Common Core

[Arkady]

I guess my point is that things may not be quite as we perceive them. There are three "types" we tend to compare ourselves with negatively. One is someplace like Finland - a relatively small and socialistic country. There are certainly some things we can learn from the Finns, but not all would be applicable to our reality.

Another sort of place we compare ourselves is someplace like China or India. Both of these countries are graduating millions of highly educated kids. But...we tend to forget that for every well educated Indian or Chinese kid, there are at least ten receiving virtually no education whatsoever.

Or...let's consider a large, democratic, capitalist country like Germany. It may appear as if German kids are outperforming ours. But...we need to acknowledge that the Germans start funneling their kids in to "success tracks" at a relatively young age.

Some suggest that we should follow the German model. I don't know if a little of that would hurt. BUT...for Americans to submit to that sort of overarching control.....let's just say it ain't happening!

How about Canada?

 

[Arkady]

Tracking? They are the government and in control of this. The dont want you to know they are dumbing down.

Why not? The government tracks all sorts of stuff. Sometimes they show improvement (falling violent crime, rising test scores). Sometimes worsening (rising obesity and global temperatures).

And, as I said, other tests, tracked by others, like IQ tests, echo the same long-term trend of improvement.

 

[fairsheet]

I like the sports analogy. If you take any individual team in a particular sport, chances are the recent editions of that team are the most talented in its history, in raw terms. For example, the recent Chicago Cubs teams are almost certainly far bigger, faster, and stronger and better at their sport, in absolute terms, than the Chicago cubs teams of the early 20th century. If you time them all in the 100 m dash, or measured their max benchpress and squat, or any other absolute measure, I bet a whole lot of money the modern team would beat the living hell out of the early 20th-century team, and would beat them on the field, too. Yet, those early 20th century teams won championships, and the modern team doesn't. The cubs have gotten much, much better, but all of the other teams advanced even more. In the same way, education in this country has improved, but it improved more in a lot of other countries.

Although it's stalled a bit of late, some Americans have been freaked out for some time about the fact that China's economy was growing at a faster rate than America's. What they don't seem to be picking up on though, was that China started out so far behind us, that they simply had a whole lot more "room" to grow.

I see education similarly. Let's take S. Korea. S. Korean students have been closing their gap with American students at shall I say...a rapid pace. Yet, we mustn't forget that little more than 50 years ago, S. Korea was a 3rd-world country. The Korean education system had a lot more "blue sky" than ours.

We may even see data suggesting that as of today, S. Korean kids are outperforming Americans kids, especially as to STEM courses. We need to pay attention to that. But...we also need to consider....where are the noted S.Korean linguists, and writers, and economists, and political scientists, and inventers...and on and on? Until we decide that STEM is the only thing of consequence or it appears that S. Koreans are outperforming we Americans across the board, we shouldn't be suggesting absolute comparisons between one system and another.

And just for fun....lemme toss in one of my favorite and ad nausem factiods. Of the 11,500 universities in the ENTIRE 7.8 Billion member world, 7,500 are right here in the U.S.

 

[fairsheet]

How about Canada?

As far as I'm concerned and as with more things that most of us may be willing to admit, Canada is more similar to us, than anyone. And, that means that IF we're able to find "all other things be equal" advantages in the way Canada goes about this sort of thing, those things are probably the most viable and realistic in terms of our adopting them.

 

[fairsheet]

And before the last couple of decades, there was almost NO school violence. (I can't speak for big cities, however).

The empirical data suggests that our schools are LESS violent than they've ever been. For the life of me, I can't figure out why people seem so eager to believe the opposite.

 

[Arkady]

The empirical data suggests that our schools are LESS violent than they've ever been. For the life of me, I can't figure out why people seem so eager to believe the opposite.

People here ridicule me for relying on statistics, but that's the best way to see past one's prejudices. I start with a lot of false assumptions, just like everyone else. I get the same misleading new stories, etc. I once assumed schools were getting more and more violent. But when I look into it more carefully and find out that I was wrong, I don't cling irrationally to my initial false assumption.

 

[fairsheet]

People here ridicule me for relying on statistics, but that's the best way to see past one's prejudices. I start with a lot of false assumptions, just like everyone else. I get the same misleading new stories, etc. I once assumed schools were getting more and more violent. But when I look into it more carefully and find out that I was wrong, I don't cling irrationally to my initial false assumption.

Of course, there are lots of instances where the truth is WORSE than the reality. But...there are lots of instances like this one (and Social Security) where the truth is actually considerably more positive than the conventional wisdom. In the latter case, I just don't understand why so many people cling so desperately to their (false) conventional wisdom.

As "they" say...."Let it go!"

 

[Charcat]

The empirical data suggests that our schools are LESS violent than they've ever been. For the life of me, I can't figure out why people seem so eager to believe the opposite.

I suppose it depends on what kind of violence you're talking about. I don't recall any school violence anywhere where I grew up....in the State of Washington, by the way. I'm sure they always had problems in the big cities.

 

[Arkady]

Of course, there are lots of instances where the truth is WORSE than the reality. But...there are lots of instances like this one (and Social Security) where the truth is actually considerably more positive than the conventional wisdom. In the latter case, I just don't understand why so many people cling so desperately to their (false) conventional wisdom.

As "they" say...."Let it go!"

I think you'll find the phenomenon is far more common among conservatives. I believe that's because of the very nature of a conservative ideology. Progressives tend to think of history as a nightmare from which we are trying to awake (to borrow a phrase from Stephen Dadelus). Conservatives tend to think that there was a golden past, in the 1950s (or the Antebellum era, for an earlier generation, or the time of the Founders, or the Middle Ages, or the time of the Church fathers, all the way back to a mythical Eden). They believe that we should be striving to reclaim what was lost. So, when actual stats show that, for example, schools are safer and students better educated today, it isn't taken as a welcome sign of progress, but rather as an attack on a core belief system.

