Our downward spiral a direct result of inferior education systems

[Used and Abused]

This is a country where most Americans only know one language (English), and furthermore, the majority of us don't know (or care) about the goings on and suffering of people in other countries. We consume as much oil and electricity as we like. Which people are easier to "take over" than us? It's no wonder that Bush "won," and most Americans are not questioning it. It's no wonder that all the legislation harmful to regular people are being pushed through without raised eyebrows from the public.

I think this is a direct result of an inferior education system. People in third world countries receive better and more thorough educations than what most of us receive here in the United States.

[iconoclastic cat]

1. A HUGE part of the problem is a manufactured scorn for education

that certain factions in this country are using to foster widespread ignorance among the serfs.

[Stevious]

3. Ever heard

Rush Limbaugh ramble on about the intelligentsia?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligentsia

[K-W]

24. Too much education turns you into a dirty liberal.

The evil liberal teachorrists and commie professors use thier vile propaganda to turn you against america.

[BrklynLiberal]

38. Sad, but true. It is in the interest of the Bushite Minions to keep the

populace as ignorant as possible. More fodder for the factories and the army. Fewer questions and resistance.

[4morewars]

2. No doubt !

Education is the answer to most of the world's problems. And the criminals that are running things now want to cut funding for education !
Of course that works in their favor, doesn't it ?

[tabasco]

32. Education immunizes one against propaganda.

Fsacists thrive on an ignorant populace.

[bryant69]

4. This is probably accurate

But I don't think it's a long term winning strategy--after all it was a very close election, and I think the trends going forward favor us rather than the Republicans--so hopefully we can get things back on the road.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[MemphisTiger]

5. I'm seeing this is my city now for local elections

if you keep them dumb, they don't know what they are getting into.

[jandrok]

6. Please substantiate that statement....

...about people in the third world having better educational opportunities.

Based on everything that I've read, most of the third world is lucky to have even rudimentary educational capabilities, and a lot of those are run by religious organizations.

The Europeans, Aussies, and Japanese probably have us beat in terms of primary education, but our universities are still a model for the rest of the world to emulate.

[Used and Abused]

7. Talk to foreign college students

Ask them about their grades and SAT scores.

[jandrok]

17. That's not substantiating anything.....

I'm looking for numbers more than anything here. You've made a statement that you can't truly back up.

Here's the thing. I went to college at the University of Houston in the late 80's, early 90's. I met a lot of wonderful folks from across the globe. They all came here to get an education because they were not offered those opportunities at home.

Some of them did come from the third world, most did not. Not a single one of them was any "smarter" or more intelligent than an American student. As a whole, they were just as likey to achieve or fail as any other person in college.

As a side note, none of the Pakastani and Indian students that I knew believed in evolution. They laughed at the concept. It was completely foreign to them that we would believe that man had descended from lower species.

I guess what I'm getting at here is that we pay a lot of lip service to the idea that our educational system is of a lower order, but I'm not sold on that idea. It sets up a stereotype that can be very pervasive.

Want your kids to achieve? Work with them. Want your kids to get good SAT scores? Be a role model. Help them with their homework. Get involved. THOSE numbers are indisputable. THOSE kids will do better in school, period. That CAN be backed up with hard data.

I tutor and volunteer at my kid's school. Let's quit moaning about how our educational system is failing and DO something about the situation.

[K-W]

26. Our educational system is class and region based, that is the problem.

Just like our health care system. No one is saying you cant get a good education in the US. You can, and you can get excellent health care as well. Its just that not everyone has access to good schools and good healthcare. Alot of people have access to horrible schools and no health care.

The thing I point to as far as our education is concerened is ugly cosnervative idea that governemnt is inherently inefficient and there is always wasted money that can be trimmed from budgets. Under the guise of responsible spending, school systems around the country have to deal with inadequate growth, stagnation, and in many cases cuts in thier budgets as the US rides around on the back of the absurd philosophy that that you cure a society by starving its government.

[jandrok]

35. That's an excellent take on the situation......

And it's all the more reason to get involved in your children's education. Budget shortfalls in schools are abominable here in Texas, as I'm sure they are in most other states.

BUT....

