Assignment Task:
During the summer months, visitors to Fanshawe College in London will notice very few students walking around campus or sitting in classrooms. When the winter semester ends in April, most post-secondary students begin their long summer vacations and do not return to classes until September. However, while students look forward to this four-month break from school, they rarely consider the disadvantages of such an extended absence. Students who take vacations risk forgetting many of the skills they have acquired throughout the year. In addition, these students will develop unreasonable expectations for vacation time in their future careers. Luckily, the solution to these problems is simple and obvious: colleges should require all students to attend classes throughout the summer to ensure that graduates are prepared to enter the workforce. Most people have long forgotten the origin of the summer vacation. In fact, they are often surprised to learn that the idea of summer vacation emerged from the need for work rather than leisure. In the past, many working-class people were farmers, and parents needed their children at home in the summer to help tend to the crops. Obviously, college students today do not use their summer vacation time to work on farms. Nevertheless, colleges continue to give students this extended vacation, and too many people have overlooked the negative impact of a four-month summer holiday on students' education. Students lose knowledge and skills during summer vacation. Educators call this problem "summer learning loss." Post-secondary students need to recognize this problem too- after all, they will soon enter the workforce, so they must be able to use all of their skills and training to do their jobs well. Imagine, for instance, a nursing student who forgets how to give an injection, an information technology student who forgets how to secure a network, or a culinary student who forgets how to handle meat safely. Everyone will admit that the consequences of these errors would be very serious; indeed, these kinds of mistakes could damage the reputation of the college and cause graduates to lose their jobs. Without a doubt, having classes all year long will eliminate the problems associated with summer learning loss: students will remember important details from their training and avoid making mistakes in the workplace.