"Educating Hearts and Minds" was replaced by "True to You" last year at Archbishop Watterson High School. The former slogan represented the main goal of Watterson High, to educate the hearts of students through Holy Cross values and to educate the minds of students to a level that is needed for a successful college career. This is the product that Watterson attempts to produce. As a Catholic high school, Watterson's purpose is to both prepare students for college and to help create a foundation of faith in the student's life. The four year process of math, English, science, and religion classes are supposed to produce this product. Like Watterson, many other high schools across the nation, whether public, private, or religious, have similar goals. All high schools attempt to produce a certain type of product, one that is well rounded and ready for the world. While different to some degree in each school, the process to educate students and create the desired product works, but it isn't perfect. Each year, approximately 1.3 million students fail to graduate from high school and become dropouts (all4ed). While the system works in most cases, that number is too large to dismiss as a minor flaw in the system.
             The average high school education is focused mainly on a few core classes: math, English, and science. The other classes, from language to theater to music classes, have little value in the sense of preparing for college and the future. This is shown through standardized testing. The ACT does not test you over your ability to play the flute or how well you can dance. The ACT tests over math, English, science, and writing. That being said, the classes that students aren't going to be tested on are deemed less important. Because of this, many students see these classes as schedule fillers. Thus the education system in high school is centered on those core classes. Getting a C on a math test is ...