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The Washington Post Pans Apple-Sponsored School Reform TV Special (washingtonpost.com)
Long-time Slashdot reader theodp writes: On Friday night, the Big Four Networks simultaneously aired EIF Presents: XQ Super School Live [YouTube], a commercial-free, one-hour TV special that championed Laurene Powell Jobs' mission to rethink the American high school. The closing credits listed Jobs as an Executive Producer, and noted that the chock-full-of-celebrities special was sponsored in part by her Emerson Collective and Apple.
"Surely Samuel L. Jackson, Tom Hanks, Mahershala Ali, Justin Timberlake, Cate Blanchett and a bevy of other celebrities have nothing but laudable intentions by appearing on Friday night's live televised high school reform spectacular on four -- count them, four -- major networks (NBC, ABC, CBS and Fox)," writes the Washington Post's Valerie Strauss. "But when an hour of prime time on four networks is purchased, it's fair to ask whether that is a public service or propaganda."
The Post points out gently that "not everyone believes" in the need to "transform" high schools, while theodp notes "viewers were pitched XQ Super School Board Program kits, which XQ's website explains are designed to prepare individuals for a school board candidacy."
If this seems suspiciously political -- or at least a way to ensure schools are friendly to Laurene Powell Jobs' specific proposals -- the nonprofit's web site adds reassuringly that "XQ won't be endorsing or supporting particular candidates; we'll be supporting all candidates who stand with us in a shared commitment to rethink high school, so all young people can be educated as they deserve."
"Surely Samuel L. Jackson, Tom Hanks, Mahershala Ali, Justin Timberlake, Cate Blanchett and a bevy of other celebrities have nothing but laudable intentions by appearing on Friday night's live televised high school reform spectacular on four -- count them, four -- major networks (NBC, ABC, CBS and Fox)," writes the Washington Post's Valerie Strauss. "But when an hour of prime time on four networks is purchased, it's fair to ask whether that is a public service or propaganda."
The Post points out gently that "not everyone believes" in the need to "transform" high schools, while theodp notes "viewers were pitched XQ Super School Board Program kits, which XQ's website explains are designed to prepare individuals for a school board candidacy."
If this seems suspiciously political -- or at least a way to ensure schools are friendly to Laurene Powell Jobs' specific proposals -- the nonprofit's web site adds reassuringly that "XQ won't be endorsing or supporting particular candidates; we'll be supporting all candidates who stand with us in a shared commitment to rethink high school, so all young people can be educated as they deserve."
This was on the four major broadcast networks (sorry, CW) - yet how many of us had no idea it was happening? This Slashdot submission was the first I'd heard of it, in any case...
#DeleteChrome
Wonder how Jeff Bezos owning the Washington Post and Apple competitor Amazon figured in on the WP panning an Apple sponsored event.
Improvements to high school are fine - but they are not of that much importance. If America is ever going to achieve racial equality, quality early childhood education is required for all. When a child is behind their piers by a year or two it becomes almost impossible to catch up.
Children of parents that are financially secure are often enrolled in programs where they are taught to read, are exposed to more language, and perform activities designed to stimulate intellect. So while poor parents can find no time to spend with their children, wealthy parents are giving their kids a head start. It has been shown that this head start stays with them all the way to adulthood. Social mobility is reduced - the poor stay poor and the rich stay rich, one generation after the other.
Racial inequality will exist so long as racial stereotypes can be statistically validated. Without social mobility, historically poor racial groups with remain poor and the stereotypes will continue. It is a never ending circle - a horrible circle which human nature will ensure persists. Those that think we can change human nature are horribly naive. But we do have control of social mobility in the form of early childhood education.
Providing more early education will lead to breaking the circle which will invalidate the stereotypes and finally end all of this hatred. Education is the only thing we have control of so we should start there.
You got several levels of schooling in this country. The elite go to prep schools and other private routes and go to elite colleges and then to elite jobs where they get an education. The elite take care of themselves just fine.
Then you got public school which has to take care of the worst (special ed, and pls spare me the crap) to the best, some who might likely get identified early and sped along. Many not. And whether they are at 25% or 90%, many have to attend the same classes.
