The Purpose of Education

[emmiedahl]

If public education is failing to both teach facts and teach thinking skills, what should the citizenry do about it?

Should we disband the whole thing? Why use pulic funds to pay for a worthless system?

Should we get involved in public education and help to rebuild it better, faster, stronger?

I have the tools and the resources to make certain that my grandchildren are educated at home and privately. Why should I spend my time and money on other people's children?

Why is it that I got a truly great education in a big city public school in the 1970's and that very same sytem is just about defunct? What on earth happened?

Why did my children get a wonderful education in a suburban public school less than 10 years ago and yet when they return to visit, they are now appalled by what is passing for education today? What on earth happened?

What destroyed public education?Why should we care? Why don't we just take our kids out of the terrible public schools and use all of our resources on them? Is it in any way our responsibility as a part of society to build a program for all children to get a decent start? Isn't that Socialist? Isn't Socialism ALWAYS bad?

I know people who want to disband the American education system.

Our system is still educating people far beyond the level they were at when we started. I think the people who started it would be pleased with our literacy rates. Most people can do basic math, sign their name, read enough to fill out a job application. And 50 years ago, those minimal skills were enough to earn a living wage. One of my main issues is that the world is changing and American education is not changing with it.

An education *is* available if you want it. A lot of kids drop out and don't pay a lot of attention in class, but they are refusing an education that is there for the taking. Also, it used to be that an education was viewed as important and valuable by most people. Neither of my maternal grandparents had degrees, but they came from a culture where a university education was something to be honored. That makes a huge difference in how children are educated. If you believe in your child's education, you will send them to school rested and fed. You will make them do their homework and encourage them to check out books from the school library. When there are discipline or learning problems, you deal with them proactively and talk to the teachers about how to resolve them. If you remove these factors, the teachers are left babysitting. They just cannot get a whole lot done because they are dealing with feral children who would rather be home watching cartoons.

I think the general disdain for education in the right wing is contributing heavily to the problem. I know middle class people who think school is useless and that the administration is persecuting their child by asking them to sit and learn. It is a common belief. Those kids are being told that educated people are stupid and mean. Also, fact has a liberal bias. So conservatives are not going to like a lot of what their kids learn. Education is a threat to dogma and I really believe that the far right is working to destroy it.

I have issues with the US public school system and would pull my kids out in a second if that were an option. But the core idea is a good one, we just need to tweak the details. The only way to do that is for us to pull together as a country and fix it. This is what some might call socialism :) It might take money (although we already fund them far more per student than most developing nations, so I think there are probably other issues as well). It might require stepping on the toes of local officials and stopping the corporate interests that make supplies and textbooks so expensive and at times insufficient. I am sure there will have to be a higher level of accountability as well. Administrators can fire bad teachers, but it is a multi-step process and a pain in the ass so they don't bother. They need to be held accountable for the quality of their workforce. Little things like that could make a huge difference.

[Austin]

I know people who want to disband the American education system.

Our system is still educating people far beyond the level they were at when we started. I think the people who started it would be pleased with our literacy rates. Most people can do basic math, sign their name, read enough to fill out a job application. And 50 years ago, those minimal skills were enough to earn a living wage. One of my main issues is that the world is changing and American education is not changing with it.

An education *is* available if you want it. A lot of kids drop out and don't pay a lot of attention in class, but they are refusing an education that is there for the taking. Also, it used to be that an education was viewed as important and valuable by most people. Neither of my maternal grandparents had degrees, but they came from a culture where a university education was something to be honored. That makes a huge difference in how children are educated. If you believe in your child's education, you will send them to school rested and fed. You will make them do their homework and encourage them to check out books from the school library. When there are discipline or learning problems, you deal with them proactively and talk to the teachers about how to resolve them. If you remove these factors, the teachers are left babysitting. They just cannot get a whole lot done because they are dealing with feral children who would rather be home watching cartoons.

