ON THE TOWN:Not too cool for a carpool

If you’re older than about 15, summer flew. Fifteen is about the age when kids take on summer jobs and learn that being busy has this magical effect on the clock.

Kids with no obligations see this summer differently. Many of them, glad to be out of school in June, could not wait until it started again Tuesday. And there were plenty of parents who were glad it started too.

Our house is adjusting to a different routine. For the first time in two years, our kids are at different schools, and what was once so easy has now become something worthy of a battle plan.

Last year, our kids were in a carpool. But this year, with my son riding his bike to his new school, I started taking my daughter to school each day, about a 20-minute drive.

I had planned to drive her until our old carpool got its momentum working again, but on the first day of our solo trip, she said something revealing.

“Dad,” she said, “Would it be possible to have just the two of us drive to school every day? I like this time together by ourselves. We get to talk.”

There is but one answer to that question, and I have given up the convenience of alternate weeks of driving in exchange for some one-on-one time with her.

The timing is good too. She is a junior now and the coming weeks and months will require some rather substantive conversations about her post-high-school plans. She is interested in college, and I expect that she will go, but as I have told both of our children, college is not their only option.

It’s tough for a lot of kids to grasp that concept, thanks to an educational system that places far too much emphasis on college as the best option once they’ve graduated.

It’s hard to argue the alternative. College does provide an enriching experience unlike any other, and as a step along a career path, it works very well. The economic advantage is there too. For the most part, college graduates make more money than those who do not get a degree.

But not always, and that is where my speech to the kids comes in.

College isn’t for everyone. What is more important than going to college, I say, is that they decide what it is they want to do, commit to it and work very hard at being good at it. If that future means that college is the best means to the end, then so be it.

But if, for example, one wants to be a chef or a mechanic, our society is more than likely to look at these pursuits as a failure to achieve.

Hope is coming in the form of renewed interest in the trades and other college alternatives. Gov. Schwarzenegger has authorized additional millions of dollars to help fund Career and Technical Education programs statewide.

C and Technical Education teaches trade skills to high school students who have neither the aptitude nor desire for college.

That audience is huge. Statewide, according to the California Coalition for Construction in the Classroom, one-third of students statewide will drop out. Two-thirds will not get a college degree, and 25% are expected to fail the 2006 High School Exit Exam.

As parents, all we can do is set the best example possible, and then rely on our kids to make good decisions. But I know that the teachers in our school district strive to make themselves available for any guidance we may need.

For the district’s juniors and seniors, this is an exciting time. After all, many of them will look forward to the end of their carpool days. But I know one father and daughter pair that will miss their time together.