s blueprint for reauthorizing the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (“Tests Loom for ESEA in Congress,” March 31, 2010). But I haven’t yet read a description of the careers everyone is talking about, especially the ones that don’t require college.
Are high schools including jobs in music and art? How about plumbing and electrical careers? Moreover, where are the requirements and the standards for multiyear foreign-language classes? And what exactly will the 21st-century-skills component of college and career readiness encompass?
Michael Carlsson
Philadelphia, Pa.