I think the general disdain for education in the right wing is contributing heavily to the problem. I know middle class people who think school is useless and that the administration is persecuting their child by asking them to sit and learn. It is a common belief. Those kids are being told that educated people are stupid and mean. Also, fact has a liberal bias. So conservatives are not going to like a lot of what their kids learn. Education is a threat to dogma and I really believe that the far right is working to destroy it.

I have issues with the US public school system and would pull my kids out in a second if that were an option. But the core idea is a good one, we just need to tweak the details. The only way to do that is for us to pull together as a country and fix it. This is what some might call socialism :) It might take money (although we already fund them far more per student than most developing nations, so I think there are probably other issues as well). It might require stepping on the toes of local officials and stopping the corporate interests that make supplies and textbooks so expensive and at times insufficient. I am sure there will have to be a higher level of accountability as well. Administrators can fire bad teachers, but it is a multi-step process and a pain in the ass so they don't bother. They need to be held accountable for the quality of their workforce. Little things like that could make a huge difference.

I agree with all of this except that I would not pull my children out in a second. But the last two are graduating next Saturday, so I guess it's a non-issue.

I am so tired of people whining about how bad public schools and public school teachers are. Really? When are we going to start talking about how bad and ineffective so many parents are? As Emmie says,

If you believe in your child's education, you will send them to school rested and fed. You will make them do their homework and encourage them to check out books from the school library. When there are discipline or learning problems, you deal with them proactively and talk to the teachers about how to resolve them. If you remove these factors, the teachers are left babysitting. They just cannot get a whole lot done because they are dealing with feral children who would rather be home watching cartoons.

Some of you would be amazed at how many children come to school completely unprepared to learn, and this is not just limited to poor children. Additionally, parents often don't support teachers' objectives and will not partner with teachers to work toward a positive result. This is the single biggest problem my husband has. Our expectations for our own children were clearly laid out, always. Many parents, however, have no expectations whatsoever, and view any efforts by the teacher to contact them over a concern the teacher has with a child as intrusive. My husband recently had one parent say to him, after trying six weeks to reach her, "Well, if you knew how to do your job, you wouldn't need my help." Excuse me? It's your fucking kid, lady. :evil:

It is not the same as when many of were in school, where you really had to be a little afraid of when the teacher called your folks. Parents will often take their child's side without even knowing the facts or making any effort to know them. Instead of helping their child improve less-than-stellar work habits or inappropriate behavior, it is much simpler to blame the teacher and the school, which is apparently supposed to be raising their kids anyhow.

Yes, there are bad teachers, just like there are subpar people in any profession. Teaching does not have a higher percentage of bad apples than does any other vocation. Most of the teachers I know (and I probably know dozens, if not hundreds) are serious, dedicated professionals who spend more time than most people can imagine to do a good job. I couldn't do it; I know that for damn sure. I'd have throttled some parent long ago.

[She Who Laughs]

Personally I support a voucher system. If schools were forced to compete for funds they would do more to make sure their school attracted students and that they had the most to offer so that parents would enroll their child in their local school rather than take the funds and enroll their child in a private school.

[2xx1xy1JD]

^This.

I run around with a lot of libertarians, and they're all for private forces in education. This is the ONE force I'm fine with in education. Send your kids to *any* public school, anywhere. Because schools will get the hint when droves of students start travelling further away to better ones. Fuck, quite a few kids in my own public high school transferred to other schools if they could--they'd live with relatives in the different school districts.

I'm not sure how this would work in the US, because everyone's so big on "states' rights" here. As always I wonder about kids on state borders. If they're like me and lived in eastern NC where schools are pretty shitty, it would take shit-tons of money to transfer to Virginia where the schools were generally better. I drove 35 minutes each morning to a school with tons of problems thanks to the good ol' boy administrators, when there were FIVE high schools within that radius. Three of which were in Virginia.

You'd probably have more issues going over state lines, because the system isn't under exclusive federal jurisdiction. In plain English - states have a role in funding their own systems and writing their own rules.

Even within cities, though, I see huge differences. Someone attending a good school in a good area will get a very different education than someone in a bad school and bad area - even though it's all at taxpayer expense.

