[xoxoxoBruce]

I hope your personal experience translates to a larger trend, and hope it will here, also.
When my mother reached High School level(grades 9 through 12), in the late 1930s, there were three choices.
1- Trade High, learn a skill to make a living, (very limited choices for girls).
2- Commerce High, to prepare for the business sector(of course girls could only learn secretarial skills), and
3- Classical High, to prepare for college.

When I reached that level in the late 1950s there was one High School, preparing everyone for college. Not even separate courses for kids obviously on a different tact, fuck those losers.

But many parts of the country didn't have their head up their ass, and retained Trade High Schools, knowing full well the affluent college graduates would be in deep shit without the butcher/baker/candlestick maker. But even there, as more kids were expected to go to college except the ones with relatives in the trade unions or a business, the Trade High Schools suffered declining enrollment and combined to become regional schools. But people had less interest in financing schools that became magnets for students that were poor, or Negro, or immigrant, so they faded too.

Apprenticeships, where you could make a meager living while learning a craft/trade, became a quaint footnote to history. Now unpaid internships are in vogue, as a replacement for slavery.

It's really hard for a kid with brains and talent to succeed if they don't fit the one-size-fits-all mold.
WANTED, 20 to 25 years old, with 50 years of experience, and PhD in a related field.
And the rest... fuck those losers.