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Bill Gates Tries A(nother) Billion-Dollar Plan To Reform Education (washingtonpost.com)
theodp shared this article from the Washington Post:
Bill Gates has a(nother) plan for K-12 public education. The others didn't go so well, but the man, if anything, is persistent. Gates announced Thursday that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation would spend more than $1.7 billion over the next five years to pay for new initiatives in public education, with all but 15 percent of it going to traditional public school districts and the rest to charter schools... He said most of the new money -- about 60 percent -- will be used to develop new curriculums and "networks of schools" that work together to identify local problems and solutions, using data to drive "continuous improvement." He said that over the next several years, about 30 such networks would be supported, though he didn't describe exactly what they are...
Though there wasn't a lot of detail on exactly how the money would be spent, Gates, a believer in using big data to solve problems, repeatedly said foundation grants given to schools as part of this new effort would be driven by data. "Each [school] network will be backed by a team of education experts skilled in continuous improvement, coaching and data collection and analysis," he said, an emphasis that is bound to worry critics already concerned about the amount of student data already collected and the way it is used for high-stakes decisions. In 2014, a $100 million student data collection project funded by the Gates foundation collapsed amid criticism that it couldn't adequately protect information collected on children.
"In his speech, Gates said that education philanthropy was difficult, in part because it is easy to 'fool yourself' about what works and whether it can be easily scaled," according to the article. It also argues that big spending on education by Gates and others "has raised questions about whether American democracy is well-served by wealthy people pouring so much money into pet education projects -- regardless of whether they are grounded in research -- that public policy and funding follow."
By 2011 the Gates' foundation had already spent $5 billion on education projects -- and admitted that "it hasn't led to significant improvements."
Though there wasn't a lot of detail on exactly how the money would be spent, Gates, a believer in using big data to solve problems, repeatedly said foundation grants given to schools as part of this new effort would be driven by data. "Each [school] network will be backed by a team of education experts skilled in continuous improvement, coaching and data collection and analysis," he said, an emphasis that is bound to worry critics already concerned about the amount of student data already collected and the way it is used for high-stakes decisions. In 2014, a $100 million student data collection project funded by the Gates foundation collapsed amid criticism that it couldn't adequately protect information collected on children.
"In his speech, Gates said that education philanthropy was difficult, in part because it is easy to 'fool yourself' about what works and whether it can be easily scaled," according to the article. It also argues that big spending on education by Gates and others "has raised questions about whether American democracy is well-served by wealthy people pouring so much money into pet education projects -- regardless of whether they are grounded in research -- that public policy and funding follow."
By 2011 the Gates' foundation had already spent $5 billion on education projects -- and admitted that "it hasn't led to significant improvements."
Most of the money the foundation donates is spent purchasing products from companies that are owned by him or a friend of his. It is a big tax avoidance scheme. Donate money with one hand to get a tax deduction that offsets the income of the same money returning to the other hand.
So how much of this money will be to keep MS the dominant OS provider to schools and therefore keep filling the Gates pockets?
Money was wasted because it wasnâ(TM)t focusing on the actual problem: parents. Seems to me that it is really parents that need educating to create a change. Education starts at home and by the time kids get to school you can already tell the dummies from the smart kids; thatâ(TM)s because of parents (and parenting).
Has Bill Gates been successful in spending his money? Is there evidence he has deep knowledge about technology? Is there evidence he has deep knowledge about programming, for example?
Over many years, I have seen almost no evidence of Bill Gates having depth of thinking.
Bill Gates and Nathan Myhrvold wrote a very poor book together, The Road Ahead. Quote from the Wikipedia page:
That New York Times book review suggests that Bill Gates and Nathan Myhrvold were deliberately engaged in fraud, and deliberately eliminated anything of value from the book before it was printed.
It's parents and culture. Nothing will overcome this.
So, the man who brought us Common Core is going to do something else to totally mess with the education system again?
Thanks, but no thanks, Mr. Gates. My state opted out of Common Core. But it's impossible to buy a math textbook that isn't written for Common Core, so the kids end up getting Common Core whether they like it or not.
