Career Education and Blacks: Trick or Treat?

Abstract

T here is growing concern by many career counseling, a component of blacks in America about the current career education, must consider the movements in education that have be- effects of one's ethnic background in come known as career education. The theory and in practice, concept is continually being redefined, Few theories of vocational develop and, in the many redefinitions, black ment and blacks have been introduced, people see many opportunities for new and fewer have become part of the "tricks" to be played. Little input has "language" of the profession. Ameri come from the black community. can education needs to revamp its pro There are few, if any, graduate schools grams and develop educational sys that offer any curricula related to the tems that allow for the utilization of area of career counseling and eth- the full potential of all its youth. Cur nicity. St. Clair Drake (1965) states rent education, by and large, sends ill that the "ghettoization" of blacks has prepared young people into a cruel resulted in the emergence of a ghetto world. It is not giving a return of subculture with a distinctive ethos, dividends appropriate to the level of recognizable in all black neighbor- investment. In all 50 states, there are hoods. For example, such phenomena minimum and maximum age limit as the numerous restaurants with the requirements for compulsory school smell of foods familiar to its residents, attendance, which means that parents storefront churches, police sirens, high invest the lives of their children in unemployment rate, high school drop- American education. One need only outs, experimental training programs, note the exorbitant drop-out (and crowded streets, and lots of laughter push-out) rate (Clayton 1972) to realize and noise are indigenous to black that all is not well in education. To urban areas. These phenomena can use terms analogous to the problems be found throughout the nation in black communities; therefore, the ethnic contributions, qualities, differ