Last night I posted a little verbal ditty at my BrainFrieze blog about the connection between standardized testing and kids coming out of school unprepared for high-tech jobs. The connection might be a little convoluted for non-educators, but my premise is this. The more we focus on standardized testing and the crieria that are used to judge the effectiveness of schools, the less time we have to spend on courses that promote the higher-order thinking skills that kids need in high-tech jobs. Our curriculum and schedule and spending is all aligned here in Florida to producing good test results. If that hasn't happened in you state, it's just a matter of time until it does.

From a practial standpoint this means the loss of lots of elective classes. In cases where things like band and art and web and graphic design are still being offered either the classes are huge or the kids who want to take the classes are being turned away. If you can't quantify the results a course achieves through testing, then it's going to be tough to get it funded in the current climate.

There are far-reaching implications to the loss of these classes, and I hope folks in the industry will focus on what's going on in education here in the US. If those "soft" courses--ones where their results can't be easily quantified--are not kept in the mix of courses we offer kids, we lose an important element of their total education.

Music is a great example of the connection between an elective class and high-tech skills. Do a little poll where you work. How many of your programmers are also musicians? How many of them had their first chance to play an instrument in a public school? I think you'll find the numbers to be significant. I know here at Community MX the programmers among us almost to a man and woman play some sort of musical instrument. There is an incredibly strong connection in the part of the brain that allows a person to understand how to play a complicated set of chords and also do multiple joins in several relational databases. Or appreciate the elegance of good scripting.

Developing that part of the brain starts early, and it needs to be supported while young. Public schools have traditionally done the most to support that kind of learning and development, but with the current emphasis on testing over teaching, we're facing huge losses of teachers and classes in the arts. Fewer kids will be helped to discover their potential, and less of them will be prepared for the type of work that they might be asked to do.

It will take a little higher-order thinking on the part of people in the industry, government, and education if we're to stop this trend before more damage is done. There has to be a better mixture of accountability and teaching and higher-order learning in our schools if the US is to maintain a competitive workforce. Yes, keeping arts in education is that important.