School as a business

[Gwynplaine]

Well I can't be expected to read shit, I'm an American stupid.

[Ehran]

i like commercialized school, more competition = better school quality

as of right now public school monopolize the education system, which leads to poor school quality and american high schoolers r getting way behind compared to students @ other countries. ranking 25th out of 50 countries is sad for a country as big as US.

If we're running schools like a business, can we put a sign out front saying "We reserve the right the refuse service to anyone?"

[SamanosukeShiva]

sure, special need ppl go to special need school

[SamanosukeShiva]

but of course lawsuit still apply, schools will also need to consider that before they can put that kind of sign

[TacoTaru]

I'm curious as to if anyone has been through the teaching program at a college. And if you have, how can you think it acts any differently than a business how it is now.

[Cesaria]

If you want to run schools like businesses - does that mean we can put the signs up saying that if you're violent or threatening to our staff we kick you out? I've been sworn at by parents, chased down the street by someone wanting to rant that her daughter had got 8/10 on a test, had furniture thrown at me by a child who did not want to be taught, threatened with a pair of scissors by a child, seen my old head badly bruised by another kid... the list goes on.

Unfortunately kids aren't a nice one size fits all option, and lots of what affects success/failure in the education system comes from external factors - I've worked in deprived areas where kids have come into school with minimal speech, or a perfect American accent because no one has ever bothered to have a conversation with them and just shoved them in front of imported cartoons on the TV for the first 4 years of their lives. Those kids are starting from a much lower baseline than children who've come from a more supportive background, and, however much you put into them, the odds are they're NOT going to do as well - but league tables comparing schools show these schools (some of whom work freaking miracles considering the state the kids come in in) "failing" time after time.

In the UK at least - the tests they use to compare quality across schools are flawed, and the better schools are just becoming very very good at teaching to them - I actually marked the ones they use to judge primary school this year, and you can spot the ways that schools coach their kids to meet the markscheme - it doesn't necessarily make their written work any better, but it just makes them good at jumping through hoops to get into the higher bands.

I'll try to re-phrase some of this stuff tonight... just on my way to run out to work now but wanted to put some quick thoughts down.

[Ksandra]

I'm curious as to if anyone has been through the teaching program at a college. And if you have, how can you think it acts any differently than a business how it is now.

I have my masters in education. A good 95% of classes involved teaching us that group work is great and what to do with the problem kids. I don't understand your post.

[Dalmbraast]

I'm curious as to if anyone has been through the teaching program at a college. And if you have, how can you think it acts any differently than a business how it is now.

You need to be more specific, please. What is it? The current school system? The teacher's college? And how does "it" act like a business now?

I have been through a teaching program at a university and didn't find it like a business at all except in the aspect that it was pass/fail - you make the cut or you don't.

[Feedmenow]

Thinking about it, I can't really say the issue is starting to include culture as well. from that same Youtube vid, you can see a good point that really makes a difference- the student's interest in getting education in the first place. At first it seems like a no-brainer, but then you realize how deep it might run through. Stupid In America points out that children in lower grades actually do above average in testing, but at high school is where scoring tends to slip to that 25th ranking behind several other nations. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that most media targeted for middle-high school students have some sort of cynical view on the educational system. I don't think I've ever seen a show on Cartoon Network/Disney that had a positive view on the actual classes in school. However, in primary school and below, you get a lot more focus on how important education is. Hell, some of those actually centered around education being entertaining. (Magic School Bus, anyone?) It seems like the age where regular TV shows (which demote education a helluva lot more) get more and more popular is when the averages start to decline.

It's hard to get kids motivated in a classroom when most big aspects of media/culture seem to try their hardest to demotivate them.

[Darus Grey]

As someone who has attended or taught school in 4 countries (France, Japan, U.S. and Iran). One of the major differences I've noticed is we(as in the U.S.) no longer place an emphasis on personal responsibility of the student. Like many things, hobbies, jobs, etc...it's hard to form an attachment to an activity when you have no personal responsibility, no stake in it. You'd think your future would be an incentive, but it's not. Many high school students are fully aware that nothing they do in high school means shit and it's just a glorified daycare for teens. If you're not aiming for ivy league or top tier colleges, high school is meaningless. It won't stop you from getting accepted to a state college most of the time, and it certainly won't keep you from the community college - > real college route.

