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?
i dont think people acknowledge this at all. i certainly dont. i've seen private schools that are significantly worse than well funded public schools.
vouchers just exacerbates the problems that already exists, that schools have such a wide range of funding disparities. private schools just select choice applicants and then people like you try to compare them directly. like of course the traveling recruiting u16 soccer team will crush the local team that can only take players in the district.
NYS K12 public schools spend 30k per pupil per year (more than any other country in the world). They include schools with horrendous results, while funding is very similar across public chools in NYS (the state compensates local discrepancies).
Care to admit that NYS schools problem are absolutely certainly not money problems?
Garbage in, garbage out. The problem isn't in the machinery, it's with the ingredients. Schools can't fix broken families.
Well, not every one. But maybe if we decided on much smaller classrooms so kids could get more one on one. Or maybe we hire a buttload of tutors to encourage kids.
Maybe we don't fix every kid. But maybe if we can get one kid in a class to change from dropout to successful, he/she passes that along to his/her child. Or maybe we get kids that are willing to do the work but have no chance of college and get them to college. And maybe the next generation isn't as failure oriented.
It won't happen over night but we can change the tide.
Like everything else, "we" have to decide this is important.
NYS K12 public schools spend 30k per pupil per year (more than any other country in the world). They include schools with horrendous results, while funding is very similar across public chools in NYS (the state compensates local discrepancies).
Care to admit that NYS schools problem are absolutely certainly not money problems?
I'd be interested to see where the money actually goes.
Main new cost center is DEI (the totality od which can be abolished with no changes in the quality of education), but generic admin bloat which started decades ago does a big part.
Then there is the common (in the USA) excess in sport costs in some cases.
But anyway, it's 30k per pupil per year. A lot more than enough to get excellent results, yet NYS k12 public schools have terrible results.
The fact that 56% of students in NYC public schools are economically disadvantaged (qualified for free lunch and so on) is the reason, results would be approx the same spending half or double, everyone knows it.
Zuckerberg tried to fix public schools with money. He tried that in Newark where they sucked badly as well.
It went as expected
Most of it went to the same teachers who failed before and so they kept failing lol.
Only the portion going to charter schools helped a bit, but logistic mistakes (my public admins) made that sort of problematic as well.
https://www.businessinsider.com/mark-zuc...
But let's try again why not it's only money and it's not like the USA are too much in debt or anything
Well, not every one. But maybe if we decided on much smaller classrooms so kids could get more one on one. Or maybe we hire a buttload of tutors to encourage kids.
That's a lot of time and effort spent avoiding the real issue, which is that maybe 1 in 8 of these kids are preventing the other 7 from receiving an education.
We used to pull those kids out of the general classroom because they were a lost cause due to their family environment. Now they're forced back into the general classrooms to ensure that everyone fails.
But hey, no child left behind!
Private schools deal with these kids by expelling them. Rich school districts deal with this by virtue of the fact that it's more like 1 in 500 instead of 1 in 8.
Everyone thinks I'm nuts for advocating military-style boarding schools for these kids, but I have yet to see any other useful recommendations for the real cause of inner city school failure, which is our complete inability to deal with behavior problems.
That's a lot of time and effort spent avoiding the real issue, which is that maybe 1 in 8 of these kids are preventing the other 7 from receiving an education.
We used to pull those kids out of the general classroom because they were a lost cause due to their family environment. Now they're forced back into the general classrooms to ensure that everyone fails.
But hey, no child left behind!
Private schools deal with these kids by expelling them. Rich school districts deal with this by virtue of t
It might be less than 1 in 8 overall, but more than 1 in 8 in public schools in some places.
In some areas public schools basically are self sorted as the bottom of the pile, every parent who cares about their children education and can afford to (or has access to charter schools) flees from them in some areas.
Which leaves exclusively poor people, and people who don't care at all about the quality of education, in public schools (in those areas).
There is academic consensus that diminishing returns sets in very quickly in terms of school spending per pupil and between state and federal fundings, most of the schools are well enough funded.
There is academic consensus that diminishing returns sets in very quickly in terms of school spending per pupil and between state and federal fundings, most of the schools are well enough funded.
Experts paid by teachers unions disagree as do politicians who get donations from teachers unions
Which leaves exclusively poor people, and people who don't care at all about the quality of education, in public schools (in those areas).
Yes, and these schools are the ones that get all the press and people on the left accusing evil right wingers of whatever offense comes up on the Wheel of Oppression that day.
We already spend far more money on these schools than the functional suburban ones, but it's on stupid bullshit like consultants who design campaigns about mindfulness, instead of locking the problem children up in a room away from everyone else and then telling mom to **** off when she calls to complain that she's going to report you to whatever acronym organization can round up the most protesters.
Nature can begin to heal if we take a hard stance on behavior issues the second they start to manifest. Spend a few days shadowing classrooms in these districts and tell me what you'd do. Suspensions and other in-school punishments aren't an option because those reflect poorly on the DPI reports for the district and affect funding. Of course, the very concept of school suspension being a punishment is outdated and from a time where parents had a sense of shame when their kid wasn't allowed to go to school.
Metal detectors and security guards aren't free ldo.
Theoretically you shouldn't need that, if you permanently removed offenders from schools well before.