[emmiedahl]

Even within cities, though, I see huge differences. Someone attending a good school in a good area will get a very different education than someone in a bad school and bad area - even though it's all at taxpayer expense.

There is a huge difference in my city. We have two main elementary school districts within the city limits. One is crap, I would not send my child there. We pay a ton more than subsidized housing should cost to live on the other side of town so my kids can have decent schools. People lie, cheat and steal to get their kids out of the other school district. The other side of town has serious social problems that are reflected in the schools--massive gang issues, high crime, a lot of migrant labor, and about half of the children entering kindergarten do not speak English so they have to learn an entirely new language before even getting to ABC's. Everyone talks about the need to clean up that district and there is a lot of administrative turnover because administrators are being held responsible for test scores. There will be no cleaning up the district until we figure out what to do with the gangs and extreme poverty.

Our town has bilingual Head Start so the Latino children learn English comfortably and the white children learn Spanish, which is an essential language to know in my town. But slots are limited, and a lot of parents bristle at the case management aspect of our local Head Start program. They do home visits. They talk to the children about violence and encourage them to report anything untoward that is happening at home. A household of drug dealers will not be sending their child there.

Even within my own district there is a huge difference between schools. A few years ago, I moved from a big house in a great neighborhood to a subsidized apartment about a mile away. The differences between the schools, which are a 15 minute walk from each other, are huge. The school district recently re-drew the lines so that my apartment building and two trailer parks nearby are the only neighborhoods served by our elementary school. The lines dividing which people go to which school are drawn so that you could live in a nice house a block from our school and go to the ritzy one miles away, or you could live in a trailer park next to the ritzy school but be zoned for ours. The rich parents did not want our kids in their school, or their kids in our school.

Now we are a throw-away school and they are trading out our good teachers with the crappy ones from nearby schools. We get hand-me-down equipment from my children's former school. We have a playground from the sixties while every other school in the district has gotten a new one in the last five years. I make do, but it sucks. It is an adequate education, but it really chafes my hide that if I lived in a house and not an apartment, my children would be going to a better school.

Sorry for the unrelated rant. But schools all over the country are doing everything they can to make sure poor people stay poor and it really bugs me.

[FlorenceHamilton]

An education *is* available if you want it. A lot of kids drop out and don't pay a lot of attention in class, but they are refusing an education that is there for the taking. Also, it used to be that an education was viewed as important and valuable by most people. Neither of my maternal grandparents had degrees, but they came from a culture where a university education was something to be honored. That makes a huge difference in how children are educated. If you believe in your child's education, you will send them to school rested and fed. You will make them do their homework and encourage them to check out books from the school library. When there are discipline or learning problems, you deal with them proactively and talk to the teachers about how to resolve them. If you remove these factors, the teachers are left babysitting. They just cannot get a whole lot done because they are dealing with feral children who would rather be home watching cartoons.

I totally agree that a big part of the problem relates to personal respnsibility on the part of the parents. Public education is not an excuse for parental neglect. As we discussed upthread, education continues throughout a person's day. Parents need to be an active and involved component of their children's education. They need to instill respect and value to the pusuit of knowledge, they need to foster curiosity and and a thirst to learn. They also need to teach their children to respect the intitutions of learning and the people with whom they associate. As another poster mentioned, zero tolerance is not the answer to bullying. We need to address both the vistims and the perpetrators (understanding that children often find themselves in both roles). Mutual respect and tolerance is learned more at home than anywhere else.

I think the general disdain for education in the right wing is contributing heavily to the problem. I know middle class people who think school is useless and that the administration is persecuting their child by asking them to sit and learn. It is a common belief. Those kids are being told that educated people are stupid and mean. Also, fact has a liberal bias. So conservatives are not going to like a lot of what their kids learn. Education is a threat to dogma and I really believe that the far right is working to destroy it.

