US Americans, Your Education System

Off Topic
41

During my study in Hong Kong, I took the opportunity to guest-teach Engrish at a school in Shenzen. While I was there, I asked (in Engrish, of course) what their education was like. When I got back to HK, I asked a couple other mainland kids the same. Then I put together this opinion.

The best thing about American education is that you can get it at any time, and it’s not really that expensive.

If you drop out of high school and fuck off until you’re 40, you still have the opportunity to get a GED, go to a community college for a couple of years, move to a state school, and graduate with honors, get a decent job, go back to grad school, and be making some fat fucking cash by the end. If you’re willing to work for it. There are people here who’ve done that.

Not so in Red China. The kids work harder and longer. Twelve hours with homework was the numbers given to me by the kids in Shenzen, and the mainland kids I studied with back in HK were telling me there are instances where the kids studying up to 18 hours a day for years ahead of the National Exam. Some take the National Exam multiple times, but competition is ludicrously hard to get into decent schools, and most are too poor to leave China for schooling. So they end up going to a trade-school, which is better than being a farmer, but not quite the delux apartment in the sky.

They’re great at math, for all the good it does them. Their English sucks, despite having studied it for several years, because their teachers don’t always know how to speak properly. Which I thought was tragic. And hilarious.

To me the important bit about education is social mobility. That’s the point, and if you miss that, you should stop. Education is NOT important for it’s own sake. Education does NOT make better citizens. It makes money. In America, it can do that. Not always so in other countries with supposedly better educational systems.

That’s something to keep in mind.

42

Why do all you USA Haterz always point out people in your cuntries can speak 2 languages, like that makes them smat? All this shows is you dunces are smat enough to learn english because the greatest nation in the world speaks it and you hope to emigrate at some point.

Also, If I lived in some teeny, tiny country where the teeny, tiny country next to mine spoke a very similar language, I’d learn how to speak it also. You speak spanish, french AND eye-talian? OMG ! You sir are a genius!!

43

[quote]stokedporcupine8 wrote:
ds1973 wrote:
Our educational system has been stifled by government monopoly and a teachers union whose interest is in protecting their members and keeping salaries & benefits artificially high, rather than rewarding achievement. A free-market solution is needed and it’s time to get the government completely out of education. It should be run by private for-profit and non-profit entities. Teachers should be paid based on performance, not tenure. Parents should be allowed to choose the school they wish their children to attend rather than have their property confiscated to support a system that is sub-par.

This is a horrible idea that will only make the US educational system much worse. While a free market style system will bring up performance, for sure, it will be not be the type of “performance” one wants. You cannot leave issues of pedagogy and epistemological value up to the free market. You think American students fail at math now? Wait until you see the sort of mathematical training that the “free market” demands… The standards of education must be set by those who, are, well, educated… Not by what the masses think is of value or by what some businesses think their employees should know.

Leave vocational training to the free market, but academic education? please. [/quote]

The university system in this country is basically free-market, and is the best in the world, hands-down. Secondary education was BETTER in this country when it was run on a local community level, vs. state and federal. The bigger the government involvment, the worse “performance” (however you define that) has gotten. ESPECIALLY factoring in cost per student.

Also, to the OP, American’s aren’t disinterested in world affairs. That has nothing to do with the fact that most of us think soccer blows ass. Its just a matter of taste. We like other sports better.

44

[quote]Otep wrote:

To me the important bit about education is social mobility. That’s the point, and if you miss that, you should stop. Education is NOT important for it’s own sake. Education does NOT make better citizens. It makes money. In America, it can do that. Not always so in other countries with supposedly better educational systems.
[/quote]

No one would deny that education is an important part of the sort of social mobility seen in the US. That doesn’t mean though that education also has value for it’s own sake. How you best structure your educational intuitions so as not to lose the practical benefits of education while keeping standards rigorous and high is precisely the point at issue. That people do not recognize this and tend to see education as a one dimensional thing is one of the major problems in America, and other countries as well.

If what you say is true, then china seems to have the worst of both worlds, so to speak. Although their stratified intuitions promote high standards, they block social mobility, since as you seem to indicate “trade schools” are looked down upon. I’m told this isn’t the case in, say, Germany, where the sort of lower tiers aren’t socially stigmatized. What I mean is that an educational system that allows for social mobility doesn’t have to consist of “be all, do all” secondary schools and universities.

45

. Secondary education was BETTER in this country when it was run on a local community level, vs. state and federal. The bigger the government involvment, the worse “performance” (however you define that) has gotten. ESPECIALLY factoring in cost per student.

