Slashdot Mirror
Bill Gates Proclaims US High Schools Obsolete
bryan sent us a story about Bill Gates' take on US High Schools. He says
'America's high schools are obsolete. By obsolete, I don't just mean that they're broken, flawed or underfunded, though a case could be made for every one of those points. By obsolete, I mean our high schools even when they're working as designed cannot teach all our students what they need to know today.'"
Hey for once Bill Gates and I actually agree. HS was fun and I did enjoy a select few classes but for the most part everything else was a waste of time generally designed to prepare students for the years ahead. Not a bad idea in theory, but for those who are already prepared and are actually interested in learning...HS life can be somewhat lacking.
In my opinion college was even worse. Here I am paying thousands of dollars per semester for the same "I'm a kid, beat on me until I can handle Real Life." stuff. I loaded up 18 credits every semester like an eager naive person only to discover 3 (1 class) of those 18 had any relevance whatsoever to my area of specialization. Once in a while another class would act as a supporting class, but more often than not the rest was just filler designed to keep me busy for a few hours every day. The result? After about 3 years of this I was sick of it...I could barely stomach a fourth. I was tired of seeing my money--earned by working--being spent on some idiot teaching an Economics class who readily admit his sole purpose at that university was to make our lives as difficult as possible and possibly actually teach something relevant to the course.
Looking back, I still feel it was a total waste of money. It made my life so miserable I didn't even have time to stop and enjoy the "college life" that many say makes it all worthwhile. It's my money, I should be able to spend it as I please...not to have someone tell me that I have to waste it on filler courses rather than something of actual use and interest to me.
In the end? I discovered I enjoyed the life of employment much more. All those years of having some teacher/professor telling me how hard life is and how clueless and naive all us students were. Truth be told, I learned most of what I use in the workplace either on the job or on my own. Not to mention I was no longer paying my boss to allow me the privilege to work--I was finally being paid to be there!
As a recent former High School student, I concur. They spent so much time trying to prepare us to take a test, they didn't stop to think that maybe they should prepare us in general, and design a test that would -- test -- us. We seriously had a class everyday that was nothing but practice testing for the FCAT.
Teaching to educate the students became a lesser priority. Teaching what we needed to pass a test so the school could get a good grade, that is what happened -- and still occuring. Out of the day, at least two hours of it is being spent teaching students nothing but what is on a test. Every single day.
I feel like complaining to someone.
Proceed with Format (Y/N)? Y
Unfortunately, it's not just high schools, and not just U.S. We are now in the information age where knowledge is accessible through many more sources than the regular "classroom" setting. The world's education system has not changed much since the Middle Ages, whereas technology has.
Even though the density of Ph.D.'s in Taiwan is much high than the density in the USA, why is the USA a much better place in which to live than Taiwan?
right, if it's good for them it's probably bad for us.
This has been a generally accepted idea for many years. For example, Neil Postman's book "Teaching as a Subversive Activity" advanced the idea back in 1969. He declared that since schools were run by school boards that were responsible to the parents of the schooled kids, and not the kids, schools would always be designed to teach the same things the parents learned, which would by definition already be obsolete.
It's sort of like the old maxims about the military always preparing for the LAST war, and always being unprepared to fight using the methods the NEXT war will require.
I don't see any real solution to the problem. You really can only teach using the methods that presumably worked on the past generation, there's no proven track record for experimental techniques in teaching. I've taken courses in college by teachers developing new methods and the classes were just as likely to be a disaster as a success.
I TAed CS to college undergrads and once I was trying to teach C code for finding factorial to the class (most of them had already completed 75% credits).
There was a pindrop silence and finally one tard managed to ask "what is a factorial?"
This stuff is taught to Indian children in their 6th grade. And they are learning binary number system in 6th grade. And they are going to normal Govt maintained public schools.
HS education in US is a JOKE!
HS is 4 years. However, the educational value is much less than that. I think the average US HS curriculum can be mastered in one year by a bright teenager.
The bottom line is that after sixth grade, there should be three options:
1. Smart kids do a college prep track
2. Dumb kids do a vocational track
3. Troublemakers go to reform school
The first interesting post in this story, that might actually lead to some intelligent discussion... thank you.
Why SHOULDN'T schools train kids to work in factories/IT? (really, I wouldn't differentiate too much between the two).
No matter how much we might dislike it, someone has to work in factories and in all the "low" jobs. The only feasible social hierarchy IS a pyramid; anything else just wouldn't work.