Government spending has actually grown under the current adminstration, it's just that none of it has been funneled to the school systems. The idea of small government has always been a cornerstone of traditional conservative thinking, but the neo-cons have turned that on it's side. We now rob social services and education funds to support the miltary-industrial-homeland security complex. THEY'RE getting plenty of funding. Oh, and we lower taxes, too, and modify the tax laws so that corporations and individuals can skirt paying anything.

[MsTryska]

9. not educational opportunities.....

educations. full stop.




as in, when 3rd world people do go to school, they learn a whole lot more than 'murkans do.


espcially in these days of no child left behind.

[phylny]

8. Interesting observation.

I think it's a result of parents abdicating responsibility to everyone and everything except themselves.

[bleedingheart]

11. I couldn't agree more...many parents don't take an interest in their

children's education.

I love exposing my son and daughter to learning. They are both bright and ask tons of questions...

A love of learning must be fostered otherwise it will wither and die. Sometimes people will awaken to it on their own...but it is not easy...

[bleedingheart]

10. funny how the US colleges still attract students from around the world

my nephew is at Carnegie Mellon, holding around a 3.5 in CS...and he goes to school with some really bright young people from around the world as well as here in the US.

Why not back up your assertions with facts...

[derrald]

12. The number of foreigners who are coming to America to learn is decreasing

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review/trib/pmupdate/s_273899.html

http://www.dailyorange.com/news/2003/11/06/News/Universities.See.Decrease.In.Enrollment.Of.International.Students-550555.shtml

http://www.biomedcentral.com/news/20040630/01

first three sites I could get off of the top of my head - google around a bit and you'll find a whole lot more

On edit: One of the major reasons that a lot of these stories cite is the overreaching security measures they must subscribe to before they're granted a student visa

[bleedingheart]

20. the VISA problem is the key issue there...

[Salviati]

14. This is becoming less and less true though..

Not necessarily because the institutions are becoming worse, but because they do not want to, or cannot, come to the US. I'm currently in a graduate program, and several of the international students I know have been warned that they should probably not visit home, because they may not be able to come back, and we're talking about New Zealand here!

The following isn't so much a direct response to you, but more ideas that I've been thinking about for a couple of weeks now, and seemed appropriate to the conversation here...

The number of international applications to graduate programs has dropped dramatically in the last few years, as the US has clamped down on foreign visitors. The number of international applications to the grad program at UW dept of physics dropped 35% last year.

As bright international students are turned away from our universities, we lose out in a number of ways. A good number of those who come here to study end up staying, providing us with a more educated populace than we would muster domestically. With the clampdown on foreign students, we will lose this valuable addition to our society.

Those who do not stay, return to their home countries after 4-?? years of study in the US, being steeped in our culture, and having personal ties to the US. The dwindling numbers of international students will shrink this built in armada of ambassadors among the educated class around the world.

And thirdly, as more and more students find themselves unwilling or unable to study in the US, alternative institutions will grow up to replace those in the US, and we will lose our advantage we have held so long in this field.

[K-W]

27. Yah Carnagie Mellon is definately representative of our whole system.

Come on.

[MadHound]

13. There has been an ongoing, long term dumbing down of Americans

My mother was born in 1930, and back in the day, a lot of people didn't progress beyond eighth grade, thus kids got a LOT of knowledge crammed into their heads. My mother was doing what we consider high school algerbra in the sixth grade, along with the rest of her classmates. By the time I hit the school system, algerbra had been pushed back to ninth grade. Now it doesn't get taught as part of the regular curriculum until 11th grade or later.

Meanwhile, the value of education has decreased. Back in my mom's day, a high school degree truly meant something because when you were in high school, you were getting taught advanced college level courses. If you had a HS degree, you could be assured of a pretty decent, well paying job. Many industry leaders got to the top of their fields with no more than a HS degree. By the time I came through the system(60s-70s), high school degrees were a dime a dozen, and their worth was not as great. Ten cents and a HS degree would get you a job delivering pizza, but not much more(there were of course exceptions, but they were few). If you wanted to get a good job, college was almost mandatory.

And now even college is being devalued, due to the facts of grade inflation and the increasing load of remedial courses that they have to offer just to get high school grads up to college speed. I was taking a few classes at a local community college, and decided to take their college algerbra simply as a brush up. Imagine my astonishment when I found out that what they were teaching wasn't how to do algerbra, but how to punch the equations etc into a calculator and let the machine do it for you. No theory, no tables, no thinking for the humans, just punch in the figures and let the machine do the thinking!