Also, to the OP, American’s aren’t disinterested in world affairs. That has nothing to do with the fact that most of us think soccer blows ass. Its just a matter of taste. We like other sports better. [/quote]

x 2 on the secondary education being better before it became more standardized. In most public schools, teachers are forced to teach to a the standard tests given so the students can “pass” the course. Unfortunately, what these students fail to learn are the critical thinking skills that are overlooked due to a lack of variation in the style of teaching. It’s hard to place blame on any one person/institution, but students are suffering because they are taught to only develop the ability to regurgitate information and fill in bubbles rather than learn how to problem solve and think critically.

46

[quote]HG Thrower wrote:

The university system in this country is basically free-market, and is the best in the world, hands-down. Secondary education was BETTER in this country when it was run on a local community level, vs. state and federal. The bigger the government involvment, the worse “performance” (however you define that) has gotten. ESPECIALLY factoring in cost per student.

Also, to the OP, American’s aren’t disinterested in world affairs. That has nothing to do with the fact that most of us think soccer blows ass. Its just a matter of taste. We like other sports better. [/quote]

I already mentioned the university system here is basically in a free free market system, but it is certainly NOT “the best in the world, hands-down”. America certainly has some of the best universities in the world, but the average American university probably falls below, say, the average German or Chinese one. Curiously enough, the elite American universities–places like Princeton, Penn, etc.–effectually are outside the “free market”, since they have truly staggering endowments that provide most of their funding. Half the professors and researches at these places are paid for out of endowed chairs, not out of the tuition dollars. It is a safe bet that if you took away the elite universities’ endowments, quality would go down. The endowments give those universities freedom from the demands of the free market, which has pulled quality lower at many other intuitions.

47

With regard to K-12 education, it is only or almost entirely the government-run schools that produce the hideous results. There are very few complaints of unsatisfactory jobs being done by the private schools. For a very simple reason: where parents are not satisfied with such schools, they move their kids to a school that does give results that please them.

Of course with the government-run schools they cannot do this, and the teacher’s union and a certain part of the political spectrum fight tooth-and-nail against parents being able to have a choice.

The private K-12 schools in most cases charge tuition considerably less than the taxpayer has to pay, per student, for the government run schools. So the problem with the government-run schools is not insufficient money. It is a proven fact that a far superior job can be done and is routinely done on considerably less money. What, they really think people are so stupid as to believe it takes more than $9000, $12k, in some cases even more than that, per kid to do a good job teaching? No it does not.

While defenders of government run schools will always blame the problem on “not enough money, if only we had more of the taxpayers’ money!” the private schools show that that is just a con job for yet more money to be pumped into the system – most of which won’t end up in the hands of teachers, by the way.

As for that part of any increased money that might wind up in their hands, those teachers that do bad jobs in the government-run schools – I’m not saying all do bad jobs, but those that do – are not going to do a better job on being paid yet more money, which by the way in most cases is probably already more, counting benefits, than the free market provides in the private schools.

And there is never talk from the teachers union that if more money is provided, then they’ll agree to the underperforming teachers being fired.

Yes, government-run K-12 education in the US sucks quite badly, for the most part, with a few exceptions. The cause is not insufficient funding. The cause is government administration and a union that protects underperforming or even downright bad teachers – e.g., the “rubber room” New York City has to maintain for teachers that cannot even be allowed in the classroom but must remain on the payroll.

48

Kindergarten through the 3rd grade was fine… the only problem was they kept the class at the speed of the slowest student, which resulted in me never learning anything. They also mixed grade levels and had one teacher so the learning was slowed down in that way as well.

Privately educated since end of 3rd though so I can’t say much past that. Seemed pretty shitty.

49

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
With regard to K-12 education, it is only or almost entirely the government-run schools that produce the hideous results. There are very few complaints of unsatisfactory jobs being done by the private schools. For a very simple reason: where parents are not satisfied with such schools, they move their kids to a school that does give results that please them.

Of course with the government-run schools they cannot do this, and the teacher’s union and a certain part of the political spectrum fight tooth-and-nail against parents being able to have a choice.

The private K-12 schools in most cases charge tuition considerably less than the taxpayer has to pay, per student, for the government run schools. So the problem with the government-run schools is not insufficient money. It is a proven fact that a far superior job can be done and is routinely done on considerably less money. What, they really think people are so stupid as to believe it takes more than $9000, $12k, in some cases even more than that, per kid to do a good job teaching? No it does not.

