PrlorHles In the Hlgh School Curriculum To the Editoc
To the Editor
The article by John Liebermann, Jr. [1985,62,321] raises some issues I'd like to see addressed in this Journal. If high school students take three years of chemistry with the last course being essentially a double course, what other courses are they taking? How can a high school student, even a very brieht one. receive an excellent eeneral education or even a broad science education and take three years of chemistry? Whendo thestudents in Liebermann's third-vear chemistn course take calculus; solid courses in ~nglish-andmer rick literature, not to mention grammar and composition; music. art, drama; US. history. world history, economics, political science, psychology; enough semeetws of the same non-English language to develop both reading and speaking competence; computer programming; physics, biology, geology, and astronomy? Surely we can teach a lot of chemical facts and concepts t o bright, highly motivated students (15to 20of 24OO), but does this serve their best educational interests? What ever happened to the ideal of a liberal education for all college-bound students, or the ideal of a general education for all high school eraduates? A rerated issue is that of college level chemistry courses taught a t the hieh school level, including advanced placement courses as well as ~iebermann'sth&d-year chemistry course. Is it really the high school teacher's job to relieve the college teacher of the responsibility for teaching freshman (and now sophomore) chemistry? Or should high school chemistry (and all high school science) be something different? The resources involved in the course Liebermann describes also bother me. As a chemist, I know the costs of the instruments he describes. Since he makes no comments about coordinating with an area university, I assume that his school has purchased IR, HPLC, NMR, and mass spectrometers. Given the incredible amount of money required to run a good lab-oriented science program for 2400 lower level students (freshmen, sophomores, general education students who will not volunteer for advanced science courses and for whom the required high school science course is the last formal science education), I must assume one of the following: (1) his school's financial situation is quite unusual, or (2) lab science for lower level students is sacrificed to support the few who are obviously heading off for science1 engineering majors. I don't intend this as an attack on Liebermann or his school's priorities. I would like to see him and others address these issues because I think manv of us. perhaps a maioritv, . .. tend to do the same thing-throw most of dur resources, both financial and human, to the self-selected science majors whiledoinga less thanadequatejvb withall those peoplethe surveys indicate arescientifically illiterate, all those people, including many future politicians, who will eventuafiy support or fail to support funding. In the best of all possible worlds, we will be able to fund excellent science education a t all levels. If Liebermann has discovered how to do that, I want to hear more about that than about teaching sophomore organic to high school students.
Mr. Lamb has pointed out some issues raised by my article. He doesn't think it is possible for students taking three vears of chemistrv to have time to receive an excellent eeneral education or even a broad science education. He concerned with the old problem of teachine colleee level courses at the high school level. He also seemsio feelthat too much time and too manv resources have been allocated for a small number of students a t the expense, perhaps, of the majority of students taking science at our school. Each of these concerns will be addressed in turn. The first concern can he partially lessened when you consider that the course descrihed is not reallv a double course. Studentsvoluntarily give up part of their l k c h periodonlab davs to have a little more time for some meanineful laboratory kxperience. They would not be enrolled in another course during this block of time. They would probably be going off campus to a fast food establishment with some of their less conscientious friends. As far as receiving a general education, a survey of the courses previously taken and being taken by these students reveals that most of them will leave high school with just that. Most of them are doubling up or have doubled up on their science courses so that they will have taken a little of everything. (At our school, we also offer three levels of bioloev through Advanced Placement. three levels of phvsics &ough Advanced ~lacement-dalculus Based, ~ % o n o mv, and Oceauoaraphv.) - . . . All of this vear's students will have finished at least four years of onelanguage and a few are taking more than one (including Russian). Several are involved in band and orchestra, dhile others are involved in the various Drama Department Productions. One young lady has already been picked as a sure bet for the 1988 US. Olympic swim team. So you see that what you have here is a erouu of students with a hieh interest in chemistrv that make the most of a s c h o o l d a g ~ h amount e of time wasted in a typical school day is truly incredible, but our third-year chemistry course illustrates that our better students (and even some aveiage students) will make the best use of their time when given an alternative. Another point needs to be made: Most students pick one particular area where they spend a disproportionate-amount of their time. For some, it is drama, and for others it is computers. I have provided, with my chemistry program, yet another identity for a . group - of students, another place to "hangout". Our third-year course is not an attempt to teach sophomore oreauic. but an attemnt to orenare notential oreanic studentsbett'er. I t is even more of an attempt to make p; for the lack of adequate laboratory time during the Advanced Placement Class. At our school we have only one 50-min period a day for A.P. Chemistry. While our third-year course does not completely remedy this situation, it does provide the students who are most likely to go on in chemistry with more basic skills than the average high school student. Ironically, we were trying to address one of Mr. Lamb's most important concerns when we acquired most of our major instrumentation (IR, NMR, AA, mass spectroscopy). In an attempt to offer chemistry at all levels and in the name of Vocational Education, we attempted to implement the American Chemical Societv's two-vear Chemical Technology Program. This is a program designed primarily to train chemical technicians at junior colleges. Our school system
Wllllam G. Lamb Oregon Ep scopa Scnool 6300 SW hicol Rd.
Ponland.OR 97223
382
Journal of Chemical Education