IMO, what makes the difference between a good system and a bad system is how flexible that pyramid is. Something like Brave New World, where your place in the pyramid is determined at birth, is bad. Something where anyone can move up (or down) to the best of their ability is good. The tricky part is defining "the best of their ability"... is it how smart they were born? (and no, all people are NOT born equal). Is it how well their parents planned for their future? Is it how wealthy their parents are?
ClutterMe.com - easiest site creation on the Net. Just click and type.
Yes, but, SHOCK, the money is spent on the people! Thus taxes are merely redistributing the wealth, rather than going to bomb someone else in another part of the world, or paying for someone's pork barrel project that no one will actually use!
That's not exactly how I'd describe being a public high-school teacher (cushy and well-paid?).
"to be drones" is exactly what our public education system is designed to do: fill kids heads with so much trivia masquerading as "knowledge" that they don't see the value in learning any more, so much relativism that they'll settle with the simplest answer anyone gives, and so much "self-esteem" that they don't believe they need to know anything. They get to be highly-suggestive ignorant adults who are satisfied with a ho-hum existence and wouldn't know how to rock the boat if it ever occurred to them to try. It was set up that way to create a complacent citizenry that could be herded like cattle.
(Yes, I'm meaning to exaggerate, but there's some truth to it)
Maybe I went to an incredibly good high school, but I found myself very well prepared (academically) for college. I'll admit that my High School was somewhat known for it's excellence in science ... but the key is it was a public school that anyone in the area could go to and anyone else could test into. We offered a program called International Baccalaureate which is light-years ahead of AP in terms of college preparation.
I agree that the majority of HS are not doing their job ... but there are still some that do. Having programs that are accessible for the motivated student and that challenge them is absolutely key to ensuring that students are able to succeed in college.
From TFA:
The problem here is that, in my own experience, a lot of instructors in public schools today confuse a challenging course that induces critical thinking and development of analytical and practical skills with a course that throws large amounts of busywork at students. I attended 3 high schools, one was Punahou Academy, one was Carlisle High School, and one was Patch High School. The first, being an exclusive private school, also had the most challenging curriculum, and the most creative teachers who. The second had the most busywork, and the least creative teachers. The last had a fair blend of both busywork and critical thinking, but leaned towards the truly challenging side.
These three schools stood at disparate places on the funding scale. Punahou charges a high tuition for their students, and pays their teachers wonderfully, enough to attract even those who hold PhDs. Patch was second on the list, being funded by the Department of Defense for teaching overseas military kids. Their benies were good and their pay-scale was fairly high relative to States-side schools. Carlisle was an underfunded school, where there just wasn't enough money to attract enough teachers who could deal with turning around undermotivated kids.
It's been my experience that there's a high correlation between money available to finance schools and the quality of education. Money and availability of resources attracts motivated people. I'm not saying that the public school systems should be expected to pay out what Punahou does to attract bright teachers, but when garbage-men (sorry, "sanitation engineers") make more than teachers, it's not surprising that a lot of people that end up in public education are undermotivated.
There are lots of other factors that go into schools' quality that money can't solve, but increased money and resources is a good start. Bill apparently appreciates that approach, as well, with his donation of over $700M to the cause.
It's such a fine line between stupid and clever.
Just like many other large corporations, he has set up an out of state entity to handle the actual sales of their products therefore eliminating the tax base that we run our scholls on.
You have to pay to play.
1. The US high school system is so obsessed with its democratic origins that it still strives to treat and educate every child the same. This doesn't work. Essentially, we have a system that imposes a K-12 college preperatory mindset on every student that comes through. By this, I mean that we aim to put every kid through Chemistry, Physics, four years of English, Pre-Calculus, etc. Contrast this approach with many foreign systems that break kids off at the 9th or 10th grade equivalent into the kids who want to be in hard-core academics and the kids who need real vocational training. Don't knock vocational training, either; a good auto mechanic or plumber makes more than I do teaching those "academic classes." This "all equal" mindset has placed us in a position where school districts and communities have essentially had to rig up an equivalent to the foreign system; honors and AP/IB classes that actually challenge and teach the "academic minded" ones, and regulars classes that are lax enough to allow the kids through who ordinarily wouldn't ever sit in a chemistry class.
Please don't take my comments up there to imply that everyone should be hard focused on only the courses needed for what they plan to "do." As an English teacher who pushed all the way through Calculus, non-trivial Biology, and some CS courses at the Uni, I appreciate the idea of learning for learning's sake. I also recognize that there are huge amounts of people out there who don't.