While defenders of government run schools will always blame the problem on “not enough money, if only we had more of the taxpayers’ money!” the private schools show that that is just a con job for yet more money to be pumped into the system – most of which won’t end up in the hands of teachers, by the way.

As for that part of any increased money that might wind up in their hands, those teachers that do bad jobs in the government-run schools – I’m not saying all do bad jobs, but those that do – are not going to do a better job on being paid yet more money, which by the way in most cases is probably already more, counting benefits, than the free market provides in the private schools.

And there is never talk from the teachers union that if more money is provided, then they’ll agree to the underperforming teachers being fired.

Yes, government-run K-12 education in the US sucks quite badly, for the most part, with a few exceptions. The cause is not insufficient funding. The cause is government administration and a union that protects underperforming or even downright bad teachers – e.g., the “rubber room” New York City has to maintain for teachers that cannot even be allowed in the classroom but must remain on the payroll.[/quote]

Well said Bill.

50

I just wish they would teach you guys the metric system like THE REST OF THE WORLD! Converting is gay.

51

[quote]G87 wrote:
BigBartDawg66 wrote:
Not to say that the topic of this thread is not a good one, but I fail to see how my post inspired that. Just because I don’t care what sports Europeans feel like playing does not make me uneducated, just uninterested. I just don’t understand why what sports other people play should influence what sports I like. That is what I was getting at.

For the record I have always done very well in school. I could give you GPA, SAT, ACT scores, AP Courses, Academic Scholarships, but you would probably call BS or make fun of me for “trying to impress people on an internet forum”.

All this because I don’t like soccer.

LankyMofo wrote:
What the hell does America’s lack of interest in soccer have to do with our school system?

Disinterest in soccer must be punished!

Nah, just kidding :). BBD66, apologies if I misunderstood your message. However, it just made me think of how it often seems Americans are only disinterested in world events out of sheer ignorance. Which in turn had me thinking of the weak US education system. I was in no way trying to have a go at you personally. MMF?[/quote]

What is it that Americans are ignorant of that makes them disinterested in soccer?
Most of us are fully aware that the rest of the world loves soccer. So it can’t be that.

52

[quote]hardgnr wrote:
I just wish they would teach you guys the metric system like THE REST OF THE WORLD! Converting is gay.[/quote]

I agree with this. I think it would be possible to implement, but it would take a while.
Fortunately our scientists also agree, and we gain a rather thorough knowledge of the metric system taking classes like chemistry, biology, physics, etc…
I just wish I had been raised knowing it.

53

[quote]stokedporcupine8 wrote:

This is a horrible idea that will only make the US educational system much worse. While a free market style system will bring up performance, for sure, it will be not be the type of “performance” one wants. You cannot leave issues of pedagogy and epistemological value up to the free market. You think American students fail at math now? Wait until you see the sort of mathematical training that the “free market” demands… The standards of education must be set by those who, are, well, educated… Not by what the masses think is of value or by what some businesses think their employees should know.

Leave vocational training to the free market, but academic education? please. [/quote]

I don’t know why you chose math as an example, math is a really valuable skill. Human invention drives production, and companies understand that.

Enrollment in liberal arts programs might suffer, but I’m not entirely convinced that’s a bad thing.

54

[quote]hardgnr wrote:
I just wish they would teach you guys the metric system like THE REST OF THE WORLD! Converting is gay.[/quote]

People always say that, but it’s like saying all Italians should learn English.

We know the metric system, we just prefer the US system.

Not because it’s better, but because it’s ours. Godammit.

55

[quote]Iron Dwarf wrote:
I wuznt a smart kid in skuul so i be came a artits insted. drawring pitcherz iz fun.[/quote]

I agreeee wit this guy he noes that lerning is real hardd. Evry1 is meen two Amerikuh.

56

[quote]ds1973 wrote:

Maybe YOU don’t want to take responsibility for guiding your child’s philosophical and intellectual growth, but I do. I can already see the programming taking place and my daughter just finished first grade. Isn’t reading writing and arithmetic enough?[/quote]

That speaks more to your parenting approach & her social interaction with her peers then the school, teachers or administration.

57

California has the worst school system in America, yet pays teachers more than any other state by far. The unions here are life the mafia. With the budget crisis going on here, teachers “considered” not getting a raise this year. Note that, I said not get a raise. I didn’t say that they would take a pay cut. Taxpayers here pay more than any other state now, and teachers want tax payers to pay even more. Teachers here are like the Catholic priests who molest kids, when they mess up they are just shuffled around. It takes an act of God to get a teacher fired because the union is so strong.

