Education in the United States
We have a thread devoted to academic freedom at universities, and we have a thread devoted to whether higher education should be subsidized. This thread is a landing spot for discussion of other issues related to education -- issues like school integration, pedagogy, the influence of politics on education (and vice versa), charter schools, public v. private schools, achievement gaps, and gerrymandering of school districts.
I'll start the discussion with two articles. The first deals with a major changes in the public school system in NYC.
NYC's public schools are highly segregated for such a diverse city. Last Friday, Bill DeBlasio announced the following:
Middle schools will see the most significant policy revisions. The city will eliminate all admissions screening for the schools for at least one year, the mayor said. About 200 middle schools — 40 percent of the total — use metrics like grades, attendance and test scores to determine which students should be admitted. Now those schools will use a random lottery to admit students.
In doing this, Mr. de Blasio is essentially piloting an experiment that, if deemed successful, could permanently end the city’s academically selective middle schools, which tend to be much whiter than the district overall.
DeBlasio also announced that:
New York will also eliminate a policy that allowed some high schools to give students who live nearby first dibs at spots — even though all seats are supposed to be available to all students, regardless of where they reside.
The system of citywide choice was implemented by former Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg in 2004 as part of an attempt to democratize high school admissions. But Mr. Bloomberg exempted some schools, and even entire districts, from the policy, and Mr. de Blasio did not end those carve outs.
The most conspicuous example is Manhattan’s District 2, one of the whitest and wealthiest of the city’s 32 local school districts. Students who live in that district, which includes the Upper East Side and the West Village, get priority for seats in some of the district’s high schools, which are among the highest-performing schools in the city.
No other district in the city has as many high schools — six — set aside for local, high-performing students.
Many of those high schools fill nearly all of their seats with students from District 2 neighborhoods before even considering qualified students from elsewhere. As a result, some schools, like Eleanor Roosevelt High School on the Upper East Side, are among the whitest high schools in all of New York City.
Here is the New York Times article that describes the changes:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/18/nyreg...
Obvious questions for discussion include:
- How large a priority should cities place on ensuring that city schools are representative of the city as a whole?
- Are measures like the ones that DeBlasio is implementing likely to be effective in making schools more representative?
- Will these measures have unintended (or intended) consequences that extend far beyond changing the representativeness of city schools?
have you ever considered that the statistics you've provided have been the result of school districts doing some, um, creative accounting in order to meet certain criteria?
Sure, it’s pretty hard to fake data in a convincing enough manner though, there are many checks yiu can do. I mean I also “considered” the argument that Trump really won in 2020, the covid vaccine is unsafe and inflation had been over 10% continuously since the Obama years and government economists are hiding it. I concluded that ideologically driven cultural conservatives are about the least mathematically literate group out there and will believe anything they want to regardless of truth or even common sense.
Sure, it’s pretty hard to fake data in a convincing enough manner though, there are many checks yiu can do. I mean I also “considered” the argument that Trump really won in 2020, the covid vaccine is unsafe and inflation had been over 10% continuously since the Obama years and government economists are hiding it.
is that anecdotal or do you have an expert study to back it up?
as an aside, liberals are the ones who abhor common sense. right wing types will generally use the power of observation to draw conclusions, while liberals throw 'expert data' in your face.
examples:
R: there are two genders, because that's what we've seen since the dawn of man.
L: no, there are in fact one thousand (or none) because Dr.Leftinexpert did a study that shows this.
R: A certain subset of the population commits most of the violent crime.
L: No, we need gun control.
R: the school system sucks. teachers are miserable because 5-10% of the class ruins it for everyone else.
L: while our studies indicate people are magically smarter since federal law said they had to be...or else.
R: the only people dying from covid are old and weak. certainly not children.
L: if you dont wear a mask, you are essentially a terrorist. if your kid doesnt wear one he cant be educated.
Sure. Cultural conservatives will say they are data driven before showing up to a rally and storming the Capitol. But aside from hardcore cultural conservatives, where the view is dominant, the claims that Trump won are rightly derided as lies. Even controlling for the lack of education and higher education among conservatives, it’s hard to explain such obvious lies gaining traction in only these heavily ideological culturally conservative groups; without confirming my obvious anecdotal conclusion and the opposite of yours, that these guys are somehow able to look around and make up for their lack of IQs/education with the power of observation.
While you talk down at conservatives using your various graduate degrees as a stand-in for a credible argument, a massive group of people who have voted in a near monolithic bloc for your politicians of choice continue to suffer.
Milwaukee has been run by card-carrying socialists or democrats for well over a century on every level of local government and spends more on the local school district than the entire budget of the United States Coast Guard, but they still can't figure it out.
Spending twice or thrice what other schools do on a per-pupil basis hasn't worked, and they're just all out of ideas.