There does seem to be a strong correlation between the increase in the influence of the far religious right and what appears to be a precipitus decline in the quality of the education that children are receiving. While correlation does not prove causation, it is certainly something we need to look more closely at. I find it suspiscious that the far right wing has been vocal about their view that science is a social agenda promulgated by the liberal agenda (See josh duggar's tweets at the amusement park). I find it suspiscious that there has been a push to grow Universities that require the students and faculty to plesdge to not question Biblical ideas. I think that it is interesting that several of these Universities have as part of their mission statements to train young people into politics. I find it curiously upsetting that sayng that a person has a Harvard degree is an insult and uniquely makes them less qualified to be President of the United States.

[dawbs]

Personally I support a voucher system. If schools were forced to compete for funds they would do more to make sure their school attracted students and that they had the most to offer so that parents would enroll their child in their local school rather than take the funds and enroll their child in a private school.

The problem with this, as I see it, is the defunding of some options.

I like the idea of vouchers, but you end up having to make sure that those schools that receive the vouchers have the same expectations.

Ugh, I have migraine-hangover-word fuge today so I know I'm saying this poorly, so let me give an example that perhaps will make more sense? I know better minds than mine have explained it better than I will though.

Ex:

Lets say there are 4 students, Abigail, Betty, Colin, Dee, in a local school .

Betty has special needs and an IEP. Abigail is gifted. Colin and Dee are 'average'.

Under the current system, each student brings $5k(

Because of their different needs, each kid 'costs' different to have stuff for. Betty's education costs $7 k per year. Colin and Dee's educations cost $3.5k per year. Abigail's costs $6k per year.--so $20k--yay for balanced budgets ;) .

Then, someone changes the law and each kid gets to take his/her $5k to their school of choice.

Betty's parents try to go to an awesome school but the local charter schools/private schools say that they won't do an IEP for Betty--because they don't have the resources to provide an aid/special ed teacher. Or they don't have a wheelchair ramp or whatever. So she stays at the local school

Colin can't go to a charter school because they don't provide bussing and his parents have jobs that don't let them take him to school every day. So he stays at the local school.

So their $10k stay at the local school and the cost of educating them is $10.5k. And both of their school experiences are 'hurt' by the fact that there has been a 'brain drain' of the gifted kids out of their school

Abigail and Dee go to the awesome private/charter/choice school (so their combined $10k goes to that school and the 'cost' is $9.5k [actually, it's probably less since they usually cut some costs at these schools, but, for the sake of argument, it stays the same]-so $.5k 'extra profit' for the charter school.).

And both of their experiences are 'hurt' by the fact that their exposure to variety of special needs and socio-economic issues in their classmates is lessened.

I'd like to think that wouldn't happen, but...eh, it sure as heck looks like it.

(where I work, you can apply for which of the gazillion public (non-charter) high-schools to go to. Granted, i work in an extreme area for this, but the fact that I know if a student comes in who came from "X" high-school, he had no math education to speak of and either no one cared [because parents who are involved REALLY try not to let their kids go there] or they were stuck. Which sucks)

[Glass Cowcatcher]

Forcing homosexuality down our throats? In my public school sex ed course, any mention of homosexuality was conspicuously absent. It wasn't condemned or anything, it was just treated as if it didn't exist. But I guess since we didn't get a fire-and-brimstone lecture about it, that constitutes not only tacit approval, but encouragement.

Exactly. Kids at that age may not have settled into a sexual/gender orientation, but they should still hear information that serves THEM, not just straight students. The may not get/get someone pregnant but they still need to hear the STD stuff.

And bullying. I understand that it is serious problem that affects lives but the focus on the victims, never the perpetrators, frustrates me. Too often discussions of bullying propose nothing that can actually be done about the bullying and the conclusion is, "If you don't want your kid to be bullied, take him out of public school."

An excellent point, and I just wrote a paper about this. As noble as initiatives like "It Gets Better" are, they aren't going to change the problem at hand - kids are taught from a young age that force is how you get what you want. And this is a lesson that both victims and perpetrators take to heart - the "fight back" mentality reinforces this. We tell a kid to act tougher to avoid getting beaten up (that we even put the onus on the victim in this is ridiculous) and then we're shocked when he brings a gun to school. That either party sees violence as a solution speaks to a problem with what kids are being taught.