2) We've gotten "dumber." This is where the root of most of our problems begin. Go look at an application for any university. They have a section where they state their minimum SAT requirements for admission. For a University that has set their minimum requirement at 1100 (for example), there will be a fine print that reads, "or 1030 for tests prior to 1994." Why? Well, the ideal for the SAT is that the average score is 1000. Unfortunately, around the late 80's and early 90's, the scores started declining more than a normal deviation could account for. The average was closer to 920. So the SAT was made "easier." Somewhere between the 70's and the 90's, we all collectively lost an intelligence level that our prior generation had.
I see it all day long in the school system. Homework is a lesser priority; I can't even assign an out-of-class reading, because it won't get done and my lesson the next day will be worthless. Academic journals targetted at teachers have articles on how to create alternatives to homework that will actually get done, which is something I highly doubt they broached in the 70's. Standards have to be lowered; if I were to fail the number of kids who really need to fail, I'd be out of a job. And don't even get me started on the priority athletics and similar extracurriculars take over academics, or the paltry sum (and respect) given to educators in this country.
Take your normal standardized test complaint. Yes, they take away from class time. Yes, I use learning time to prep for these things. But they aren't really all that difficult, and it's hard to argue against any claim that they cover things you should already have discussed in the classroom (in most cases). I have no doubt that a 1970's era classroom, poor or no, could tackle an English or Math standardized exam with less preparation than an '05 classroom would need, and still score better. We really are "dumber" than the prior generation (I say "we" here because I am part of this group).
There are hundreds of theories on why this is the case. I'm not going to pretend that I can explain any of them. Parental involvement is lower with the severe proliferation of two-income households. The burgeoning American obsession with consumer debt both drives the previous issue and misleads students into thinking that a $25K/year job in their late 20's will allow them to have an Escalade and a nice house. The disrespect of education and school in general is an ingrained part of our culture. We are one of the few school systems worlwide t
But BG is right. High Schools (all public schools really, and not just in the US) were designed around the concept of a socialist industrial society (which thankfully never fully materialized in this country). It was a blatant attempt by wealthy industrialists at the turn of the century to remake American culture into something that would better benefit them. A lot of damage has been done to our culture as a direct result of this system of education.
I would go one step further than Bill Gates and say that when our school systems are functioning perfectly as designed, they actually prevent education rather than enable it. Any kid who learns anything during their time in a public school does so IN SPITE of the school system, not because of it.
I disagree however that all high schools should be preparing their students for college. College is not the only choice and college students are not the only people this country needs. I hate to break the cold hard reality to Gates et al that we do still need industry. We do still need service workers (lots of them since our culture and economy are practically built on the service industries).
I'd like to see a slight resurgence in vocational schooling as well as schools that better prepare students for further education. We need both of these things, and neither of these needs are being met by the current system.
I'd also completely disagree with those posters who think we should be careful when moving forward with these changes. I think we should be radical. I think we should be a little reckless. Let different states try different things. Let people experiment. Throw the old system out into the trash violently and let chaos reign for a short while. Let evolution decide which system works the best. We've been so conservative and frightened of change for so long now, that our students are struggling to learn anything. Taking things slow and being safe has gotten us into this mess.
It's time for the NEA to be shut out of the discussion. It's time for the current system to die, immediately. The cost of taking this slow and safe is much much higher than the cost of rapid change. Our kids are already stuck in a worthless system. Protecting it won't do them any good. Throw it out and be reckless for a while. The best ideas in education will rise out of the wild experiments, and things will settle down after a while as those ideas start to spread and take over.
It's time to take a risk, because not taking a risk will end up being the same as not doing anything at all.
I know this will sound like an advertisement. But if you are a parent, you MUST read some of Mel Levine's work. He's a pediatrician whose sole work is to encourage and teach children how to maximize their learning based on their aptitude. If I can explain the gist of his beliefs, he believes the school systems today are too reliant on performance based on standardized tests; parents are too hung up on "college prep" when they should be stuck on teaching their children "life prep;" and there is no such thing as "well-roundedness" (by packing a child's schedule with unneeded even detrimental extracurricular activities) and he labels it "mental obesity."
Each child is wired differently and it's the schools job to identify how the child is wired and to approach their teaching according to how the child learns, rather than sticking with the current monolithic system that essentially espouses the "one size fits all" model. As a parent it is imperative that you learn how your child learns and foster that. He believes that the current system is one of the reasons why there are so many children returning home from college, "living in the basement," with nary an idea of what to do with their lives or what steps to take next because all their lives, decisions were made for them.
One thing that he advocates quite vocally is that children should read more biographies. His reasoning is that if they are interested in a certain field, biographies give a glimpse of the "untold" aspects of the career that is often overlooked, like office politics and the social involvements required in certain careers.