And apparently this type of mindset is becoming increasingly common across the educational board, rather than figure out the problem yourself, simply learn how to enter data and let the machine do the heavy lifting. Spell checkers, grammar checkers, calculators, machines and software are taking over the functions formerly done by humans, while we are being reduced to data entry specialists.

Meanwhile the curriculum is being ever increasingly dumbed down. Course that I took in junior high are now limited to high school. NCLB and other such like programs are not teaching students how to think, but how to take tests. Our population is deliberately being dumbed down because it is easier to cow and fool a populace that is uneducated rather than one that is intelligent and worldly. This has been aptly demonstrated over the past five years, as we watch Bushco fooling most of the people most of the time, over and over again.

And now we've got the RW fundies successfully pushing through a curriculum requirement that teaches a "theory" that is nothing more than a myth, a fable, with no evidence backing it up. And better yet, they come up with a great Orwellian moniker for this "theory", calling it "intelligent design". What is even scarier is that they're being successful in getting legitiamte, well proven facts like evolution thrown completely out of the curriculum:eyes:

I fear for the upcoming generations. I fear that my nieces and nephews children will only be required to learn the RW fundies version of the Bible, be able to read "My Pet Goat" and have the ability to enter data into their all encompassing personal intelligence device in order to be able to graduate from high school. The big question is where are we going to get the people educated enough to keep this society going? Probably outsource for that like we're doing with everything else. H1-B visas here we come.

[seabeyond]

15. i have had kids in private school until end of nov

and though i have only had children in this poor public school for a month, i am impressed with how good they are. i have heard for years how bad the public schools are, how bad the teachers are, how bad the administrations are, yet having nieces and nephews and now my kids in the system, i am not seeing this. further, as a parent i take responsibility for children and their education above and beyond any school system or government. i dont hand off the responsibility of my kids. what they arent learning in school, they are learning in this house above and beyond.

yes as a culture we have an envioroment embracing the dumb. but it is not just in the feeding of this with the repug party, which i feel they do. it is also in the media and hollywood what they give to our children. the left. the liberals. i dont let my kids watch about 90% of carttons. they honor stupid and angry. what the majority of the programming, (programming?) is fed to our children. again the responsibility sits with the parents.

i dont lightly do my job, handing off responsibility of my children to the instititutions and then blame them for being incompetent. it always sits on the parents shoulders.

[Used and Abused]

19. private school is the way to go

Especially in the red states or in violent cities.

[seabeyond]

21. i am in texas and the private schools are christian

and though i thought it was the way to go, and it was for a while, since last spring and the escalating of frenzy with the movie passion along with the presidential race created a mess at our school. they were sending their young kids to see passion. they were telling kids god is a republican, kerry not a christian, kerry murderer ect..........

so no, it wasnt the way to go on revision of our present and history. i could do with some academic inaccuracies, but this fall, there were just too many. no balance in the presentation of two parties, two candidates and it fed through out the school in so many ways.

so dont make assumptions

[K-W]

28. Public schools are massively underrated.

The conservatives do what they have done with all government programs, exagerate the problems, then use those exagerations to convince the people to stop funding the programs until the problems expand to the point where there are real major problems, then exagerate those problems until the nation gives up on educating children.

[seabeyond]

30. i have certainly seen this. i agree

this is why now, i stand up for the school. issues, yup have already run into it. immmediately. they want to foot print, thumb print and photo my kids cause of kidnapping. i said no. but then that is liberal policy feeding fear of keeping kids safe, not repug. when repug insists on creationism, i will reject that too.

not a perfect system. but that is where my job as the parent comes in, i say again. what is our job in this whole thing. the public school, so excited i participate in the teaching with my kids. that i support the teacher, deal with the issues

we are talking mere people creating a "school". good, bad, hard working, lazy..........just people. you get out of it what you put into it

[4_TN_TITANS]

16. There's some merit to this.....

Like a thread yesterday mentioned, the more education a person has, the more likely they are to be liberal.

It's no accident that Red America consists of mostly Southern states. Unfortunately, there are tons of undeducated idiots here in the South.

