Being an educated human has many sides

Spectrum, by Art Carney

In reference to the Spectrum article (Frontiersman, July 2), I agree with Kelly Sidebottom about the lack of vocational training opportunities for young people who cannot afford, or who have no interest in a college education.

College was the last thing on my list when I graduated from high school, and it would have been nice to have had a chance to learn a trade. I'm sure there were some such opportunities in the idealistic days of the 1950s, but I never knew of any. I struggled like all other "have-nots" until things began to smooth out for me in the late 1970s. It was then that I discovered the value of education when I took a sociology class at the Mat-Su Community College, and I've taken a class or two almost every year since. However, had I taken the same class back in the early '50s, it isn't likely that I'd have had the same favorable reaction. Without the experience of my troubles and tribulations, there is no way I could appreciate the personal revelations I learned in it and in subsequent classes.

When personal computers became a reality and the Internet was starting to take shape, I disagreed with then President Bill Clinton when he predicted there would be only high-tech, high-paying jobs for future Americans. Even though -- with one exception -- I had lots of respect for him, I thought his prediction was ridiculous because there will always be work to do and someone has to do it. Kelly Sidebottom described it very well in the Spectrum article.

One size will never fit all; not on the social scale, nor in religion, politics, economics and certainly not education, but even so, I believe in education -- both academic and vocational -- ought to be available for all who qualify and have the will to pursue it.

In the Frontiersman's Jan. 21 Saints and Sinners column, George Plagenz quoted Mortimer J. Adler, philosopher and educator, as saying "specialized vocational training which does no more than fit a man for a limited task in the industrial process is not education in the human sense at all. It contributes to the production of material goods, not to the development of human beings."

Although I agreed with his sentiments at the time, the recent Spectrum article has broadened my viewpoint, and Adler now seems to be among those "highly academic" people who forget that the production of material goods is the engine that drives our economy and raises our standard of living. It is also what puts food on the table when a higher education is not an option, not to mention the satisfaction workers enjoy when they rest their weary bones after a hard day's work -- work that makes it unnecessary to jog, ride bicycles or go to the gym twice a week.

It seems that Adler believes the development of human beings -- "in the human sense" -- is the function of higher education, but my experience in the world of work and worry has revealed to me that human development results from the vicissitudes of life, including anguish, forlornness and despair, as well as the joys of love and the satisfaction of making slow but steady progress. Human experience is what makes human beings more human, and while an academic education can help us to better understand the outer world we live in -- as well as the inner world of ourselves -- education is only one factor in determining whether or not a person's life has been a success.

We are all inclined to seek after our own best interest, so we must deal with our limitations even as we pursue our aspirations and utilize our talents. Chance happenings and other outside forces -- including our genetic make-up and the subtle influence of social and cultural mandates -- make our choices difficult because we are always uncertain of the end result, but even so, it seems obvious that many youngsters are better suited for vocational training than for an academic or a scientific career. It only makes sense to provide them with the opportunity to choose their own type of education.

The values and preference of the individual are what determine the best course of action.

Art Carney is a Wasilla resident.