And public school has little tolerance for trade jobs, the overriding message is "Go to College" nevermind that many people work well with their hands, don't have the funds for college, and that college doesn't automatically mean better pay in the long haul.
We can also seperate this between inner city schools, most are underfunded, and suburban schools -- where the teachers often make more than the surrounding median population but will cry how poor they are like inner city teachers while their pay/benefits/pensions put crushing taxes on their districts in some states.
Public schools are generally a one-size-fits-all system when it doesn't and that is the overriding problem. Children can certainly benefit some customization something like a tablet running Khan Academy or Duoling-like programs can bring. But then again, tablets in their current form with browsing and other manner of garbage are unsuitable. Before someone mentions cost, prepaid smartphones are down to $30 at Walmart... they certainly can play Netflix and such. Not much more is needed for a tablet. A classroom of kids can be outfitted for less than a single iPad.
What states really need to do is hire people at a state and national level to cooperate on these programs and on public-copyright textbooks and save on costs over time by cooperation and having development costs spread out over thousands of school districts rather than rely on vendors.
First it says that the need for high school "redesign" is a faulty narrative, then it says that the school system "needs serious reform". Which is it?
Redesign is when you make elaborate plans to change it so people think you're going to do something. Reform is when you actually do it.
i spent ten minutes browsing their web site and found very little about WHAT they're really proposing. i want a page that directly answers the questions: What needs to change? How can we fix it? What is our Plan? Do they investigate individual learning styles? seems not: they still want standardized testing School for me was like that old cartoon: the students are: a monkey, a bird, a giraffe, a fish. The standardized test is "get the thing at the top of this tree". I'm the fish. They didn't teach to my strengths. Yeah, school, what i remember of it, was mostly "memorize, regurgitate, and then forget". It was great at teaching THAT modality, but horrible at teaching *understanding of a subject*.
"But when an hour of prime time on four networks is purchased, it's fair to ask whether that is a public service or propaganda." So what is it fair to ask when someone buys a whole newspaper?
"We'll be supporting all candidates who stand with us"
Translation: "We'll be supporting all candidates who will buy our stuff."
Of course the rich will always be able to get the best education available. They can pay for it. Why is that a problem? Them getting the best education has nothing to do with everyone else being able to get a good education.
The real question should be how do we improve education for children whose environment teaches them education is unimportant? That's the real problem. Children in homes where education is valued will almost always get a good education. Children in homes where education is not values, where they are not valued, have an uphill climb and will almost never succeed, at least not through education.
And the U.S. as a society need to decide what education is for. Is it for job training? Is it to produce well rounded citizens? Is it to benefit society? Who decides what "benefits society" means?
So we have one Democratic billionaire corporate master (Bezos) criticizing another Democratic billionaire corporate master (Jobs) over how to spend tax dollars on education. This is the vision Democrats have for America: propaganda, corporatism, and government by elites and billionaires.
What these pricks are united in is in denying Americans the right to make their own choices for how their kids are educated with the tax dollars their parents have spent.
'sounding out' is NEVER a reading method, but a method for people who speak a language far better than they (currently) read it to learn new words. This means young children- but actual PROPER reading must be taught in a way that bypasses the verbal part of our brain.
You should read by SEEING each word, in the same way you see a car or cat. If you read by sounding out inside your head, you are effectively reading 'disabled'.
The confusion comes from the mechanism of understanding NEW words- and dim witted parents, who probably cannot read correctly themselves- think reading by sounding out inside one's head is how it is supposed to be done.
For adults, there is a test. Go find a site that jumbles up the letters in each world of a paragraph according to a special rule. If you can still read that paragraph fairly easy, you read correctly. But adults who 'sound out' have to solve each jumbled word one-by-one as 'anagrams' - and thus essentially find the paragraph unreadable.
The key to learning to read PROPERLY is to have the child read as much as possible with a rapidly expanding vocab- so as many words as possible are learnt 'on sight'. Having the young child use the internet is the very best way- cos the internet demands reading skills.
On the other hand, having the young child read very little- and that having limited vocab content- combined with hitting the child with constant 'sounding out' - means the child will never learn to read properly, and will continue to read by 'sounding out' as an adult.