His two most popular books:
A Mind at a Time
Ready or Not, Here Life Comes
You can also learn more about his organization All Kinds of Minds online.
Also, for a quick "intro" of his program, you can hear an online interview with him by Susan Page at the Diane Rehm Show. He talks about everything from the current school system to the increasing diagnoses of ADHD among children.
Linux at home
Quoted by rueger: 'The most blunt assessment came from Microsoft chief Bill Gates, who has put more than $700 million into reducing the size of high school classes through the foundation formed by him and his wife, Melinda. He said high schools must be redesigned to prepare every student for college....'
It's comforting (and simultaneously disheartening) to see that old Bill is talking out of the same fallacious American trap so many people spend their whole lives operating under. Namely, it's the 'college as end-sought' theory, where parents spend their whole lives pushing little Timmy to 'go to college' without (in many cases) considering what it MEANS to go to college and more importantly, that all colleges are not equal. Combine that with the fact that a substantial portion of graduates are majoring in 'business' (I got my info from Paul Fussell and will dig it up if you all really need it) and you end up with a country that regards college as some categorical end-all be-all without noting that Oral Roberts University is not providing the same education as the University of Pennsylvania. Trade schools are getting promoted to the level of 'universities' by the expedient method of having a name change and eventually the more nebulous and esoteric 'majors' of classics, history and physics will keep being replaced by generations of business and 'administration' majors. So what kind of college does Bill want to prepare children for? Saying 'college' doesn't mean a whole lot.
High schools are not obsolete. They're not efficient or full of advanced learning, but every student I've known who wanted either of those things found a way to get it elsewhere (other programs or simply with the weight of their own interest.) People work up to the level of their interest, kids no different than adults. Most of them learn how to run in a crowd figure out what other people think, get places on time (theoretically), do what they need to get by, and they keep doing it for the rest of their lives. I think it should be about more than that, but for that you'd have to change not only school, but the character of students.
'Sparrow.'
Probably the worst thing about High School is that it barely resembles the "real world" at all. Only the most bureaucratic corporations resort to standardized testing for employees. Only the most inane HR departments think a degree is worth more than years of work experience. Yet, our schools drive these terrible things right into the skulls of our kids.
Why are kids so stressed out about the SAT and going to college? Because we make them that way!
Quite honestly, telling an average kid that going to college will make them more successful is a lie. Pay-wise, they can easily do better with a two-year degree. Family-wise, they'll probably be better off not being so career driven, anyway, so that their own kids will be better adjusted about what success really is.
-- Microsoft is the most expensive commodity operating system and office suite vendor in the marketplace.
I was never a good student. I hated school up until college. During junior high I would not to assignments on a regular basis, I was a standard rebel. I graduated junior high with a 68 average.
High school came along and it was more of the same. I failed chemistry, two math classes, four english classes, I was a wreck. I didn't even plan on going to college because the plan was that I would take over my fathers computer business after high school. I Didn't take the PSAT, I didn't take the SAT, and it was my senior year.
I found out about some local colleges that didn't require SAT scores for admission. I looked at some local technical schools. I then found out about the SUNY technical school chain, which opened my eyes. I could go away to an upstate college that didn't require SATs or anything. (I managed to get accepted based on my resume and references, not my high school transcript)
My senior year I worked quite alot to try and get my grade up. My average up until then was 74. My average in my senior year was 98. Even though I failed seven classes and never went to summer school I still graduated on time and I had a reduced schedule in my last year as well. Somehow in my last year I had three classes, I was back home by 10am every day.
I graduated college with a 3.5. I don't attribute my success in college to anything I ever learned in high school. High school was a complete waste for me. I could have skipped high school completely and dropped out as a freshman, got a GED and went off to college and probably would still be doing what I'm doing right now (which is owning/running a highly successful business)
The goal of computer science is to build something that will last at least until we've finished building it.
Bill, before offering half baked solutions to the "education problem" try to think of one that takes all of these people into consideration.
But you can't have one school that works for everyone. You'd have to have two different kinds of high schools - a vocational one and a prep school. Other countries do this all the time, maybe the U.S. should give it a try.
"For a University that has set their minimum requirement at 1100 (for example), there will be a fine print that reads, "or 1030 for tests prior to 1994.""
That's interesting. As someone who graduated in the 70's, I took the SAT's and scored about 1225...which was 3rd highest in the school. The highest was 1275, and the girl was really really smart. The average kids were getting 900-1000.
Today, I see kids that I consider pretty average getting 1300-1400.