[Austin]

Sorry for the unrelated rant. But schools all over the country are doing everything they can to make sure poor people stay poor and it really bugs me.

I doubt the schools want to keep people poor. One of the problems we have in my state and many states is that schools are supported largely through property taxes, so property values matter. "Rich" school districts (there are sixteen total districts in my county) with high property values generally have money and don't have the social issues. Poorer districts are always in a situation where they're lacking funds and since their property values are low, they don't have near as much money to begin with. There are more social problems associated with higher poverty rates, so the poorer schools have to have more programs to help students, not fewer.

There is been some minor talk about consolidation in our county(which I support) which would do away with this system of haves/have-nots based on geography, but the haves are in no way interested in putting their money in a common pot with the 15 other school districts.

But I will say that some of the most innovative teaching that I know of that's going on right now in our area is actually happening in an urban school. In many situations, regardless of wealth, the education is there for the taking. All of our sons went to a middle school which was in a low socioenconomic area. We live in lily-white-land and we felt strongly that they should have some diversity as part of their education so we made this choice. Some of the best teachers I have ever met are at this school, and the education was definitely there for the taking. When they came back to our suburban high school, they were not in any way behind their peers who had gone to the suburban feeder schools. Test scores are not the most reliable indicator for what's going on in a school.

[emmiedahl]

I don't think it is a conspiracy to keep us poor, I should have been clearer. But when a district is disproportionately putting their resources into the wealthier schools to keep the wealthy parent happy, then the poor children lose.

My kids will get an education wherever they are. They like to learn. But it is annoying to note the differences between our school and the one a mile away. We have a few old metal jungle gyms, they have two huge new playgrounds and are getting an expansion this summer. Stuff like that. It is the same district and our school is about 3x as large, so why do the wealthy schools get all the cool stuff? We are also the only school in our district that has no sports or extracurricular activities. None. The other schools have sports teams, drama, band, things that we don't have.

[pomology]

Why does socialism have to have such a knee jerk reaction in the US? It works pretty well in other countries.

Because socialism = communism; communism = the USSR; the USSR = Stalin; Stalin=Hitler; Hitler=evil

I mean I know that most of those things are not equivalent (except Hitler does equal evil), but I would not be surprised if many in this country did not.

[freejoytoo]

Someone did tell me on here that the reason the Holocaust happened was because of Germany embracing socialism..

[Austin]

I don't think it is a conspiracy to keep us poor, I should have been clearer. But when a district is disproportionately putting their resources into the wealthier schools to keep the wealthy parent happy, then the poor children lose.

My kids will get an education wherever they are. They like to learn. But it is annoying to note the differences between our school and the one a mile away. We have a few old metal jungle gyms, they have two huge new playgrounds and are getting an expansion this summer. Stuff like that. It is the same district and our school is about 3x as large, so why do the wealthy schools get all the cool stuff? We are also the only school in our district that has no sports or extracurricular activities. None. The other schools have sports teams, drama, band, things that we don't have.

I didn't understand that you were talking about disparities within the same district. I'm betting it's similar to what goes on here: the folks that show up to school board meetings and vote (or who are expected to vote) are the ones who drive the train. The disadvantaged middle school I referred to earlier is in the same district with our sons' assigned suburban district, and yes, there are definitely disparities. One reason why there is often better playground equipment and amenities is because many more suburban parents have the time to devote to huge PTA fundraisers and they can raise the needed money for those sorts of items. Poor parents are working to keep body and soul together and don't have the time to be too worried about what the PTA is doing or if their children's playground equipment is old.

