Is it possible to achieve equity through the education system?

[superpunch]

If it's like the US system with normal and advanced classes, that's a shame. I took honors English 9 th grade, AP English 10th, 11th grade then regular English in 12th grade. It went from being a challenge to feeling like I was in a class for people with learning disabilities.

Easy A and was self destructive. Just made me feel like I was specially intelligent -- better than other people (entitled) -- and further weakened my work ethic.

An entire high school career of that would have been very bad for my development.

A comfortable middle ground is to let the individual students decide whether they want to be in the normal or the advanced classes instead of having strict standards. That way, a "normal" student can still take an advanced class and, if he tries hard enough, succeed or he will fail on his own merits. But you can't say that he didn't have the chance that way.

 

[Grenz]

I find it really interesting that the Chinese or Indian immigrants who came here 20 or 30 years ago managed to spawn a bunch of doctors, engineers and entrepreneurs. How did they manage to do that without the help of a robust diversity curriculum?

 

[sangreporsangre]

I find it really interesting that the Chinese or Indian immigrants who came here 20 or 30 years ago managed to spawn a bunch of doctors, engineers and entrepreneurs. How did they manage to do that without the help of a robust diversity curriculum?

That's the elephant in the room when it comes to these discussions, isn't it? It's not like this is only limited to Chinese or Indian people either. My daughter is "historically marginalized" according to the SJW doctrine that they push, and yet she's always performed exceptionally well in school. Imo it's because she has a stable home life and 2 parents who support her in every way possible (albeit while not living together anymore). It seems to me that the family situation is the real predictor for success.

 

[Gregolian]

That's the elephant in the room when it comes to these discussions, isn't it? It's not like this is only limited to Chinese or Indian people either. My daughter is "historically marginalized" according to the SJW doctrine that they push, and yet she's always performed exceptionally well in school. Imo it's because she has a stable home life and 2 parents who support her in every way possible (albeit while not living together anymore). It seems to me that the family situation is the real predictor for success.

I know guys that had a stable home life who's only hope of getting a college education was football scholarships or the GI Bill post military cause their high school grades weren't great.

You can have 2 parents at home and still have utter dysfunction that limits your ability to succeed. The key is having parents or a parent that gives a shit about grades.

 

[sangreporsangre]

I know guys that had a stable home life who's only hope of getting a college education was football scholarships or the GI Bill post military cause their high school grades weren't great.

You can have 2 parents at home and still have utter dysfunction that limits your ability to succeed. The key is having parents or a parent that gives a shit about grades.

I agree 100%

 

[Gregolian]

I agree 100%

I'll admit up front, the dysfunction, and the way the guy's I know that went to the military to get a means to go to college, their parents essentially not giving a shit about their grades put a huge chip on their shoulder. All the ones that got out and went to college finished with a 3.8 or above GPA (out of 4.0).

They all also were in pretty high end units that required their brains even if they were still "boots on the ground with guns" types. not JSOC guys but they all were at minimum one step above basic infantry. The chip on their shoulder is boulder sized, but it's made them incredible people with incredible work ethics and they know how to use their intelligence.

 

[Grenz]

I can't comment on Finland. But we have something similar in Germany now where they tried to include mentally disabled in a regular school.
IMO it's not working well mostly because the school system in my state is not set up like that. We have special schools for the disabled people.
So regular schools don't have the manpower, budget or facilities to handle those mentals.

That's beside the issue that ordinary students are held back. But I have to say in Germany this is not so much driven by the SJW.
But somewhat by parents that to a certain degree don't accept their children have to go to a special school.
So its a bit of an uncomfortable issue.
But in general, I would say it's not working.

Not sure if it still works like this in Germany, but when I went to school there (mind you that's more than 20 years ago now), we had to write state exams in grade 4, and based on those results you were sent to one of the three branches of school, only one of which prepared you for university. So it went even beyond segregating special needs students, it segregated all students based on ability. It was a comparatively unforgiving system, students from your grade failing and having to repeat a grade would happen pretty much on a yearly basis starting pretty early. I was lucky enough to spend most of my school years there, because compared to the Gymnasium curriculum, Canadian high school is a fucking joke, even the advanced classes. I was an average student in Germany, and here I was like 90th percentile, having to put in only a fraction of the work I did back in Germany.

 

[Grenz]

That's the elephant in the room when it comes to these discussions, isn't it? It's not like this is only limited to Chinese or Indian people either. My daughter is "historically marginalized" according to the SJW doctrine that they push, and yet she's always performed exceptionally well in school. Imo it's because she has a stable home life and 2 parents who support her in every way possible (albeit while not living together anymore). It seems to me that the family situation is the real predictor for success.

My wife is a refugee from the Yugoslavian civil war, barely spoke English when she came here as a little girl in Elementary School, and now holds a PHD in human genetics from McGill. Stable homelife, which I agree is a predictor of academic success (although having a shitty homelife is not insurmountable).

The sad part of the diversity agenda is that it's not doing the kids any favours. Adaptability is the major advantage kids will always have over adults, they can almost seamlessly adapt and integrate where adults will have a lot more trouble. This is obviously extremely beneficial when you're moving to a foreign country and have to get used to a new culture.