I'd put it down to better test preparation, but I never really thought too hard about it.
Now the funny part is despite all that, despite a complete lack of "computer education" in high school, I don't seem to have a problem with new technologies.
Of course, back in my day, about 1/2 the kids had what we called "vo-tech". Unless you really were college material (less than 30% of the class), you were pushed towards vo-tech or business.
Today, everybody is college material? And we wonder why college tuition is increasing? Too much demand from the looks of it.
That's actually a myth, Canadian taxes aren't much higher than US taxes. Once you aggregate all of the various taxes we have here in the US (Federal income tax, FICA, Medicare, State income tax, State sales tax), you won't see much of a difference... we just spread out the pain, so it's less visible.
Besides, you're very naieve if you think that the current tax rates here in the US are suatainable. All that debt we're racking up will have to be paid back, either by raising taxes, or printing money (which leads to inflation, lowering your purchasing power, effectively a tax). Things will only get better as the boomers begin to retire- the social security and medicate liabilities ammount to the GDP of the entire WORLD.
Oy vei, it's not even that your facts are all wrong (in Canada there are multi-tier school systems, private schools, religious schools, etc,) it's that you believe that a 1 tier system for anything is good.
Ouch. The health system is 1 tier? Yeah, for those who can't afford the better tier, the tier where you go to the States or to Europe (as I see preference for,) and pay, and get things done faster, better. It's not even about dental (my father just came back from Ukraine, where they fixed 16 teeth with transplants etc for a mere 1500CAD,) it's about any serious procedure. Germany is the place to be, not Canada, where you can wait for months to see a specialist. What a joke 1-tier system it is.
1-Tier school system? For those who cannot afford a better tier that is. In our public schools here kids don't do anything and they don't want to do anything of value there either. Well maybe because nothing of value is offered.
You can't handle the truth.
I am an american but grew up in Europe. The educational system I was in is (or was at least) very specialized.
Despite a number of flaws, it worked very well, because the people who wanted to study hard were tracked into challenging, competitive/selective, and demanding curicula. We had mostly technical classes (lots of math, physics, chemistry, engineering), but also some foreign languages, history, geography. litterature.
The most important aspect of my section was that everyone took it vey seriously (students, professors), and while we had fun too, we worked really hard. I guess the main point is that because it was competitive/selective, we *wanted* to be there, those that didn't... left. Having gone on to get a PhD in Physics and an MS in CS (uiuc.edu), I can still honestly say that I worked harder in HS than at any other time in my life... and loved it. We viewed ourselves as professionals and for the most part enjoyed the experience (math/science really can be lots of fun!).
This is probably not for everyone. Some people, for a variety of reasons, are uninterested (or unable) to pursue that kind of education (by which I mean serious, intense and academic, not only scientific), which is fine. Those people should be provided useful ways to pursue some other kind of education, be it a "less intense/focused" track or a "tradesman" track. We need poets and airplane mechanics too. Those are no less valid choices or careers.
My best friend was one such person who, while not in the least bit dumb, was not interested in lots of math/physics. He chose to go into a metallurgy track, and came out at 18 being a highly-skilled metallurgist/machinist. His was hardly a wasted HS experience, quite the opposite. He knew things about metal and could do things with it that were quite amazing. He knew substantially more about metals than I did as a "science/engineering" student.
If I recall correctly, in both the US and there, about 50% of students actually graduate with an "academic" degree. In the US though, that degree represents a lot less actual usable knowledge, and the other 50% are simply left to twist in the wind. Think about the cost of discarding (or under-utilizing) the potential of half of your population.
So I guess my point is that tracking is good, if done right:
1) Give some general-ed classes to everyone, but allow them to pursue their interests.
2) Make it as demanding/competitive as possible,
3) Don't toss out people who don't have an interest in purely academic pursuits, or can't make it there, they deserve a good education also.
Whatever happened to learning for learning's sake?
There is no such thing as learning for learning's sake. Every bit of education is merely a means to an end. Eduction is never the end.
Don't believe it? Answer the question: what is the use of learning merely for learning's sake?
A: Because you'll be an educated person!
Q: So what? What does that get me?
A: You'll get to be in society's elite!
Q: So then learning is a means to an end -- a means to get into a higher class in society?
A: No, that's not it! Learning is good in and of itself!
Q: Why?
A: You'll have a greater understanding of the world!
Q: And what does that get me?
A: You'll be able to talk more authoritively on subjects of science, history, and politics!
Q: So then learning is a means to an end -- a means to get into a higher class in society? Being able to "talk with more authority" merely means that I'll be able to hold my own in "higher" conversations with "more important" people, right?