Recently, teachers here went on a hunger strike in hopes to avoid layoffs. It didn’t work. Teachers went on to ramble about how the kids will suffer, when in fact California teachers perform the worst in the whole country. Also, a large portion of kids in Cali schools are illegal or anchor children. They hardly speak English to begin with, lowering scores and reflecting poorly due to communication problems.

Kids have it easy with the internet now. When I was a kid I had to go to the library to find something out. Now, your laptop is your library. Hell, even your cellphone. Kids today are weak.

58

[quote]tom8658 wrote:
stokedporcupine8 wrote:

This is a horrible idea that will only make the US educational system much worse. While a free market style system will bring up performance, for sure, it will be not be the type of “performance” one wants. You cannot leave issues of pedagogy and epistemological value up to the free market. You think American students fail at math now? Wait until you see the sort of mathematical training that the “free market” demands… The standards of education must be set by those who, are, well, educated… Not by what the masses think is of value or by what some businesses think their employees should know.

Leave vocational training to the free market, but academic education? please.

I don’t know why you chose math as an example, math is a really valuable skill. Human invention drives production, and companies understand that.

Enrollment in liberal arts programs might suffer, but I’m not entirely convinced that’s a bad thing.[/quote]

Very few areas of higher math would constitute “valuable skills” in the free market. In what career is knowing group theory going to help? There are some careers where mathematical training is required–engineering, statistical analysis, etc.–but the sort of mathematics required for these fields are very limited.

But look, the point is this. If in our secondary schools we only taught the sort of skills that are in demand things like our mathematics education would get worse. Don’t believe me? Just look at some of our universities, which already basically are a free market system. In universities that are heavily dependent on enrollment and classes filling up for profitability, the first type of classes to be cut are the more upper-level esoteric math and science classes.

It is hard to imagine that a similar thing won’t happen on the secondary level as well. While there is SOME demand at the secondary level for the sort of rigorous training in math required to pursue it at the university level, I imagine there isn’t nearly enough to make teaching a high standard of mathematics profitable at most secondary schools. Hence most secondary schools will stoop to teaching more profitable math classes that are seen as valuable or applicable to most jobs, and only a few more elite secondary schools will develop where demand is high enough to make teaching rigorous math classes possible. Again, what is funny is that the situation I’ve described is basically the situation that has developed in our free market university system.

Similar arguments can be given for subjects like science and english lit as well. I’ll say it one more time. Think we’re bad now? Wait until your average American high school student is taking mostly the sort of “applied” classes that would be in demand if secondary education is completely privatized.

59

[quote]MaximusB wrote:
California has the worst school system in America, yet pays teachers more than any other state by far. The unions here are life the mafia. With the budget crisis going on here, teachers “considered” not getting a raise this year. Note that, I said not get a raise. I didn’t say that they would take a pay cut. Taxpayers here pay more than any other state now, and teachers want tax payers to pay even more. Teachers here are like the Catholic priests who molest kids, when they mess up they are just shuffled around. It takes an act of God to get a teacher fired because the union is so strong.

Recently, teachers here went on a hunger strike in hopes to avoid layoffs. It didn’t work. Teachers went on to ramble about how the kids will suffer, when in fact California teachers perform the worst in the whole country. Also, a large portion of kids in Cali schools are illegal or anchor children. They hardly speak English to begin with, lowering scores and reflecting poorly due to communication problems.

Kids have it easy with the internet now. When I was a kid I had to go to the library to find something out. Now, your laptop is your library. Hell, even your cellphone. Kids today are weak. [/quote]

I mostly agree with all the anti-union-teachers-are-over-paid-and-under-performing sentiment. My perspective though isn’t as a parent looking into the actual system working, but rather as someone who went to a four year university that had a major teachers college. While there were a few education majors that I liked, the vast majority of education majors that I ran into where some of the laziest and dumbest students I’ve ever met.

Many of these education majors where in education simply because they didn’t know what else to do. I tended to see a lot of secondary education math majors in my math classes, and I wouldn’t want most them teaching my children mathematics at ANY level. While I realize this was only one college, since it’s suppose to be a better place to get a degree in education I imagine it’s a fairly representative picture of education students.

60

[quote]hardgnr wrote:
I just wish they would teach you guys the metric system like THE REST OF THE WORLD! Converting is gay.[/quote]

They teach it in science classes. I’m comfortable with metric. I have to agree though, I wish it would become the dominant system in America.