While you talk down at conservatives using your various graduate degrees as a stand-in for a credible argument, a massive group of people who have voted in a near monolithic bloc for your politicians of choice continue to suffer.
Milwaukee has been run by card-carrying socialists or democrats for well over a century on every level of local government and spends more on the local school district than the entire budget of the United States Coast Guard, but they still can't figure it out.
Spending tw
Sure. And rural areas have been culturally conservative/backwards since before the civil war and sill are some of the worst places in the country to live today. I never said I knew how to solve whatever problems may or any not even exist in Milwaukee or the ones we know do exist in rural shitholes. You made a claim about the cause that doesn't make much sense.
As the libs are always keen to point out, those rural areas don't hold very many individuals.
Milwaukee Public Schools represents 10% of the total student population in the entire state of Wisconsin, and it's an unmitigated disaster.
Sure...rural America has been struggling and unable to support itself for a while now causing massive population drop or best case enough development to get the promotion to sparse suburban, most of which still suck. But again, nothing to do with your point and diagnosis for supposed poor school performance.
Sure. Cultural conservatives will say they are data driven before showing up to a rally and storming the Capitol. But aside from hardcore cultural conservatives, where the view is dominant, the claims that Trump won are rightly derided as lies. Even controlling for the lack of education and higher education among conservatives, it’s hard to explain such obvious lies gaining traction in only these heavily ideological culturally conservative groups; without confirming my obvious anecdotal
calling guys like these culturally conservative is... a joke I hope
Sure. And rural areas have been culturally conservative/backwards since before the civil war and sill are some of the worst places in the country to live today. I never said I knew how to solve whatever problems may or any not even exist in Milwaukee or the ones we know do exist in rural shitholes. You made a claim about the cause that doesn't make much sense.
this was 2015, top and bottom of the rankings.
aside from the fact that even the "best" state has horrendous results given the money spent, this doesn't look at all like a democrat vs republican nor an urban vs rural thing, especially when you consider Washington DC horrible numbers.
nasty rural republicans destroying American education!
btw this is what is basic level for NAEP in grade 4, basically reading comics understanding the story would be more than enough
Wait what? 65% of American kids can't read properly? I mean, I knew it was bad, but WTF! I'm looking at the first chart with the US overall bar.
*in public schools iirc
half the 10y old in LA public schools can't read a comic understanding it.
And according to experts IIT that's because of the state of schools in rural Alabama, and because of republicans.
According to other people that's because some of those kids are very violent and disrupt teaching and nothing is done to keep them away from the normal kids.
no one cares to admit if your brain is normal and you parents are good, you can read a comic at 10 even if you don't go to school.
many of us could before they went to school!
I'm looking at the 35% bar in the first diagram, what exactly is that saying? That 65% of 10 year olds in the US can't read properly? I mean, I understand that's what it's saying, that is just crazy to me. What are the comparable stats for UK or other European countries?
That's the bottom of the rank, the second is the top of the rank, 2015 data about public schools, proficient level or better in literacy per state.
Then I gave one data point about a democrat urban feud, in a democrat state with horrible public school results in urban areas (to counter the claim it was about ruralness, or about republicans).
There half the kids aren't even at basic level (reading a comic)
It's 65% of the 10y old that go to public schools can't read WELL (not proficient), or rather couldn't, in 2015.
That's the bottom of the rank, the second is the top of the rank, 2015 data about public schools, proficient level or better in literacy per state.
Then I gave one data point about a democrat urban feud, in a democrat state with horrible public school results in urban areas (to counter the claim it was about ruralness, or about republicans).
There half the kids aren't even at basic level (reading a comic)
How does the US as a whole rank second from? Shouldn't it be around median? The states towards the bottom don't seem to be the most populous ones, I'm confused.
To clarify: I am looking at the bar that says "United States 35%".
ETA: Sorry, just realised it's not second from bottom. Looks like I can't read either, well, not diagrams anyway.
Actually I imagine California at 28% and Texas at 31% drag down the average quite a bit.
International comparisons can be done but to my knowledge, we dont have the internationally comparable data (PISA scores, a very decent attempt to measure students achievements internationally in a comparable way) divided between public and private schools for the USA. Or maybe we do but I can't find them.
Anyway the USA for PISA has decent absolute numbers, a little over OECD avg, at 15y old (that's what PISA measures).
But that includes private schools, and the good public schools we discussed.
USA has under OECD average results for the 2nd, 3rd, 4th quintile of income distribution (*international income distribution, so it's not 60% of students, rarher way less)
So, it seems the consensus here is that our education systems is bad, but nothing can be done about it.
le sigh
lol one of the two parties is saying "do vouchers, do charter schools", and doing it where it governs, and improving results saving money in the process
Tell me exactly how this works. Do we completely eliminate public schools, or just siphon money away from them? Will the voucher pay 100% of the private school tuition? How much would that come out per student vs. public school. Can we guarantee every student can attend?