We had a huge issue in our district several years back, where the suburban community wanted to pledge money to buy a new scoreboard for the wealthiest high school in our district (we have four; one is relatively wealthy, one is a bit less so, and two are disadvantaged). The district said "no" because of the obvious huge disparity. The community did not take this decision well, as they pretty much don't care what the other schools have or don't have. It's a touchy situation and there are legitimate arguments to be made on both sides of it, but in general, I think the adults in the mix should want things to be as fair as possible for ALL students, not just their suburban speshul snowflakes. And I say that as someone who lives in the suburbs. Needless to say, my opinion was not a popular one (like that's unusual!) :D

[emmiedahl]

Austin, you are definitely right. We have a PTA with fundraisers but it is kind of a joke, especially since they redrew the divisions between the elementary schools. No one in my hood is buying $20 cookie dough! We also had a thing selling $10 rolls of wrapping paper, which also did not go over well.

I never go to school board meetings, so you are probably right about that as well.

[julie paradox]

One of the problems we have in my state and many states is that schools are supported largely through property taxes, so property values matter. "Rich" school districts (there are sixteen total districts in my county) with high property values generally have money and don't have the social issues. Poorer districts are always in a situation where they're lacking funds and since their property values are low, they don't have near as much money to begin with. There are more social problems associated with higher poverty rates, so the poorer schools have to have more programs to help students, not fewer.

Wow. That is fucked up.

(I'm a governor in a primary school that has 25% of its students on free school meals and 35% on the SEN register. I'm not sure we could cope under the situation you describe.)

[emmiedahl]

Wow. That is fucked up.

(I'm a governor in a primary school that has 25% of its students on free school meals and 35% on the SEN register. I'm not sure we could cope under the situation you describe.)

I'm not sure if this is the case in every state, but Washington ensures that all schools get a minimum amount of funding that is adequate. I think it is around $7500-8000 per student per year. Part of the problem is that this goes to the district to distribute and I think it is pretty much at their discretion. Our district gives the wealthier schools more than their fair share. Even if you cut out things that are paid for by PTA. At Neighboring School the children are each assigned a book and at my school the books are kept in boxes in the hall, the teachers bring them in when the class uses them and the entire grade shares. We are a larger school, so that could be the issue. We have 3-4 classes for each grade and the other elementary schools in our district have 1-2, usually one, so sharing is not always possible. I am not positive, but I think at least half of our school gets free meals. Because we are in a wealthy school district, we are not eligible for the benefits given by the state and private foundations to most poor schools, like full day kindergarten and computers and stuff.

My daughter goes to middle school next year and I am looking forward to it. There is only one middle school in the district, so my child will once again be getting the benefits of a healthy PTA and the resources devoted by the district to the rich children they actually care about.

[fakepigtails73]

I think some aspects of public education are very, very broken. On the other hand, if schools are a reflection of the community, then we have way more problems that really need to be addressed.

I went to a school where I was taught to question things and to think critically. Despite Hometown being as conservative as it is, I think I benefited from that. Unfortunately, education is thought to be all about "book learnin'" so even kids in my honors and AP classes got annoyed. It's depressing how common that mindset is-- that education is purely academics and nothing more. That mindset is what leads to books being banned and curricula in all subjects being compromised in favor of religion. If education is simply academics, then the academics should conform to a very specific worldview. I was fortunate that my teachers went off the beaten path, even risking their jobs for it. I was unfortunate that my classmates did adhere to that mindset.

What I find very worrying is the near-worship of Asian countries' school systems. I can see how it appeals to the American work ethic, but they're not perfect either and in a country run by religious wackjobs it would turn out much worse. In China, Japan, etc. education is largely rote memorization and testing, and education isn't for personal gain but for career training. And that's what it's turning into here in the US, or maybe has always been. I just know that a few decades ago, you went to college and majored in whatever you wanted to, because it was for *you*, not your career. Now it's just for job training, and if you're not in the "hard sciences" people will smugly inform you that Starbucks is hiring. I'm not suited for the "hard sciences," but I didn't want to spend any more time in Hometown.

I've had people with no hope of being accepted into college become very smug that they found something they could do with an associate's degree. So the fuck what? I wanted something more. I don't want to just do low-paid shitwork for the rest of my life. Can't I go learn something for the sake of learning? Apparently not, because that's just weird.

