My topic on horizontal diversification brought up some points and I started thinking, what is our goal, our responsiblity in these times?
Are we just trying to get our children a good education or prepare them for a future where graduates have a 20% unemployment rate coming out of college. Most that are emplyed are not getting ideal jobs, but glad for something.
We want our gifted children to have education that challenges them, but can I really fault the parent that works the system to get their children into an advanced math class -- that most children with an IQ above 120 probably could handle, so that they will challenged and into an AP track that gets them into a good college?
There is a woman I met, whose son (IQ around 160 on the SBV) didn't get into Hunter and we talk about schools and math programs and she is so anxious for her sons. A little background. She and DH are Chinese. DH got out of China with a scholarship to Oxford. Has excellent job now. Their perspective is that education is the ticket to success and the better the education the higher chance of success. Having parents that came out of Europe post WW2 with nothing but their education, I grew up with the same parental attitude. Education -- the right education, like engineering or medicine, protects you against what life can through against you. Since it is apparent now, to even the most hopeful economists that the limpy recovery is jobless and things don't look so good for 2010, I think I can understand these parents attitude and think I have it myself.
Ren
