[Reading-hall-of-fame] Valuing America's Workforce

[tsticht at znet.com]

Greetings all! The article below was published online last week at the
Education News web site (www.ednews.org) which gets some 1.3 million unique
hits per week. Take a look!

Yetta: Still no book!

Tom Sticht



March 3, 2010


Valuing America’s Workforce


Tom Sticht
International Consultant in Adult Education


Two reports of multi-year research projects, separated by a decade and a
half, one using statistical analysis and the other interview and
observation methods, produce similar conclusions.  Both call for a greater
respect for the work that people in service and so-called “blue-collar
jobs” do in America to make a living, support their families, and provide
for the common good of the Nation.


Concern About Disparaging People’s Competence: Cast-off Youth (T. Sticht et
al,,Praeger, 1987)


Cast-off Youth is concerned with the tendency of many to denigrate the
“intelligence” and character of young adults with low aptitude scores on
the literacy- and numeracy-based Armed Forces Qualification Test (AFQT). In
2006 a New York Times article was entitled “Don’t Dumb Down the Army” when
talking about the young adults who score low on the AFQT.


Concern About Disparaging People’s Competence: The Mind at Work (M.
Rose,Viking Penguin, 2004)


The Mind at Work is concerned with the tendency of many to denigrate the
“intelligence”, “aptitude”, or cognitive ability of workers such as
waiters, assembly line workers, welders, and other so-called “working
class” people such as those reported by Rose as: quote:“the autoworkers I
heard labeled by one of the supervisors as “a bunch of dummies.” end quote
(pp. xix-xx)


Cast-off Youth: Quantitative Research Approach & Goal


Cast-off Youth reports a study of the Defense Department's Project 100,000.
It studied the records of some  340,000 undereducated men during the
Vietnam War in which the Army brought in 100,000 men a year who were
formerly rejected because of low AFQT aptitude scores. The military’s
project was called Project 100,000. Robert S. McNamara was Secretary of
Defense at the time and he told me that many referred to the Project
100,000 personnel as “McNamara’s Moron Corps”, confirming the tendency to
refer to those who score lower on literacy-based, aptitude tests in a
derogatory manner, much as Rose found in his qualitative research with
“blue-collar” or service workers.


The goal of the Cast-off Youth research was to find out how these men
performed in the military and afterwards in civilian life and how the Army
trains lower aptitude men to render them competent job performers. We found
that more than 85 percent of these “lower mentality” who were all expected
to fail, performed their jobs and completed their service with satisfactory
or outstanding evaluations.


The Mind at Work: Qualitative Research Approach & Goal


The Mind at Work research used qualitative methods including extensive and
intensive interviews, observations, engaging with both those learning a
trade and those expert in the work. Rose provided his analyses of the
cognitive processes engaged in manual and service work using "the hand and
the brain".


In discussing the goal of the Mind at Work research, Rose states: “My
purpose in writing the book, then, is to provide an alternative lens on
everyday work, to aid us in seeing the commonplace with greater precision.
I believe that such a change in perception could contribute to a more
accurate portrayal of the full world of work, and could help us think more
effectively and humanely about education, job training and the conditions
in which so many people make a living.”(p.xxxii)


Similarities Among Conclusions of Cast-off Youth and The Mind at Work


Both of these research projects studied the job performance of “unskilled”
people working in jobs thought as “low skilled” or "blue-collar" and found
that:


People whom society might consider incapable of complex thought and as
“dummies” in fact learned and performed jobs using more knowledge and more
complex thought processes than typically imagined.


There needs to be a greater appreciation of the so-called “manual” and
“unskilled” vocational trades and their potential for human cognitive and
affective development.


Society should avoid the sole use of standardized cognitive test scores to
exclude people from opportunities for education, training, and work.


Policies are called for which encourage greater inclusion into the
mainstream of American life of those marginalized citizens whom society
thinks can be cast off.


Believe in the Power of People to Achieve When Given the Opportunity


In the conclusion to The Mind at Work, Mike Rose writes: quote:“If we think
that whole categories of people—identified by class, by occupation—are not
that bright, then we reinforce social separations and cripple our ability
to talk across our cultural divides.” End quote (p. 216)


When I traveled to Washington, DC and reported the findings of Cast-off
Youth about the positive success of the Project 100,000 young men to Robert
McNamara 25 years ago in April of 1985 he told me:


Quote” Its an argument that if people are motivated properly and trained
properly, they can succeed.  This kind of approach shows that there is
something that can be done, and that people---individuals in our
society---that our society thinks can be cast off need not be cast off!”end
quote

tsticht at aznet.net

Dear Tom,

This is wonderful. Of course I know your work, and in fact cite you in
the notes to The Mind at Work, but I did not know about your Cast Off
Youth book. Do you know if it is still in print? I am really honored
to see my work paired with yours in such a smart way, and in a way
that certainly has pertinence for today. Thank you for sending me this.
-----------------------------------
Mike Rose, Professor
Social Research Methodology Division
Graduate School of Education and Information Studies
2011 Moore Hall, Box 951521
Los Angeles, California 90095-1521
(310)-825-8076

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