Curriculum Studies, The Future of: Essay 2

In a 1930 speech, W. E. B. Du Bois reconciled the need for both academic-liberal studies and industrial training as part of the curriculum African American college students needed to confront the realities of the current day and the future. He saw [Page 239]industry, commerce, capital, and credit transforming into a superorganization with global influence and wanted the Black community to be in a position to create its own independent institutions of commerce, capital, and so on and have a role in transforming this superorganization to improve the lives of Black people instead of being enslaved by it.

Eighty years later, the need for a curriculum that prepares students to participate in a diverse society and global community is perhaps even more urgent for poor and ...