I am no Bill Gates fan by any means. I think Microsoft's domination of the PC industry through aggressive business practices set the IT landscape back 10 years. That being said - the money is now his and he can do whatever he wishes with it. The Washington Post is strangely bothered that someone is trying to improve the horrid state of American education - at least in a way that is not simply "more cowbell." "This has raised questions about whether American democracy is well-served by wealthy people pouring so much money into pet education projects — regardless of whether they are grounded in research — that public policy and funding follow." Is our current educational policy eminently "grounded in research" and producing extraordinary outcomes? I think we can agree that is not the case. Furthermore, I think this line of questioning "raises questions" whether the Washington Post has an even rudimentary understanding of the American constitution, or at least of the first few amendments. Mr Bill Gates is free to engage in the pursuit of his happiness as he sees fit. The people and institutions choosing to work with Mr Gates or his charities are equally free to do the same. And we are free to not encourage clickbaity low quality content from the WaPo.
Speaking as someone who is married to a teacher and sees all of it firsthand (and hears about all of it every night when I am not actually visiting the school) there is some technology that works and some that is completely useless. Endless standardized testing and data collection are completely useless. It takes away from actually teaching and does not contribute anything back. You are not teaching a data metric. You are teaching a child, and education is not just learning to take a test. Look abroad to find more well rounded and less myopic views of education, or look at Montessori schools. Education that includes, art, music, fun science and free play time. A healthy balance and a much reduced focus on data metrics.
Using computers to administer tests when they are needed, and to track grades and scores are good. That's about where it ends. Endless repeated testing that requires all children to follow the same learning schedule and eats away at classroom time is completely useless.
I would say that the single most important factor in determining an individual child's quality of education is class size. The difference between 20 kids in a classroom and 30 kids is enormous. What 20 kids buys you is the ability to give a much more individual focus on each child and help them personally. It greatly decreases the chances of a child slipping through the cracks and falling behind for no good reason other than they needed a little extra help and they didn't get it. It allows you to see and spot problems much more easily through the noise.
Also, classroom aids and special programs to help children with behavioral issues are very thin on the ground. The lower the socioeconomic scale in the neighborhood, the more this becomes critical. The average family income of schoolchildren should be proportionate to the class size. The lower the income, the lower the class size should be. Anyone who has observed classes in both high income schools and low income schools would probably agree with me. There are far more behavioral issues and other needs in a poor classroom. Their home life is much more varied, and for many of these children, School is their only safe place where they are welcomed and loved. You are a teacher, a counselor, a mom, a dad, whatever they need. My wife sometimes go buy clothes for the kids that show up with dirty clothes with holes in them. Just that small act makes the child feel so much better about themselves, and their performance in school improves. She is always there for a hug or to listen to their problems and help them cope with life.
The class sizes are one way to illustrate how funding is the opposite of what it should be now. Wealthy schools typically have lots of tax income as well as plenty of extra money generated through PTAs and parent donations.
Poor schools, who need extra activities and support the most get the least amount of either.
I don't have a good answer for any of this, only realities of what's on the ground here. Perhaps if schools stopped spending money on technology that is aggressively marketed to them and does not work, they could use the money on more staff. Case in point, I know that in our local district, hundreds of thousands of dollars have gone towards technology programs that could have been used to hire a few more teachers and made a big dent in class sizes.
It's easy for people who are not teachers or principals to come up with ideas that sound good. But ideas that actually work require a lot of input from the troops on the ground, and not just at your blessed Cupertino school where children are well supported with highly involved, highly educated parents. You need to look at what works in poor, rural schools where many basic needs are not met. Talk to the teachers. Ask them what they need to help their kids. More often than not, it has nothing to do with technology. It has to do with nurturing and that fuzzy stuff that cannot be quantified.
Of course having good parents makes a huge difference. But just talking about money - how would I spend $1.7 billion on education?
1) Buy the rights to highly-regarded educational books, and release the books freely over the internet.
2) Set up some private schools that teach as they do in Finland. This imitating Finland would include hiring outstanding teachers, and paying them well.
3) Open private schools for students who want to learn, putting them in areas with bad schools. The students in the good schools don't have to be geniuses, but they do have to work hard and behave well. Make these schools low-tuition or free, for students whose parents can't afford the cost. I hate reading articles like this one, about students who were physically attacked by other students for the "crime" of studying hard.
4) For students who are fighting peer pressure to not study and to behave badly - if they don't have an alternate good physical school to attend, then set up a free, high-quality online school for them to attend.