 

[Arkady]

I suppose it depends on what kind of violence you're talking about. I don't recall any school violence anywhere where I grew up....in the State of Washington, by the way. I'm sure they always had problems in the big cities.

The government tracks theft, violence in general, and serious violence in particular. All of these things have declined substantially in schools:

http://nces.ed.gov/programs/crimeindicators/crimeindicators2012/tables/table_02_1.asp

There aren't the same kind of compiled official stats for schools prior to 1992, but sociologists have compiled the stats themselves, for the wider society, and they show an overall pattern. Violence in America was generally fairly high for most of its history (as you'd expect from what was, essentially, a frontier society). Things got particularly bad in the 1920s (Prohibition and severe income inequality). Then we had a period of low violence, in the 1950s and very early 1960s. Then things got worse again, pretty steadily, leading up to an all-time peak in violent crime in 1991. Ever since then, things have been getting better.... a lot better, in fact: violent crime has fallen by about half. To the extent separate school stats can be pieced together from these earlier eras, they typically show the same overall pattern.

I haven't seen stats indicating how much of the violence in these various eras was in big cities versus rural areas and the suburbs. But I'd caution against just trying to work from your own recollection, since that can be influenced by changing patterns of news coverage. With the 24/7 news cycle of the CNN/MSNBC/Fox News era, any school shooting anywhere in the country gets reported on exhaustively, so we all hear about it, whereas in prior eras, most such events would only make the local news. So, we perceive a great uptick in the reporting of such events, when there has not actually been an increase of the rate of the events themselves.

 

[fairsheet]

I suppose it depends on what kind of violence you're talking about. I don't recall any school violence anywhere where I grew up....in the State of Washington, by the way. I'm sure they always had problems in the big cities.

Ten acts of violence occur in 2004, but you're only made aware of one of them. Five acts of violence occur in 2014 and you're made aware of four of them. Has violence increased by a factor of four?

 

[connieb]

My little city's public high school routinely produces more national merit scholars than any other in the state. My two stepchildren on the other hand, were average as can be. I saw the work they were doing. It was average.....and they accomplished it averagely!

But....the fact of all those national merit scholars suggests to me that the opportunities are definitely there, for those who seek them. The same was true in my high school. A lot of kids took the minimum amount of math to graduate. My mother made me take a "college prep". level of math. And...note that I say "college"prep, not "math degree prep". Those kids that took the minimum, didn't hold me back. And then...there were students who DID take something a akin to a math degree prep. level. And....they weren't held back by me!

There is certainly chance to excel come HS. But, I none in elementary school. And, since we learn the best the younger we are - I believe that it is in elementary school where we really need to push students to learn and excel and fill up those little sponges that are their brains.

connie

 

[connieb]

There is no substitute for a well trained mind. Going through calculations on a given problem are key to deep understanding. I don't agree with this logic at all.

You are so right. I have seen so many accounting students come out and not be able to understand how debits and credits really work because so much has been computerized, etc.

And, that is great to use the computer now as a shortcut. I would not be in this career if I still had to use 13 column paper every day. BUT- if you don't actually understand what you are doing and why -when the program screws up or when the person entering things screws up - how will you ever know, or be able to figure out how to fix it?

I use an adding machine every day - so much so that I really don't do math in my head at all anymore. BUT - I have done enough math and know enough math on sight that when I look at my number on my adding machine I can say, wait a minute.. that can't be right.

connie

 

[fairsheet]

There is certainly chance to excel come HS. But, I none in elementary school. And, since we learn the best the younger we are - I believe that it is in elementary school where we really need to push students to learn and excel and fill up those little sponges that are their brains.

connie

Even clear back in the 60's when I was in elementary school, we had plenty of opportunities. For instance...again, clear back in the 60's, we had a reading/writing program called "SRA". We better reader/writers participated in this program seperately from our classrooms as a whole. The program included the best students from both the 5th and 6th grades. I remember that I was in the 5th grade, yet outperformed most of the 6th graders. Does this sound like a bit of conceit?.....yeah, I suppose it does. But, it also makes the point that there was no "ceiling" to my opportunity.

Even as to the classroom in general though.....if teacher assigned a book report, I chose a book and submitted a report at my level. The other kids did the same. If the "slower" kid next to me chose a simple book at her reading level and submitted an equally simple report, she might well have been praised for her work, based on her level of competence and expectations. If I chose the same book and submitted the same report, I would've been ripped a new one. To some (many?) then and now, that might sound "unfair". I never thought so, then or now.

 

[fairsheet]

You are so right. I have seen so many accounting students come out and not be able to understand how debits and credits really work because so much has been computerized, etc.

And, that is great to use the computer now as a shortcut. I would not be in this career if I still had to use 13 column paper every day. BUT- if you don't actually understand what you are doing and why -when the program screws up or when the person entering things screws up - how will you ever know, or be able to figure out how to fix it?

I use an adding machine every day - so much so that I really don't do math in my head at all anymore. BUT - I have done enough math and know enough math on sight that when I look at my number on my adding machine I can say, wait a minute.. that can't be right.

connie

No question....as we old fuddy-duddies love telling all who'll listen, the computer absolutely is NOT an exact replacement for all that came before. I'll be the first to make that point. But....that doesn't mean that it can't be an improvement upon SOME things that came before.

Sometimes, the "way we used to do things" IS better. Sometimes it isn't. So once again.....we need to make sure our fatuosity and pomposity isn't overriding our reason.