General Education for Technical Education.

Overview & Synopsis

The stated purpose of this report "is to give the reader a recent definition of general education, a college president's persepctive of general education and high technology, and sources the reader can examine for curriculum planning." The definition of general education is a paragraph quoted from Cohen and Brawer's book "The American Community College" (1982). The college president's perspective is provided by including a 9-page paper by H. James Owen entitled "High Technology and General Education". Mr. Owen is President of the Tri-Cities State Technical Institute, Blountville, Tennessee. The bibliographic sources are provided via a 25-item selected bibliography entitled "General Education and Occupational Curricula". Mr. Owen's examination of the published views of administrators of two-year colleges across the country provides support for strengthening the general education component of associate degree programs in technical education. General education and high technology are found to be complementary to one another. The rapidity with which technology is advancing has led to the virtual overnight obsolescence of some jobs and creation of others. Such a rapidly changing labor market has necessitated the development of high technology programs that will: (1) teach a specialized technology application with a high market value, and (2) provide program graduates with a commitment to lifelong learning and transferable skills necessary to hold a job, move into a new job, or change careers. (MN)