"Those who can do, those who can't teach."
Fuck You. Public education is failing because of assholes like you. I don't know a single teacher that recommends entering the profession because of this type of bullshit.
Blame teachers for all social problems, and go out of your way to pass laws to restrict their right to unionize. Make sure that teachers have no due process, and no professional respect. Be sure to siphon off money to for-profit charter schools who often do not teach high school students because extra curriculars are more expensive. Don't hold charter schools accountable when they mishandle public funds, fail to report progress numbers to the State, or refuse to provide services to special education students. Couple that with abysmal pay and benefits in most districts, and the reality is that there is a massive shortage of teachers across the U.S.
Try teaching kids who are hungry, exhausted, and homeless. Students who have no support at home, and nobody to advocate for them fall easily through the cracks. Everything revolves first and foremost around the parents, but many have abdicated their responsibility long before a student meets a teacher.
Take some time out of your important life to volunteer in a school and you will see the reality of the situation. If public education is failing it is precisely because you are not there to make a difference.
The problem with education is the following statement:
"Those who can do, those who can't teach."
My best teachers were always those who had a non-teaching career first before going into education. One particular AP History teacher I had worked extensively at the state department for many years and moved back home to his podunk country town to raise a family.
Find a way to get those who do or have done something notable into the classroom either as a teacher or a visitor on a regular basis and you'll see a turn around in education.
Or I don't know. I suppose you can pay them like a real professional and not an upper hand blue collar worker. Finland pays them over 100K a year and it is very hard to get into teaching school as it is such a high sought out job. You need a masters degree too and tons of constant workshops.
There are good teachers. The problem is those who are driven to succeed can take the same drive in another field and earn double the income. What kept them in teaching was a desire to help kids out as well as the generous government penchants.
Thanks to conservatives cutting the penchants promised as well as the great recession forcing states to cut funding that is now gone too! Imagine if your 401K could be taken away just like that due to a politician trying to score points or the CEO needs a bonus?
Education is not valued in America. Money talks shit walks on any who say otherwise.
Many teachers today are expected to get masters degrees and tons and tons of debt and do constant training workshops and work well after 4pm when the students leave but only make 40K a year who may have penchant if they do this for 30 years. Screw that man.
Now you end up with the losers who have a degree but can't find work and just get another 2 year degree to be certified to teach. Beats McDonalds right? Those are the ones teaching your kids.
http://saveie6.com/
Right, ignore the failures of the parents of the students in failing schools....its all the teachers....
Being smart and / or successful in school is looked down upon by the majority of their peers. You're labeled a geek or a nerd and ostracized for it.
Those who attempt to learn are merely targeted and ridiculed by the rest who seem to exist only to make everyone's life as miserable as possible. Some kids endure it and move on. Some give up and join the crowd. Others snap and go on a killing spree.
Some of the brightest people in this GD country are financially dwarfed by half-wits who can throw a ball, cry on cue or had the luck of being born with the right genetics and / or wealthy parents. High schools pour hundreds of MILLIONS of dollars into athletic programs, but seem to have little interest in funding anything academic outside of the bare minimums.
America has little interest in intelligent people, they want stupid ones who will serve as entertainment for the rest. The powers that be all but beg kids to get interested in STEM programs while, at the same time, they're outsourcing all the jobs associated with those programs overseas. :|
Kids see this and they ask themselves " Which one would I rather be ? "
You want to fix education ?
Start by figuring out how to make advanced learning something kids will strive for vs something they shun to avoid the persecution and misery that usually comes with it.
Teachers are paid ok. Let them teach is the problem. Friend teaches. The kids run the class. He would be non-renewed if he sent too many disruptive kids to the vice principle. They have 3 security guards full time roaming waiting for fights to break out. I saw a story about a sub who duct taped a few kids mouth shut. I am positive they deserved it. But of course the sub got canned that day. And parents are just as bad. I recall when I was in school my parents backed the teacher. I did not dare get in trouble. Now the ax murderer student's parents justify the kid killing the teacher.
Did you miss the part where parents of disruptive children do not support teachers and actively fight to undermine them. It doesn't matter if all teachers get paid 6 figure salaries if they do not have the authority to command respect from children and their parents. Children within that kind of setting will not get an effective education no matter how much money is spent into salaries.
