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Obama Kicks Off Massive Science Education Effort
In a speech at the White House today, President Obama launched a new campaign, "Educate to Innovate," designed to get American students fired up about science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). The full text of the speech is also available on whitehouse.gov. "The new campaign builds on the President's Inaugural Address, which included a vow to put science 'in its rightful place.' One of those rightful places, of course, is the classroom. Yet too often our schools lack support for teachers or the other resources needed to convey the practical utility and remarkable beauty of science and engineering. As a result, students become overwhelmed in their classes and ultimately disengaged. They lose, and our nation loses too. The partnerships launched today aim to change that. They respond to a challenge made by the President in April, when he spoke at the annual meeting of the National Academy of Sciences and asked the nation's philanthropists, professional and educational societies, corporations, and individuals to collaborate and innovate with the goal of reinvigorating America's STEM educational enterprise. The partnerships announced today — dramatic commitments in the hundreds of millions of dollars, generated through novel collaborations and creative outreach activities — are just the first wave of commitments anticipated in response to his call."
In other news politicians still haven't made the connection between an arbitrary and inherently abusive disciplinary system of absolute authority with no accountability or responsibility layed over the top of a system of "education" designed around teaching students to do well on a few standardized tests and students becoming "disengaged".
Ditch zero tolerance and standardized tests and the problem will solve itself.
A bullet may have your name on it but splash damage is addressed "To whom it may concern."
I really think someone should bring back Public Service Announcement education (a la "Schoolhouse Rock") in a big way. Keep the lessons small and bite-sized, fit them into 30 second spots. Just keep banging away simple concepts that are aimed at middle-schoolers and adults who forgot all of that stuff. Using simple math to figure out gallons of paint required for a wall of a given size. Linking fuel purchased to pollution created in numbers. Explaining the difference between anecdotes versus statistical norms, like the recent breast-cancer-screening recommendations. Illustrating the kinds of technology Europe, Asia and the Americas had in 1400 AD or 1600 AD or 1800 AD. Heck, even just quoting and explaining each of the Constitutional Amendments during shows like "24 Hours" or "CSI" would have a profound impact in the long run.
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More top down central planning of the government schools isn't going to lead to more productive outcomes. Science isn't a rigid, unchanging system that can be taught as dogma. Instead of throwing another stifling straitjacket onto the failed government schools, he might emulate the diverse and decentralized environment of scientific achievement, and allow competition with government schools, and competing curricula that will over time lead to increasingly more beneficial outcomes.
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When I was about 4 years old, dad put a cup of ice water on the counter and told me to come back in about 10 minutes. After the time had elapsed, I did, and there was condensation on the outside of the glass. Dad asked me how the water got there. I speculated that it had somehow leaked through the glass.
I can't remember if he told me how the water actually got there, but that was the first time I can remember deliberately forming a hypothesis about something I'd observed
Also, for as long as I can remember, my folks had science books just floating around--lots of them with pictures like the Time-Life science books, which I had thumbed through many times before I even knew how to read. Plus they had a set of World Book Encyclopedias. I was always re-readings those.
I do wonder if I'd be as science-minded as I am today without such encouragement, or if I was just born that way to begin with. I'm sure the encouragement didn't hurt.
On the flip side in states where you can't unionize, North Carolina for example, in order to balance the budget they gave teachers a retroactive pay cut which means your next paycheck gets docked all the money you got payed earlier in the year to bring it down to your new lower salary level. For all you people who think I typed something wrong because that sounds too illegal and crazy to be true, it is, and it did happen. The Governor apparently has broad constitutional rights to balance the state budget. Teachers that had a lot of money already taken out for things like medical spending and the like actually had to PAY the state back. That sorta thing doesn't exactly help get good teachers in our state.
Now compare that to the quality of education in the state of New york where I first lived and they did have teacher unions....
>>>Republican pundits would say as much about Democratic proposals for U.S. universal health care.
- We believe in the right to get health or sickcare.
- We also believe in the right to choose smoking, drinking, or overeating.