I love the part I bolded, as I think it is so true! My high-school average was 80% except for maths which I failed with 30% (!). Thankfully that was in the late-80s when maths weren't mandatory for a high-school diploma. Now in QC one needs advanced grade 11 maths and chemistry + physics to pass...Yup, I've noticed that HS ed. is more and more focused on creating corporate drones than mindful citizens. Chalk this to the worship of Japanese work methods and the rise of China (what works for their kids may not work for kids of occidental cutures); I read that Finland has one of the best education system in Europe. Bureaucrats from the Quebec Dept. of Education went to Turku a few years back to look at it; I wonder if they'll implement parts. Most likely not, as we had a new "ed.reform" in the late 90s which is hated by everybody, students, teachers and principals alike (only the bureaucrats like the reform).

[freejoytoo]

I got told I did a 'Mickey Mouse degree'. I did English Literature!

[jaynie]

I love the part I bolded, as I think it is so true! My high-school average was 80% except for maths which I failed with 30% (!). Thankfully that was in the late-80s when maths weren't mandatory for a high-school diploma. Now in QC one needs advanced grade 11 maths and chemistry + physics to pass...Yup, I've noticed that HS ed. is more and more focused on creating corporate drones than mindful citizens. Chalk this to the worship of Japanese work methods and the rise of China (what works for their kids may not work for kids of occidental cutures).

This kind of attitude towards the sciences is creating a sort of ironic secondary problem, in that a lot of post-secondary science students are very good at memorizing the names of things and using calculators to do math, but absolutely not suited for the sciences at all. I've had teachers complain that they get twice as many students who are completely unenthusiatic about the subject, but think that they will be good at it because they got good grades in school. I've heard fellow students say that they're good at science because they like facts rather than creative thinking, but in fact scientific progress is dependant on creative thinking -- and you don't always get nice, simple facts. By pushing students towards the so-called hard sciences, schools are setting a lot of people up for a fall. Especially since the idea seems to be that you go into sciences to make money, when in reality most of the sciences lead to pretty average middle class jobs.

I read that Finland has one of the best education system in Europe. Bureaucrats from the Quebec Dept. of Education went to Turku a few years back to look at it; I wonder if they'll implement parts. Most likely not, as we had a new "ed.reform" in the late 90s which is hated by everybody, students, teachers and principals alike (only the bureaucrats like the reform).

I think Finland's system is one of the best in the world, and I believe it's ultimately much moredoable in our culture than the work-till-you-drop Asian model. It takes individuality and life satisfaction into account more. The thing that I admire about Finland's system is that it acknowledges the psychology and mental health of the children, not overworking them, giving extra help to those that need it, focusing on cooperation and universal achievement rather than competition. I understand that every country and every culture is different, but I can't understand why there aren't more people demanding that we at least look at why they're doing so well and what we could copy.

[Austin]

I think Finland's system is one of the best in the world, and I believe it's ultimately much moredoable in our culture than the work-till-you-drop Asian model. It takes individuality and life satisfaction into account more. The thing that I admire about Finland's system is that it acknowledges the psychology and mental health of the children, not overworking them, giving extra help to those that need it, focusing on cooperation and universal achievement rather than competition. I understand that every country and every culture is different, but I can't understand why there aren't more people demanding that we at least look at why they're doing so well and what we could copy.

This article sums it up rather nicely, in my view:

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/arc ... s/250564/#

1. The teaching profession is venerated in Finland, is difficult to enter, and requires a high degree of mastery (as it should be).

For Sahlberg what matters is that in Finland all teachers and administrators are given prestige, decent pay, and a lot of responsibility. A master's degree is required to enter the profession, and teacher training programs are among the most selective professional schools in the country. If a teacher is bad, it is the principal's responsibility to notice and deal with it.

2. Every child's education is equally important.

Finland's experience suggests that to win at that game, a country has to prepare not just some of its population well, but all of its population well, for the new economy. To possess some of the best schools in the world might still not be good enough if there are children being left behind.