A: No, that's not it! Learning is good in and of itself!
Q: Why?
A: Sinks to invective, talks about me being "anti-education."
I don't make the rules. I just make fun of them.
I do have a serious grudge with the education system. Everything useful I learned, I learned on my own, or in college. Mostly on my own. School was of very little help. It was mostly about power, authority, and the abuse thereof. Learning anything else took a back seat to those important lessons.
Maybe you were someone who 'played the game' and lived with the system. I couldn't stand it, and bucked the system from the time I was in kindergarten. I can count the number of times I destroyed property, hurt other students or disrupted classrooms on the fingers of one hand.
I just didn't play the game. I didn't value the things I was supposed to value. I didn't think the things that were supposed to be fun were fun. I didn't care about the approval of teachers, I cared about learning things.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
I think that social systems like software are best improved incrimentally and by as little as possible in order to make the system work.
Our public school system is obsolete and dates from a time when we were an industrial economy. In this environment, a high-school education was important, but the difference between an indistrial labor and a higher-paying management job was usually a matter of education. In this context things like encouraging high-school graduation and affirmative action made a lot of sense.
However, our economy no longer makes a division between industrial labor and management based on a level of education (there are a few industries which are exceptions). And one cannot earn a livable wage on a high-school diploma. The industrial jobs have largely left the country and we have low-paying menial service jobs and high paying information jobs (including management). In order to give everyone a chance at escaping poverty, we need to make sure that everyone has full access to a college education.
So rather than trying to redesign our high-school system, lets focus on making our college system more accessible to those of limited means. We cannot create a public school system which will teach people enough to really be able to do well in todays world by the time they are 18. We need to push that back to 22 and the BA/BS. The vision needs to be one where every American can afford a debt-free BA or BS.
Our education system must produce thoughtful and contemplative adults. I think there are a lot of people that just want universities to crank out trained worker bees at age 22.
I completely agree with you. I always tell people that it is better to get a degree in a field you love than study what you think might make you money. In the end, the former approach will give you many more skills which will in the end make you more successful even if HR departments are clueless (which they often are when you don't have a degree in the field they want you to have).
The economy has changed. We are now largely a knowledge and service-based economy with manufacturing and other sectors in slow decline. To be successful we need independent thinkers who can contribute ideas.
I studied very little computer science in college. Instead, I devoted the majority of my effort into studying history. As time went on, I took up philosophy and computer science as hobbies. I now do IT and programming for a living. Because HR departments want worker bees usually I work as a consultant, and my work speaks for itself. Indeed I credit much of my success to the fact that I have studied what I found interesting and developed strong critical thinking skills in the field.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
I recently saw this article on the American education system and its fallacies. It's very interesting and I think everyone should take a look at it, it's long so stick with it. I completely agree with it:
http://paulgraham.com/nerds.html
Sexual intercourse is kicking death in the ass while singing. ~Charles Bukowski
My two cents...
For me college is nothing more than a money-sucking machine. I am just one of its many cogs. As a freshman in college studying Computer Science, who has/is taken/taking 3xx-4xx CS courses, I find college to be a complete waste of my time. Correction - I find the "gened" classes to me a complete waste of my time. I think I better explain myself.
I love my CS classes. They are interesting, exciting and at my level (3xx-4xx courses) are quite challenging. I love my mathematics classes (currently taking 3xx level mathematics course in Linear Algebra). What I _don't_ like is being forced to waste my time every day doing assignments for fluff classes that I can't avoid. Look - there is nothing wrong with making sure you can still form coherent sentences. However, having 5-6 10-page assignments is pushing the boat a bit, considering I am NOT aiming for an English major, m'kay? Next - social sciences. Many of you will naturally respond in a condescending tone that 'these course will expand your mind.' I call bullshit. Having reviewed the course catalog, I have seen nothing of worth to expand my mind with. The list of courses from which I have to pick ranges from "Psych 101" to "feminism study." I think I can live without any of this shit. If only the courses offered actually EXPANDED my horizons by allowing me to indulge in say... Norse mythology or history of Astronomy, or an in-depth analysis of Dante's Inferno, OR A STUDY OF A FOREIGN LANGUAGE. But no. Study of a foreign culture's language is not a viable option for fulfilling the "cultural development" requirement of graduation, yet studying the plight of [insert-favorite-oppressed-group] is. A non sequitur at its finest.
