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SAS CEO Blasts Old-School Schooling
theodp writes "What does SAS CEO Dr. Jim Goodnight have in common with 47% of high school dropouts? A belief that school is boring. Marking the 50th anniversary of Sputnik with a call for renewed emphasis on science and technology in America's schools, Goodnight finds today's kids ill-served by old-school schooling: 'Today's generation of kids is the most technology savvy group that this country has ever produced. They are born with an iPod in one hand and a cell phone in another. They're text messaging, e-mailing, instant messaging. They're on MySpace, YouTube & Google. They've got Nintendo Wiis, Game Boys, PlayStations. Their world is one of total interactivity. They're in constant communication with each other, but when they go to school, they are told to leave those 'toys' at home. They're not to be used in school. Instead, the system continues teaching as if these kids belong to the last century, by standing in front of a blackboard.'"
Just because some kid has an ipod and a cellphone doesn't mean they're a genius when it comes to technology. An ipod is easy enough for an idiot to use, it's not a badge of honor to be able to use one.
Standing in front of a blackboard and addressing the students orally is an excellent method of education.
And interactive, for that matter.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
In the olden days, would you have let them bring cribbage boards and cards into the classroom? Get a grip. They're fancier toys, but still toys.
we will end no whine before its time
Part --- not all, but part --- of the reason for more kids sucking in school is that when they go home, they've got all these gadgets that put them on a continuous reinforcement schedule. They get IMMEDIATE reinforcement on every click of the mouse, every push of a button, every touch of the stylus.
It's been a while since I took Ed Psych, so I can't use too many more big behavior-analysis words, but when you saturate children with immediate reinforcement and then drop them into a classroom, it's pretty obvious that a good percentage of them will become zombie children. Human teachers just can't provide the reinforcement schedule that they've become accustomed to.
The United States of America: We do what we must because we can.
OK, it's a generalization, just like his generalization. I hate the notion that "technology savvy" means "knows how to operate a user interface designed to be easy to operate". Yes, I'm an old fart (38), and grumpy. Regardless, my 4-year-old is proficient with a web browser. He is by no means tech savvy, and he learns more about real technology by interacting with a tricycle or bionicles than he does by playing some Flash game.
That said, I agree school sucks. It sucked when I was in school ("good" public schools in the 70's & 80's) and I hear it sucks worse now. I don't particularly see what text messaging can do to improve on the suckiness.
I certainly didn't like high school, but I don't remember being inflicted by boredom as much as frustration and annoyance. I never really understood why so many people called school "boring" until I started my first ever job teaching last year. I taught Arabic at a popular university in California, mostly to freshman and sophomores. Even in that rarefied atmosphere of over-achievers volunteering for a tough course, the difference between the top students and the bottom students (we were supposed to say they had "less capacity", as though they were hard drives) was vast indeed. So the problem wasn't teaching in and of itself, although that is a hard job and my hat goes off to people who actually make a career of it. No, the trouble for me was trying to teach to a bell curve of ability.
If I left no student behind and pitched to the slower students, then I would have completely alienated the average and gifted ones. If I pitched to the gifted ones, then 80% of the class would have felt left out. If I drove down the middle of the fairway, then both ends of the curve would be, well, bored.
So when I read this SAS guy's comment about how advanced these students are these days, with their MySpace and iPods and cell phones, I don't buy into the connection between their "cyber-lifestyle" and their educational ennui. I think a typical classroom with typical chalk and a typical board can be plenty stimulating in whatever topic, provided it's tuned to the students' ability levels. But if you are going to insist that everyone in the class is equally able to absorb the material just because they all somehow ended up in the same room together, then you are probably going to have a chunk of students tune out because they're too far behind, and a chunk tune out because they're too far ahead. It would not surprise me if those two groups together would add up to about 47%.
Think about what you know, and how much of it you got in school.
One of the biggest problems with schools in the USA is that they do not reward learning, they reward docility.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
... though not what he thinks.
He outlined the problem with the *kids*, NOT the problem with schools. Perhaps if the kids didn't have access to all those toys they'd have an attention span beyond that of a chronically depressed lemming and actually be able to learn something while in class.
I wonder if he has ever taught a class.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
I'm an freshman at MIT, taking a physics course (8.01 classical mechanics) that is supposed to use technology to the fullest: radio frequency response cards, computer for every third person, full integration with experiments, video feeds from the professor's desk to screens all around the room, online extra homework assignments, etc, but undergrads pretty much all agree that IT SUCKS. Interaction is far lower, the professors are tempted to stuff absurd numbers of meaningless assignments into the syllabus since they no longer need to grade them by hand, and the end result is that learning physics has become a lot harder than it needs to be. A lot of my friends have moved up to 8.012, not because it is a harder class, but because they have -normal- lecture and recitation sessions, which makes all the difference. We may like flashy technology a lot, but right now it isn't an improvement over what we have. The 'blackboard' style of teaching goes back 2000+ years for a reason.
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Prior to iPods, mobile phones, Facebook, etc. etc., were the youth of the day just standing around bored with their hands in their pockets any more than they do today?
When I was a teenager 25-30 years ago, I read a lot, built models, did a lot of home electronics, a bit of woodwork and started programming on some of the first home computer systems - and I'd argue that I'm more technically savvy than most of the youngsters today because I learnt to build stuff from scratch so much, whether software, some wooden shelves or an electronic gizmo.
An iPod is a portable music player like a Walkman was 15 years ago, Facebook is just an extension of writing and meeting pen-friends 20 or more years ago.
If anything the modern "have it all now" youngsters have lost such qualities as patience and long attention spans.
I did well at school because I DAMN WELL GOT SOME COMMON SENSE AND BUCKLED DOWN TO DOING SOME BLOODY WORK!!!!
Remind me - HOW MANY KIDS WITH DYSLEXIA AND ADHD WERE THERE 25 YEARS AGO???
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
Dr. Goodnight was a statistics professor at NCSU before he started SAS. Yeah, he's taught a class.
Go read the historical reasons why school really sucks
That book explains everything you need to know about the education system, why it is so fucked and yes, why it is boring, what it really is supposed to do and how it is doing Just That Real Well.
Making laws based on opinions that stem up from false informations leads to witch hunts.
Dr. Goodnight is also the de-facto CEO of Cary, NC, a well-to-do suburb of Raleigh. He attempts to rule the place with a velvet-clad iron fist, much like David Packard tries to dictate terms to Palo Alto, CA. As a result, all the new development in Cary (and there is a lot of it) tends to resemble the set of either "The Stepford Wives" or "The Truman Show". (I know, I lived there for 13 years.) Thus Dr. Jim has the occasional delusion of God-like powers within the town limits.
To his credit, he also started Cary Academy, a boarding school with a very intense math and science curriculum. (I think it's K-12, not sure, but I do know that SAS employees get a break on the tuition.) But I'm convinced his insights are marred by the bias of the student population he's observed there: motivated, intelligent kids with affluent parents.
He only needs to venture a few miles west to Granville County, NC to see what the rest of the student population looks like: neglectful parents who have never known the value of an education, and who are barely scraping by in construction or crappy service jobs. (I know someone who taught there. If you ever want to know where the left-hand side of the bell curve lives, go to Granville.) I don't think any upgrade of classroom tech will transform the young lives there.
So Jim, if you read Slashdot, please heed my advice, and pull your head out of your academy.
--- The American Way of Life is not a birthright. Hell, it's not even sustainable.
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Sure they are, just like interior decorators are building houses.
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