To me, this is over-complexification of the school system. IMO schools need to refocus on the basics:

- Maths
- English
- World History from the time of the Greeks right up until the present, in order to create an understanding of how we got to this point. Plus, history encompasses all the social sciences, so you'll get a taste of psychology, sociology or political science as a result of studying history anyway.
- Phys Ed (kids need exercise and should also be taught proper nutrition here, it's not complicated enough to need a dedicated nutrition class - this will add enormous benefits when it comes to driving down health care costs in the future)
- The three major sciences, but I would only add those in the later years, most people just need base knowledge

That's it. Sprinkle in one elective class each semester in the later years, and maybe we won't be churning out an increasing number of people who are essentially unemployable beyond the basic levels.

 

[SammyPops]

Interestingly, I just had a conversation last night with a teacher about differentiated instruction and she felt positively about it but that it put significantly more burden on the teacher in order to make it work. She echoed the idea that the wider the range of abilities in the classroom, the difficult it was to implement.

However, she also noted that she started teaching at a public school, she's at an expensive independent school now and the difference in school resources combined with smaller classrooms makes things possible that she couldn't do at the public school.

Never ask teachers abut the education system, similar to never ask doctors about the medical system.

 

[snakedafunky]

Not sure if it still works like this in Germany, but when I went to school there (mind you that's more than 20 years ago now), we had to write state exams in grade 4, and based on those results you were sent to one of the three branches of school, only one of which prepared you for university. So it went even beyond segregating special needs students, it segregated all students based on ability. It was a comparatively unforgiving system, students from your grade failing and having to repeat a grade would happen pretty much on a yearly basis starting pretty early. I was lucky enough to spend most of my school years there, because compared to the Gymnasium curriculum, Canadian high school is a fucking joke, even the advanced classes. I was an average student in Germany, and here I was like 90th percentile, having to put in only a fraction of the work I did back in Germany.

Yeah in Northrhine Westfalia where I am from I think it still works like that. It has been almost 20 years for me as well .
But you didn't have to write a state exam in grade 4, but your grades and the teacher would usually recommend were you end up.

It does sound somehow unforgiving. But you could still change to the "better" school after grade 10. That's what I did, I started in the "lower" ability school and later changed after grade 10.
You can also always go back to school after your apprentiship. And get a Bachelor as an engineer for example. That's what a lot of my friends did that didn't go to the best school.
Its paid for by the government and usually, you can keep working at your company and do your education part-time.

I am actually in favor of that system. Taking myself as an example, I wasn't that "mature" and didn't take studying seriously. So for me, my parents decided it would be better to go to the "low" ability school first.
My sister went to the Gymnasium, but I simply wouldn't have had the ability to do it at the time.

 

[lifelessheap]

I find it really interesting that the Chinese or Indian immigrants who came here 20 or 30 years ago managed to spawn a bunch of doctors, engineers and entrepreneurs. How did they manage to do that without the help of a robust diversity curriculum?

They need to check their white privilege, and they need to stop oppressing minorities.

 

[panamaican]

Never ask teachers abut the education system, similar to never ask doctors about the medical system.

Why not? They have more direct experience than I do. Doesn't mean they're always right but they're closer to the reality than most of us so long as you remember that they have a professional bias.

 

[panamaican]

I find it really interesting that the Chinese or Indian immigrants who came here 20 or 30 years ago managed to spawn a bunch of doctors, engineers and entrepreneurs. How did they manage to do that without the help of a robust diversity curriculum?

Because all of the parents that struggled with our system were sent back to China and India.

 

[HIMBOB]

I do like splitting major subjects based on ability.

Compared to me most of the population are retarded at maths.
Compared to most of the population i am retarded at English.
(My highschool results firmly support this) .

I see no value mixing students of differing ability when you can easily split them.

Further i feel this would be a negative effect for the brightest students in the worst schools and these are the students we should encourage most.

 

[SammyPops]

Why not? They have more direct experience than I do. Doesn't mean they're always right but they're closer to the reality than most of us so long as you remember that they have a professional bias.

Because they are bias and receive special treatment from the system.

 

[panamaican]

Because they are bias and receive special treatment from the system.

By that logic, we should never ask anyone about the system that they work under. Instead we should ask people with no experience to do so?

 

[SammyPops]

By that logic, we should never ask anyone about the system that they work under. Instead we should ask people with no experience to do so?

No, you should ask experts in the field. Sure, go ahead and ask whoever you want I guess, just expect a certain self serving answer.

 

[panamaican]

No, you should ask experts in the field. Sure, go ahead and ask whoever you want I guess, just expect a certain self serving answer.

Sure, but you started the conversation with "never" which seemed a step too far.

 

[SammyPops]

Sure, but you started the conversation with "never" which seemed a step too far.

True. I think its a bad idea to ask such people, and I woudl be happy to never do so, but to each his own. I am unrustled if you do so. Just be prepared if you ask teachers to hear that the way to fix everything is to respect teachers more, which means more pay, benefits, shorter working days etc.


Not to oversimplify, but it gets bakc to the fox guarding the hen house thing really.

 

[WorldofWarcraft]

How are the rest going to compete when they import so many Chinese people