To repeat a point already addressed by others in this discussion, I should state that I am PAYING these sons-of-a-bitches to waste my time and make my life miserable. This is coming out of my own pocket. I see the value of having a broad education, but "study of feminism and gender issues" and other similar redundant crap is NOT going to expand my mind. The classes that will give me a broad outlook on life - such as study of foreign languages (and I mean _study_, not the cursory, slanted and biased overview of some miniscule topic pertaining to some culture), mathematics (the Lin. Alg. course I am taking is not part of my fard. requirement, and thus is for my own enlightment only), history of major cultures in the past millenia and not of some minor occurance within the past 25 years, etc.
What the hell happened to the "trivium" and the "quadrivium" - the REAL liberal arts, as opposed to the crap forced down our throats that will simply make us clueless cogs, ready to be exploited by the system, instead of thinking sensible adults??
When I was in elementary school (DODDS [Department of Defense Dependant Schooling]), we didn't have enough students to spread them out evenly for all of the grades. Twice, I was placed into a mixed-year class.
For some things, the whole class interacted with each other (reading time, recess, etc). But for much of the day, the teacher would teach one grade, while the other group did their classwork assignments. That time might've been otherwise been used by the teacher to grade papers -- but she didn't grade quizzes, tests, homework, or classwork -- the class did.
She would collect up all of our work, mix them up, and hand them back to the class, and give us red pens. If anyone got their own page, we had to trade with whoever was next to us. She'd read out the answers, and we'd mark them, and sign our name as the grader. She'd collect them, and do spot checks to make sure we didn't mess up. [someone could also complain if they were unfairly marked].
Now, in today's high schools, there are chances at people cheating -- spot checks can help, and if you find something was consistently boosting grades, you have it impact their grade negatively. Some folks might complain that kids might make fun of the others who don't get high grades -- yes, there's that chance [we actually had the opposite -- I remember getting teased for getting good grades], but there's also the possibility that if there isn't so much anomynity that kids will have reason to work harder.
I admit, this won't work for essay questions and longer reports, but there is no reason for teachers to be taking home stacks of papers to grade every night. Sure, they might mean well, and be dedicated to their job, but it's like anything -- work smarter, not harder.
I admit, I'm not a teacher, but I do have a few friends who are teachers, and occassionally drop by my highschool, more than 10 years later. [I actually gave a talk, when I accidentally dropped in on the day they were covering 'The Internet' and 'Search Engines'] -- it seems to me that the problem isn't so much the size, but problems with such a heterogeneous mix of students. Some students are solitary learners, some learn by example, some are very visual, some like story context, and some have to learn by doing.
It might be possible to take the same idea above (more than one 'class', but instead of seperating by age -- seperate by learning style. [I'm not sure which would be easier to handle, and this would probably need some tests run to validate the idea]
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
Imagine if we ever taught students to actually think about history, literature, or economics rather than making sure that they memorized the answers for the test?
What if we really encouraged students to ask the primary questions of philosophy before introducing them to the ideas of philosophers:
Metaphysics: "What is the nature of things?"
Aesthetics: "What is the nature of Beauty?"
Ethics: "What is the nature of Good?"
In essence what if we really taught our students to think rather than to be good test-passing machines?
What if we actually had professionals come in and explain to algegra classes why algebra is so useful and how they use it? And what if we told more young women about the likes of Grace Hopper and Augusta Ada Byron? Would we not inspire children to learn more about the world around them?
My son is now 14 months old, and I keep thinking more and more about how to prepare for his eventual schooling and make sure he can think and approach matters of substance.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
I have several friends that have been a year in the US, studying at a high school (yes, the foreign exchange students that always seem senile in the hollywood movies,) and even the ones that I would hardly classify as "smart", "clever" or "hard-working" got very good grades. They also said that nearly all tests were multiple choice, opposed to the tests here in Denmark, where we usually have to write long explanations.
Now, don't flame me if I'm wrong. After all, I've never studied at a US high school myself. But is any of this actually true?
The actual problem with schools are that they are not focusing enough on the core needs upon which all education rests.
Personally, I think that schools should teach only three things; Language, Mathematics, and Discipline.
With language, all knowledge is merely a library away, and communication will be a lot easier than it is for a good number of people.
With mathematics, just about anything can be quantified.
With discipline, a person can successfully organize the above two skills into a weapon with which to attack their future.
Once the schools finish with those three very important skills, the student can then begin the process of building the rest of their own education. Higher learning can still be available, but they should be optional and specialized based on what the student is interested in learning, rather than forcing the student to learn their way.
The Penguin Producer
"Gates is absolutely right. I found that out in my first college year."
I went through a similar thing myself, but I have one thing to amend Gates' assertion about. high schools aren't obsolete, schools are obsolete, but it's because of money.