[GumboYaYa]

18. Part of the problem is that education has become credintialization

in America. Often people who have college degrees or even postgraduate degrees have never learned to think analyticaly. As others have noted, the pursuit of knowledge for the sake of knowledge is scorned. Kids are taught to get a degree that will get a you a job in the "real world." Students go through the process of getting a degree because it is required for the next step in life, but many do not actually bother to learn while they are at school. Its the pay your fees get your "B"s mentality, that has taken over education.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

22. Former college professor here

1. The biggest problem in America's educational system is that there is no system. All school districts are locally controlled. Local elected officials build the facilities, hire the teachers, and determine the curriculum beyond the state-mandated minimums. These state-mandated courses are often things like First Aid or State History, not advanced math or world history and geography.

If a school board wants to spend millions on athletic facilities and only thousands on the libraries, there's nothing to stop them. If it wants to cut art, music, and foreign languages to "save money," there's nothing to stop them.

In general, communities with a highly educated population have schools that can stand with any in the world. Communities where the parents are poor and over-burdened and not too educated themselves, or where the parents are freeperish, the schools will be lousy.

Students in highly educated communities get AP courses, International Baccalaureate options, lots of options for participation in the arts, high-level courses in science, math, literature, writing, three or four foreign languages to choose from, and history. Students in less-educated communities get dumbed-down coursework and lots of emphasis on sports and social life.

2. Our pop culture devalues education. All that's important is to be physically beautiful and athletic and to own all the latest Stuff. Going to school is good if it gets you a good (i.e. high-paying) job, bad if it means that you know stuff that other people don't.

3. There are foreign students and foreign students. A few I encountered were dumb rich kids who couldn't get into universities in their home countries and spent their time here playing. The Japanese students were usually here to improve their English or to avoid the intense pressures of their country's university admissions process. (Their own universities are good enough in science and engineering that the Japanese government offers graduate scholarships to foreign students.)

In most countries, admission to college is not as easy as it is here. Many of the Third World countries do not have enough places for all the students who are qualified. Many other countries have such tight standards for admission that only the top 5% of the typical high school class qualify for admission to any post-high school institution. (Both these reasons help explain the large number of Chinese students in recent years.)

In my 11 years of teaching at both private colleges and a large state university, I found that on the whole, the foreign students had better attitudes and better study habits than the typical American student. They had more general knowledge and awareness of world affairs, and they laughed off the math proficiency requirement that one of the colleges had: for them it was eighth or ninth grade math. If there was a cultural event or a famous speaker on campus, the foreign students turned out in greater proportions than the American students did. They could certainly party hearty with the American students, but somehow, with the exception of the dumb rich kids, they didn't lose sight of the academic side of things.

-----

If I were education czarina with complete power to remake the U.S. educational system, I would do the following:

1. Give the schools funds earmarked for reducing class sizes and making teaching a more attractive option for the brightest students. (In Japan, teaching is the highest-paying job a new B.A. can get.) In tutoring street kids, the complaint I heard most often from them was that class sizes were so large that the teachers didn't have time to explain things to students who were struggling. Even on the college level, I found that large classes tended to make students feel anonymous, so that disruptive or sneaky behavior and/or cheating increased noticeably.

2. Set standards, but only in broad terms. Instead of the constant testing of the NCLB law, have schools selected randomly from year to year for an assessment of student portfolios.

3. As long as the required content is taught, encourage teachers to use the methods that work best for them instead of requiring everybody to follow the same methods.

4. Reduce the amount of paperwork (outside of grading) that teachers are required to complete. If an administrator needs a written lesson plan to tell whether a teacher is actually teaching or sitting around reading People magazine while the students run wild, then that's one lazy administrator.

5. Set high expectations. I found that if you wait until the students "feel ready" to move on, most of them never will. They may grumble about higher standards, but they can actually meet them, especially if the class size is small enough to allow for special help for the slower students.

6. Equalize the options available to students. It's known that intelligence and talent are randomly distributed across populations, so there's no reason that a predominantly African-American or Latino school district shouldn't have options like the International Baccalaureate or an arts magnet program. I would mandate the availability of such curricula in at least one school in every district (one school in every county in more sparsely populated areas).

7. All students would have art, music, theater, and creative writing in the lower grades, as well as real physical fitness training (walking or cycling to school if possible, otherwise, starting the day with a run or fast walk). Outdoor recess twice a day would be mandatory for elementary school children in good weather. The school experience would include exposure to age-appropriate cultural events and class trips to local historical and nature sites.

Parts of these ideas are already in force in some districts. If we could make them national, we'd have a school system second to none.