3. There are no standardized tests in Finland.

For starters, Finland has no standardized tests. The only exception is what's called the National Matriculation Exam, which everyone takes at the end of a voluntary upper-secondary school, roughly the equivalent of American high school.

Instead, the public school system's teachers are trained to assess children in classrooms using independent tests they create themselves. All children receive a report card at the end of each semester, but these reports are based on individualized grading by each teacher. Periodically, the Ministry of Education tracks national progress by testing a few sample groups across a range of different schools.

4. There are no private schools in Finland.

Yet one of the most significant things Sahlberg said passed practically unnoticed. "Oh," he mentioned at one point, "and there are no private schools in Finland."

This notion may seem difficult for an American to digest, but it's true. Only a small number of independent schools exist in Finland, and even they are all publicly financed. None is allowed to charge tuition fees. There are no private universities, either. This means that practically every person in Finland attends public school, whether for pre-K or a Ph.D.

5. There is no school choice.

Finally, in Finland, school choice is noticeably not a priority, nor is engaging the private sector at all. Which brings us back to the silence after Sahlberg's comment at the Dwight School that schools like Dwight don't exist in Finland.

"Here in America," Sahlberg said at the Teachers College, "parents can choose to take their kids to private schools. It's the same idea of a marketplace that applies to, say, shops. Schools are a shop and parents can buy what ever they want. In Finland parents can also choose. But the options are all the same."

Herein lay the real shocker. As Sahlberg continued, his core message emerged, whether or not anyone in his American audience heard it.

Decades ago, when the Finnish school system was badly in need of reform, the goal of the program that Finland instituted, resulting in so much success today, was never excellence. It was equity.

These are just some points from the article. It is too involved to detail them all here. In my view, it is well worth the read and also addresses the homogeneity argument that is often made.

We (the USA) think in fundamentally different ways and value different things than the Finnish. More than anything, those are the reasons why we probably could never have the type of success the Finnish have had.

[freejoytoo]

I love the Scandanavian system. We need more socialism.

[GolightlyGrrl]

I got told I did a 'Mickey Mouse degree'. I did English Literature!

Hey, I got a "Mickey Mouse" degree,too. My BA is in Communications. According to some people who despise Liberal Arts majors my degree is worthless and I should be lit on fire.

[snarkbillie]

lit on fire.

Suddenly caused a mental image of a truck going around collecting books to burn. "COME ONE COME ALL DONATE TO US WE'RE LIT ON FIRE!!!!!!!" I'm weird.

[freejoytoo]

It says a lot when you are less likely to get a job with a university education.

It infuriates me when people tell me my job is worthless. I didn't go to university to get a job and even if I did, that doesn't make studying literature defunct. With my degree I learnt to analyse, study things from different points of view, organise my time and all sorts of other things. Just because I didn't do something 'useful' doesn't make it worthless.

[2xx1xy1JD]

It's worthwhile to look at other school systems, but I don't think that it makes much sense to say that the Asian model should be rejected and the Finnish model adopted,

Both of those systems reflect their societies - and those societies are relatively homogenous. There's a lot more diversity in North America.

Put enough Asian students into a North American school, and you will see results that start to resemble that of an Asian school. In general, the classes will be quieter, the students will be focused and tend to choose math and science, and the families will be very focused on hard work and achievement. [This describes many of the schools in my area, including the ones at which my mom and my best friend teach. From a teacher's POV, it's great.] In the northern part of the school board district, the opposite is true - there's very little immigration, and the families don't place much value on educational achievement.

Article on school performance:

http://www.yorkregion.com/print/1328211

Demographics of township with schools with the lowest rankings:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgina,_ ... mographics

Demographics of the townships with the schools with highest rankings:

Richmond Hill: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richmond_H ... mographics

Markham: http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recen ... ll&Custom=

I also don't know how you can apply a Finnish school model to a very non-Finnish society. You've got far more cultural and economic diversity and disparity in North America. Perhaps Soldevi could weigh in on Finnish society a bit more, but my understanding is that there is far less of a rich/poor gap.