Sunburn — The Morning Read Of What’s Hot In Florida Politics — 12.16.21

By Peter Schorsch    

Good Thursday morning.

For several years now, Florida high school students and their parents have heard the message: While a college education is a good thing, they can still have a good life without one.

Lawmakers, with justification, advanced the idea that vocational education can provide perhaps a more practical everyday skill than learning the works of Plato. A student can

learn things like auto mechanics, plumbing, construction, the culinary arts and so on.

You may never appreciate how much a good plumber is worth until you need one.

I mention this because of a News Service of Florida report published in The Capitolist. The story detailed a steady decline in Florida college students over the last 10 years.

The state college system has about 100,000 fewer students today than it did a decade ago. Educators, naturally, wonder why.

Theories include an increase in part-time students, perhaps because of work or other factors. The pandemic is part of this and could be a bigger part in the future, but enrollment was trending downward years before anyone ever heard of COVID-19.

I have a couple of ideas about this.

Although Florida does a good job keeping college costs down compared to other states, it’s still expensive. Maybe potential students don’t want to be saddled with debt just as they’re starting lives in the working world.

I think education burnout is an issue worth exploring, too. Students coming out of high school just spent four years stressing over their SAT scores and all the other things required to gain acceptance to the school of their choice.

The University of South Florida, for instance, reports the average high school GPA for incoming first-year students is 4.18. The average SAT score is 1,297.

Just getting accepted to USF or any other top Florida university isn’t easy. And that — wait for it — can lead critics to grump about the so-called “elites” in those ivy-covered towers.

A consistent conservative drumbeat is that universities are staffed with Communist professors who teach students to hate America. It’s hyperbole, of course, but those repeated dog whistles may have had a hand in plummeting enrollment.

Maybe it’s a combination of all those things — debt, requirements, other options, and perhaps a sense that some graduates will be lucky to make $15 an hour when they’re out in the workforce, even with a college degree.

My late father-in-law, a professor at USF for many years, was a huge proponent of vocational education. I am too. Neither of my parents graduated from high school, but that didn’t stop them. They made a good life for our family through hard work and perseverance.

These days, the more significant threat isn’t from potential students who decide college isn’t for them. A more sinister danger comes for those who lack critical thinking skills when they head out into the world.

That’s why so many Americans believe the oft-repeated lie that sinister forces stole the 2020 election.

That’s how we have QAnon and an insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

You shouldn’t need a college degree to know those things are bad.

— SITUATIONAL AWARENESS —

Tweet, tweet:

—@Runolgaran: I literally have COVID right now, and they keep using this phrase ‘post pandemic’

—@Scott_Maxwell: The gov’s office just announced a news conference for 8:30 a.m. today in Wildwood — just a few miles from The Villages polling precincts. Obviously, to be consistent, he’ll demand a full FDLE investigation into voting irregularities in that community. And harsh penalties. With great surprise & a heavy heart, I learned this alleged election fraud was not, in fact, the focus of the Governor’s ire. Instead, it was “woke”-ness. Gee, it’s almost like the Governor just wants to gaslight his base, hoping they’re too damn dumb to notice. Or just don’t care

—@AnaCeballos_: (Ron) DeSantis says the media acts as if critical race theory is not being taught in schools (As notes, State Board of Education already barred it in Florida), and he proceeds to list examples of how CRT has influenced what is taught in Philadelphia, Arizona and Santa Clara County.

—@Fineout: Is it a news conference, or is it a campaign event? Play today. Valuable prizes not forthcoming

—@ShevrinJones: My fight is and will never be about parents having a vested interest in what their child is being taught, because I believe parents SHOULD know what their child is being taught. But this notion by our “leaders” that children are being taught to hate their color, I call BS!

—@BiancaJoanie: Would love if @JeanetteNunezFL gave her hometown paper a 1-on-1 interview.

—@ChristinaPushaw: I do not care if Nikki Fried (or anyone else) uses MMJ but building your entire persona around smoking is cringe. She is a grown woman and elected official acting like the “edgy” kids in my high school at age 15 or 16.

—@CoachNorvell: Great day for student-athletes across the country getting to live out a childhood dream of signing a college scholarship. Respect decisions and celebrate accomplishments. Grateful to be a part of such a wonderful program representing incredible young men and the #NoleFamily

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