[Karenina]

23. Superb!

:kick: :yourock: :kick:

[K-W]

29. I agree with all but #3

In some subjects there are standerdized methods of teaching that increase the percentage of students who learn the material.

There is room for both precision teaching and personal creative teaching in every classroom.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

34. Oh, yes, there are some basic principles

In foreign language teaching, for example, beginning instructors have to be cautioned against the "helpful" practice of saying something in the foreign language and then repeating it in English right away. All that does is train the students to wait for the translation. :-) They have to learn methods of getting the students to try to speak the language, and there are a few tricks that work with any curriculum, such as role playing, cuing responses with pictures, and having the students make up dialogues in pairs.

But when some dogmatist comes along and say, "You must teach out of this textbook, which will make all your students proficient in Japanese, or else you're a heretic," then I have a problem.

I once adopted a curriculum designed by someone I knew and admired. It had a lot of fine qualities, especially in the type of natural, conversational language presented, but I found that it didn't work with my very average students (as opposed to the Ivy League students on whom it had been field-tested), because in its pure form, it required the students to do a lot of independent listening and speaking work, with almost no written homework. My very average students believed that if they had no graded written assignment, then they had no homework. I finally had to make adjustments to the curriculum and add written exercises, just so the students would open their books once in a while.

The next year I switched to a different textbook (much to the dismay of one of the true believers in the other curriculum), one that included a lot more written work. The students thrived on it.

So in answer to your remark, I'd say that yes, each subject has some proven techniques, but set-in-stone curricula are not appropriate to all teachers or to all classes.

Techniques, yes. Set-in-stone curricula, no.

[Ron Green]

25. It doesn't take a graduate degree to learn to share an abundance of

resources with the rest of the world, but it does take a general movement toward critical thinking, which at this point in our history goes against corporate control. As long as our acquisitive and consumptive way of life is held up as the thing worth striving for, indeed as long as striving itself is seen as material and not spiritual, education (even at the graduate level) will be vocational and not broadening. Our toxic culture is both a symptom and a cause of unfettered capitalism.

[K-W]

31. In some sense, the third world has the advantage of ignorance.

At least in the third world people can see things that are right in front of thier faces. They can look at thier economy and say, "our resources are all leaving, and im not making any money, im getting screwed"

Whereas americans watch the hand and miss the magic trick. I dont think it has anything to do with education. I think it has to do with the flow of information in our society and the massive influence our culture has on our thoughts.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

33. Canada passing grade is 50%.....think this might affect the numbers crunch

[BrklynLiberal]

36. Isn't the pathetic salaries we pay to teachers a factor? If you want to

maintain an excellent education system, it would help to have great teachers, and one way to do that would be to attract top notch people into the teaching profession. That is very difficult considering the salaries and conditions that teachers are forced to deal with these days. Considering that the future of our country is literally in the hands of teachers, we should be putting alot more work into making sure the best and brightest are becoming teachers. Teaching should be one of the best paid and highest prestige professions.

[GreenPartyVoter]

37. Breaking the education system was all part of the master plan to

make us into a feudal state.

-------------------------------------
Liberal and darned proud about it!
http://timeforachange.bluelemur.com/

[Karenina]

39. And THAT, dear GPV

is the unvarnished truth. It has been DECADES LONG in the making.

[Boosterman]

40. Actually the schools here have plenty of money

Casino state. However, I deplore the current lesson plans. The only one that I feel justified in critiquing is the math plans. They are horrible. They don't teach the basics. In second grade they were teaching this count 10 and doubles crap. I understand the concept of teaching math shortcuts. But in this case it isn't a shortcut and they aren't even sure what 7+5 is. Fortunately for me my son has a natural talent for math which I have encouraged. Pity bout those other kids though.


In addition I despise a couple of other things about the public school system.

1. I don't mind helping or teaching my kid...but don't send him home with NOTHING covered from the previous day and expect me to pick up the slack.

2. Hes an unruly child...he needs medication or therapy. WTH? a boy acts up a bit and hes hyper? Yeah that whole Ritalin thing worked well didn't it?

[Solly Mack]

41. a very simple fact

you can't indoctrinate children and then expect them to become adults who can think for themselves

it just doesn't work that way

[Solly Mack]

42. a simple truth

you can't indoctrinate children and then expect them to become adults who can think for themselves