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Finland pays them over 100K a year
Teachers in Finland are paid $37,500 on average, which is considerable less than most American teachers make.
You need a masters degree too
There is no evidence that advanced degrees improve teaching ability in any objectively measurable way.
What you describe is a completely rotten administration.
What he said is 100% true. No Child Left Behind deals with metrics. One of them is discipline and classroom management. A principal who has a high number of students sent home is less effective than one who doesn't.
What? You think just because it is the government and not the private sector that bullshit metrics are not used?
http://saveie6.com/
Seems to me, you and your spouse should work a few years averaging 100-120 hours per week between the two of you, for a lousy two-bedroom apartment, before you start lecturing people on how they aren't doing enough to support their families.
First problem, the world's full of people, who've never taught a class in their lives, giving their poorly informed advice to teachers. And too many pundits berating teachers for issues that aren't caused by teachers.
Next, you can't sack "bad" teachers and hire "good" ones. Teachers aren't factory or office workers. Education isn't a service or product. Pupils/students learn in communities cultivated within schools and neighbourhoods. "Good" teachers are cultivated, mentored, and encouraged, not hired. "Good" teacher means a teacher who is sufficiently well supported and given the autonomy over curriculum and assessment so that s/he can do his/her job well. Give teachers shitty status (i.e. constantly under attack from govt. and the media) and working conditions (i.e. long hours, insufficient resources, bureaucratic overload, and held to account for things outside their control) and guess what you'll get. Most of the policies for 'improving education' are actually making it worse.
Want to know what's most effective at improving learning outcomes across the board? Formative assessment (AKA feedback & actually talking to pupils/students about their work). If teachers can get that right, learning outcomes improve. In order for teachers to learn how to get that right, they need effective in-service continuing professional development (CPD). It's also a lot faster and cheaper than trying to train and sack-and-hire your way to improvement, especially when it's not the teachers themselves who are the cause of the problems. Most CPD is ineffective because it's too short, not followed up on, misdirected, and so doesn't change what the vast majority of teachers do in their classrooms in any significant way.
Also, when govt. and the media stop parroting 80s Reagan adminsitration "A Nation at Risk" style "Education is broken" rhetoric and actually acknowledge that the USA has top-rate education systems and that much of the poor performance on the OECD PISA tests every 3 years is due to child poverty and social exclusion (Why study hard when it won't get you a good job?), then we can start having well-informed, constructive conversations about how to improve US education outcomes.
And finally, we have to stop this nonsense about 21st century skills. How often do the people who use this buzz-phrase actually define what 21st century skills are? When you look at the few definitions that there are, they look an awful lot like 3rd century B.C. skills... apart from the learning to use computers for studying and work part. I'll give them that.
End of rant.
Debate is a form of harassment. Do not question my truth.
Teachers are hounded out of the business if they don't parrot the political bias of the department head, principal, superintendent. Good teachers won't work under such conditions, hacks do.
I find it hard to imagine any teacher in any subject before 10th grade being worth more than $50,000/year. The material isn't difficult and teaching isn't difficult.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
Adding money to a failed institution like our public schools is pointless. If Gates wants to help poor kids escape the school-to-prison pipeline, he needs to create schools that have no government involvement at all.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Yes. https://www.theatlantic.com/bu...
The parents at "bad" schools are much, much poorer than the parents at "good" schools.
Poorer parents are far more likely to both be working, and work longer hours. Thus they have less time to raise their children. They also have less resources when a child has trouble - for example, middle-class and up can afford tutors/tutoring services.
Finally, the local property taxes bring in more money around "good" schools because the houses are worth more. That gives these districts more money, leading to better-equipped schools.
Teachers are paid ok.
You and others like you are the problem. You endorse payment of crap wages and get exactly your money's worth. They lost control of the classrooms because they don't get respect and adequate pay is part of that.
GP is right.
Those who continuously say teachers are paid crap wages are the problem, because you push people away from a very lucrative career. While teachers will never reach the $200k+ salaries that around 5% of college graduates could eventually make in the private sector, teachers overall are very well paid. Every state is different (and some states do pay teachers crap wages) but on average teachers make about $56k per year. They also get a pension which would take about $5-10k per year in pre-tax income above what a private company would contribute to a 401k. They work about 10% more hours per working week than most professionals, but work 20% less weeks per year. They also get health benefits which are far more generous than nearly any private company plans.