- We even believe you have the right to replace your damaged lung, liver, or fatty heart.
What we do NOT believe is that you can force your neighbors to pay the bill. Most Americans consider that theft of another man's labor. We are amazed that Europeans do not. If you wanted to make a "safety net" to help-out those who can't afford their own care, fine, but 99% of Americans have enough money to pay the bill themselves and should do so.
Also the "40 million American are uninsured" is only half the story. The other half of the story is that 30 million of those Americans are uninsured but covered by government programs like SCHIP and Medicare. The remaining ones are illegal intruders (non-citizens).
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Having a wife who went through Catholic schools, and 2 kids who went to Catholic high school, I can say that it's at least partly because they don't confuse religion with education. There are religion classes, but they're NOT in the science classes. Plus before you get too upset about religion classes, in some other school they might be counted under ethics or some form of social studies. Neither of my kids nor my wife complained about the religion classes being some form of indoctrination. (My wife is a self-professed liberal, and proud of it.)
One other ingredient is a little discipline. Not the sort that stamps out all fun, but the sort that keeps an anti-education counter-culture from growing. (Not physical discipline, either.) My son was thrilled after his first day in high school, because when some kid started cutting up, the rest of the class shushed him.
By the way, the Catholic schools are privately funded. Even at that, the cost per pupil is cheaper than the public schools, I suspect at least partly because they're not the baby-sitter-of-last-resort. Unfortunately I paid both tuition and taxes for the schools - it hurt, but it was worth it.
Nor do they neglect sports or the arts, just for a little further completeness.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
Catholic schools don't teach creationism since the Catholic Church does not believe such rubbish, even as far back as St. Augustine. Catholic schools simply care about teaching children. Even though there is a religious element, it is not nearly as pervasive and forceful as creationist-fuckwad-controlled public schools.
Similar to the upcoming US election results
I've always been a little concerned that the campaigners to keep religion and existential philosophy out of schools
Has anyone been saying this, ever?
No one wants to keep this out of schools. We want to keep it out of science class.
you can't actually control what the children are thinking about or the questions they will internally ask.... if you think a policy of "no philosophical or religious discussion allowed" will stop children from thinking and internally asking those religious/existential questions,
You seem to be assuming (mistakenly) that we want children to stop asking these questions.
We don't. There is a time and a place for such questions. A few possible places in school include religion class, philosophy class, or ethics class -- all of which are important, but are not science class.
Suppose a student stood up in math class and asked, "What is knowledge? How can we really say that we know, or have proved, anything?"
That's an important question, and it may even be somewhat relevant to math, but it is inherently not math, it's offtopic, and it's disruptive when the intent is to actually teach math.
So the answer to all of these questions would be, very simply, "That's an interesting question. Why don't you ask that in philosophy?"
A better answer would be to actually explain why that question is outside the domain of science. Carl Sagan's "dragon in my garage" might be a good start.
And if you wish to stop those questions from being discussed in class, then frankly you might as well put up a sign saying "only government pre-approved questions may be asked, and only government pre-approved answers will be given"
Really?
You really can't see a difference between trying to keep things on-topic and a totalitarian government pre-approved list of questions and answers?
The empirical evidence in Europe is that science applications to universities appear to have fallen as society and schools have become more secular. And the empirical evidence in Europe is that it seems to be the religious schools that produce the best science results
Nice evidence. Now, how do you connect it with this conclusion:
and part of that is that they most certainly do make space in their schools (in RE classes) for discussion of what (let's face it) society has always called "the big questions" about the meaning of life.
Really?
How do you know that? Especially given that the person you are replying to claims that this is actually not what happens -- that the religious schools absolutely do keep religion out of the science classroom, and instead tell their students to ask in a more appropriate class?
they expect them to think about everything, not just science.
That's a good idea.
Why don't you think about what you've learned here, if you've been paying attention. Two important things:
First, read the post before replying.
Second, make an effort to understand what your opposition says, rather than creating elaborate strawmen.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!