The district that I work for splits elementary kids into three groups, with two of these groups being the majority. These are normal learners, slow learners, and gifted learners. Most of the kids are in the normal category, a measurable chunk are in the slow category, and a very small number are in the gifted category. Schools are not supposed to have more than 9% of their students in special education. They're probably not supposed to have more than that in the gifted programs either. This means that they're supposed to have at least 82% of students in common curriculum, even if the student excels beyond the class or struggles, but not struggles to the point of qualifying for intervention. This leaves kids at both ends of the spectrum of normal not getting the education that they are truly capable of.
If I were the all-powerful person in charge of everything, I'd split groups up a lot more distinctly, and by subject. I'd have four or five levels, with the current normal range being three distinct levels. There would be extremely bright, "I have to learn this for one day and then I have it down pat" kids, "Give me a compressed unit and I'll have it perfect" kids, "Teach me at the previous normal pace and I'll have it" kids, "Give it to me with more basics and combine it with other exercises to reinforce it" kids, and "I need special assistance because I'm not able to keep up" kids. Broken down by subject, a student would be kept in with a smaller peer group for each subject, and the pace of learning could let the student reach to their potential, rather than being held back because they're just sitting there.
This costs money. This requires home support. Where I work, both are strongly lacking. We get $5,600 per kid per year to teach them, and that has to pay for everything from the classroom teacher to the new tires for the lawnmower.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
But in Bill's defense, he did three years at Harvard, which is a much better education than you'd get by graduating from most other schools.
That is such a misnomer. I was part of a team in college that went to a national database compition where the studens were anywhere from small-private schools to large state ones and Harvard was by far the worst. The cost of tuition and mystique of Harvard has much more to do with the connections you make and thereby, it opens alot doors for you. The in class education is by no means extraordinary.
It's true taxes are higher in Canada, but for most people -- the middle class -- they're not that different. And while you may get taxed in one area you might make out better in others -- such as unlimited capital gains exemption on your primary residence, vs. $250/500k in the US.
Cost of living is generally lower too, especially in the cities. Vancouver may be expensive, but it's more affordable for its citizens than NYC, DC, SF, or "the OC" are for theirs. I'm always amazed at how many young (30) Vancouverites with average jobs I meet who own their own houses and condos. In any major metro area in the US nowadays, this is limited to the extremely successful or the already rich.
Higher taxes or not, I believe Canadians actually have a higher standard of living than Americans -- even if the standard measures don't show it. The real challenge for most Americans in Canada would not be taxes, but long, cold, dark winters.
I went to a school that serves the communities around montpelier, VT. It was started in the 1970s when the HS in Montpellier was becoming overcrowded. A community planning board came up with numerous "out of the box" ideas.
Students address teachers by their first name. There were no interior walls so adjacent classrooms could be joined together to work on inter-disclipinary lessons. No grades. No penalty for missing classes - you want to learn, you go to class, just like college. No bells - the passing of Bands (bands of time) is marked by music. No study halls - Students spend free bands in the student lounge or in the library or in outside areas of the campus. No homeroom - every morning the first place we went was our Teacher advisor group; a mentor who guided you through your career at u-32 and was your advocate if you ever were in trouble or had a scheduling problem, basically a virtual parent. No prepackaged AP curriculem.
Not all these rules were still in effect when I went there in the 90s. We had grades and penalties for missing classes. And some more permanent walls had been built. But the rest remained, a unique public school.
What is harder to give a sense of is a faculty that generally loved teaching and the classesd they were teaching. Perhaps this is because the original faculty was recruited from all across the USA, not just the local towns. There was no pre-determined plan for what students chose to learn. After freshman year, which was fairly regimented, you got to choose your path. I took Public Speaking, Humanities, Film as Literature, Future literature, Journalism and Advanced Expository Writing. These were not the only options, and the same was true for History, Math and Science depts.
As an artist I also was blessed to have more art electives to choose from than anyone could have time for, and this was not unique to the visual arts department.
It would be easy to write this off as some hippy school in Vermont that would not work anywhere else, but I don't think that's true. Teachers who are passionate about what they teach and are given enough leeway to create exciting curriculums can give a meaningful public school education. Young adults can act like adults if they are treated like them. Teachers who interested in a subject can teach it just as well as they can teach their college major. As many other posters have mentioned, there is more to an education than preparing yourself to work at a corporation, or even to go on to higher education. (For the interest of full disclosure, my mother is an english teacher in middle-school and I had the unique experience of knowing many of my teachers inside and outside the classroom. Believe me I did not get any special treatment in class for this.)