To compare teacher pay to corporate pay, average teacher pay is closer to $70-75k per year when factoring in their benefits. Average bachelor degree salary is $60k and average masters degree salary is $78k. Figures for average teacher pay and average professional pay vary widely, so take these figures with a grain of salt, but it is obvious to see that teachers make a very competitive wage.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
The problem is those who are driven to succeed can take the same drive in another field and earn double the income.
Not quite. A lot of problem is in the education system that allows people to become teachers. It tends to favour those too dumb to do anything else.
When my wife became a teacher she did so with a post grad diploma in education. She was ridiculed at her school because she didn't do a "full teaching degree (Bachelor of Education)". She was ridiculed by idiots teaching things they didn't understand, but confident in the fact that they were able to impart their poor understanding on the next generation.
Fast forward a few years and she breezed through a Masters of Mathematics with almost perfect marks and became the head of a department full of "bachelors of education" who failed their masters in the field and were left picking their nose and scratching their arses.
Worse still are the idiots who take the easy road and do a major in education and a minor in the easiest subject they can think of (typically English or some other subject so over populated that they are unable to find a job).
Most skills are improved with practice, not with study. Studying is abstract and removed from the real practice.
"Whose design?"
Whomever is the current scapegoat?
ugh can we stop telling this bald face lie about teacher pay!
While there are a few pockets in this country where teachers are under paid the national average pay rates for public school teachers are only slightly below that of work requiring similar educate with other fields. They are HIGHER than average when you consider most teachers have 2 months off in the summer time, in addition to multiple breaks during the school year plus discretionary PTO. Finally its a position where you enjoy greater job security than most. Workers in other fields can expect to be laid off at some point in their career. Teachers provided they are willing to go where they are asked are virtually assured a job once they get past their first few years.
Which is not say teacher compensation is well managed. Its known to every large corporation's HR department that within a reasonable pay band (extravagant CEO pay aside) there comes a point with professional employees where you really can't motivate them as effectively with bonus and wages. You get less renewed enthusiasm for each additional dollar you compensate them with, its a diminishing returns thing. Generally you offer other perks like added vacation (but teachers already have a lot of that) and new responsibilities ( hard to do with teachers because each successive generation of students has about the same needs).
Maybe the problem is that teaching is looked at as a career. Maybe it should be a Job and teachers should be encouraged to simply move on after a few years.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Yes, a good teacher is important. Yet, I'd say a supportive, loving family is even more important.
"There are no gods, no devils, no angels, no heaven or hell. There is only our natural world. Religion is but myth and
"Special education" is frequently exorbitantly expensive, more expensive than one full-time tutor per student (easily over $100,000 per year). The return on investment is zilch, and certainly not a responsible use of taxpayer money. If a child's mental potential is limited to basket weaving, spending 12 years in a futile effort to teach him to read does no good.
At least you're honest about your desire to cull the weak from the herd. You're right that special ed is tremendously expensive, but many of the students that enter into these programs have physical handicaps, not mental ones. Look at Stephen Hawking for perhaps the best example of how special education students can succeed academically. Additionally, for many of these students, an education is the difference between a life collecting disability and a life of contributing to society at a basic minimum wage job.
Regardless of the fact that providing education to all yields a very tangible public benefit, it's also simply the right thing to do. What do you recommend as an alternative? Shuffle the disabled away into asylums? Euthanization? Let them starve on the street? Or just plan that they will be dependent on government handouts for their entire lives and get them started early? You really only have a handful of options available, all of which have been tried in various places and times. Using public education to give each individual a fair chance at self-sufficiency seems to be the obvious choice from a perspective of liberty, equality, and social good, not to mention simple decency.
I would love to see your attempt at a rebuttal, both for the entertaining mental gymnastics and so we can observe exactly how atrophied your moral compass has become.
Right, in the same way that Lenin and Stalin were hardcore capitalists.
/rollseyes
What color is the sky on your world? Not on this one, where the WaPo ran 16 negative stories on Bernie Sanders in 16 hours, and who's owner has a deal with the CIA work more than the paper.