Fact is that's only the tip of the iceberg of the problems.
We have schools with abysmal results in Italy where the violence problem is only a small fraction of what it is in the USA.
As much as it is visible and shocking to think of an 11y old using knives at school or whatever, the problem is much bigger than that.
It's about whole segments of the population having real problems with stuff that for many of us is exceptionally easy.
The "proficiency" required for base levels at 10 or 12 years in literacy is something that many kids get at 7. It's incredible anyone without a serious diagnosed cognitive problem could lack base proficiency in literacy at 10.
In some areas half of students in public schools do.
I am sure having some very violent elements kn their classrooms isn't helping but I am pretty sure that's not the only reason, probably not even the main one
There are adult posters on this (and every other) forum who don't have base level writing profiency, so I don't know know why it surprises you that there are 12 year old kids who don't.
I am sure having some very violent elements kn their classrooms isn't helping but I am pretty sure that's not the only reason, probably not even the main one
I'll forgive you for being Italian and having no clue about this, but you're incorrect.
Behavior issues are the primary cause for negative outcomes in the areas of America where shitty schools get a lot of bad press.
The reason we keep lowering the bar for proficiency is because there aren't enough hours in the day to both police these future criminals and teach everyone else in the class how to read.
You can't hold most failing kids back, either, because they don't just need more time to master the material. They never made an attempt in the first place.
The teachers in Elm Grove don't have to spend 70% of their classroom time on behavior correction like the ones in Milwaukee. It's not any more complicated than that.
There are adult posters on this (and every other) forum who don't have base level writing profiency, so I don't know know why it surprises you that there are 12 year old kids who don't.
I think the person you have in mind (l***n) has a far better literacy proficiency than what is needed to get a "basic" assessment for a 11y old
For the record, I didn't have anyone specific in mind. The only thing I had in mind is if you read user submitted content online long enough you realise how many borderline illiterate people there are around.
Overall, this forum probably enjoys a much higher level of literacy than is average online, for obvious reasons.
For the record, I didn't have anyone specific in mind. The only thing I had in mind is if you read user submitted content online long enough you realise how many borderline illiterate people there are around.
Overall, this forum probably enjoys a much higher level of literacy than is average online, for obvious reasons.
I think you fail to realize that 11y old that don't reach basic levels of literacy, can't read a short paragraph about anything giving you back the most relevant elements in it
not even about something they care about.
if you think voters, imagine a voter NOT UNDERSTANDING the question of a referendum, whether yes or no is what he thinks is proper as an answer.
the most stupid conspiracy theorist that can write to you the basic elements of a purported conspiracy (Including 5g tracking vaccines, to give the idea) is FAR more literate than the people we are talking about.
who wouldn't be able to write the conspiracy they refer to.
we are talking 11y old kids who don't understand 3 lines about the character of the videogame they play hours per day.
That's a lot of time and effort spent avoiding the real issue, which is that maybe 1 in 8 of these kids are preventing the other 7 from receiving an education.
We used to pull those kids out of the general classroom because they were a lost cause due to their family environment. Now they're forced back into the general classrooms to ensure that everyone fails.
But hey, no child left behind!
Private schools deal with these kids by expelling them. Rich school districts deal with this by virtue of t
i'm a product of boston public schools. back when i was in middle school each grade was split up by letters, maybe A-F. the 6a class was the brightest and 6f the not so brights and/or severe behavior issues. i'm assuming the school had access to testing results to divide classes up like this but it seemed to work okay.
i have no idea but im guessing in modern day public schools this is not done anymore. this was thirty years ago, fwiw.
I think you fail to realize that 11y old that don't reach basic levels of literacy, can't read a short paragraph about anything giving you back the most relevant elements in it
not even about something they care about.
if you think voters, imagine a voter NOT UNDERSTANDING the question of a referendum, whether yes or no is what he thinks is proper as an answer.
Oh I don't have to imagine that, we had Brexit.
i'm a product of boston public schools. back when i was in middle school each grade was split up by letters, maybe A-F. the 6a class was the brightest and 6f the not so brights and/or severe behavior issues. i'm assuming the school had access to testing results to divide classes up like this but it seemed to work okay.
i have no idea but im guessing in modern day public schools this is not done anymore. this was thirty years ago, fwiw.
I'm a product of the Boston system as well, and I can vouch that the units in Nashua St. and South Bay are still coded similarly. Floor number + letter.
i'm a product of boston public schools. back when i was in middle school each grade was split up by letters, maybe A-F. the 6a class was the brightest and 6f the not so brights and/or severe behavior issues. i'm assuming the school had access to testing results to divide classes up like this but it seemed to work okay.
i have no idea but im guessing in modern day public schools this is not done anymore. this was thirty years ago, fwiw.
some places do this reversed. They test to make homogeneous classes.
when the number of "problematic students" is low, that's actually very very good for everyone. top students learn to deal with actual normal people, or people under average. and they get the chance to be in a group with far more resourceful people, and they can learn something in the process.
I can't remember right now how this system is called but it works, this is how my kid school makes classes.
but to be clear, the starting material is above average, this is how you can "absorb" students with problems successfully.
if the ratio of problematic students is too high (something in the range of over 10-20% of total) everything blows up