Hell, when I went to school I never got above an F, never did a single bit of work, skipped most the time. Day I turned 16 I dropped out and went to get a GED and went to college early. GEDs are funny, once you take one everything you did in school becomes truly meaningless. As far as every college I've ever applied to is concerned my highschool GPA was equivalent of a 4.0(because I scored 98% on GED), and I got scholarships out the ass(9yrs and I still haven't had to pay for going to school). This obviously is a failing of the system, or not so much a failing, but it shouldn't actually be *beneficial* to go this route.

The next big factor is culture. However our lack of focus on education in culture isn't the end-all be-all. One example is France, who has a much bigger culture on de-emphasizing education. But they still do better often. I honestly don't know what to think of this one.

Third factor is in the way we teach to begin with. I think this is an area where the U.S. completely lacks creativity. When I was in Iran I encountered a small school where they taught everything in lyrical prose, and I thought this was a brilliant idea, there's lots of research that shows human memory has a strange attachment to music; Often being able to remember an entire score simply from hearing the first three notes! I actually plan to invest in a private school doing this. The Greek philosophers considered education to be a prominent liberal art, and I think it should be treated as such.

In summary I think the fact that most school children know that if they're not aiming for the top, what they do has little to no impact, is a major factor in their performance.

[Arcana]

Coming from the UK education system, our public schooling is very good if you have passionate teachers who are willing to take the time to help students, but that isnt very often these days, since many teachers are looking to just pass you.

when i was in second year high school, my science teacher from the previous year left and they kept replacing him with new ones, two that spring to mind One good One bad. i can remember the good ones name, but he knew i was fairly good at the subject and encouraged me to do extra credit work even though i know i wouldnt have it recognised, but he certainly made the subject alot more interesting, and also the fact that i could connect to him as a gamer, this was when FF7 was out for a year and i was getting into it, he taught me about chocobo raising and the easy method of it.

the other however was obviously some guy who had been stuck up his own anus for far too long, and required all the students to refer to him as dr. whatever his name was
no one liked him and i dont think anyone wanted to learn from him.

now though as i look back at it being a university student, the school did have flaws, everything tends too, but its not just the shitty ciriculum they teach, it is also in part how its taught in a meaningful way. people tend not to do something if they can avoid it, catering to only passing exams and raising league tables leads to under educated students & poor life long learning skills, which they then pass on to their children.

i think a combination of being taught well pre-school & a passion for learning is the key to stop our population becoming similar to that of the movie Idiocracy, i know its fictional, but it could possibly happen. we really do need some form of education for parents to enable them to teach their children acceptable study skills and engage and question their child to gauge if they are understanding the problems they are given, this would also likely lead to the discovery of learning difficulties earlier and so they can be addressed earlier and be less detremental to the child.

thats just my two pence on it all.

[Dalmbraast]

Coming from the UK education system, our public schooling is very good if you have passionate teachers who are willing to take the time to help students, but that isnt very often these days, since many teachers are looking to just pass you.

I suppose things might be a little bit different in the UK, as I understand your system is quite a bit different than in North America, especially considering grades don't mean much until you get to your level exams. However, your statement above in completely indicative of the issue with the system that the last few posters have been addressing - there is a HUGE negative public association with education in general. It's no longer seen as useful, or as a means to a better future. Or it is by some people, but the rest see what others (maybe their parents, family members, friends) have done without school and figure that's good enough for them, why bother?

This actually brings up an interesting point from a seminar I was at a few months ago. The presenter was quoting from a book (wish I could remember the name of it now) but he essentially said that "schools no longer have a monopoly on information". With the internet in at least 75% of my student's homes, perhaps people are thinking that they can go elsewhere and get the same information as their teacher or textbook presents... but this, to me, is a fundamentally flawed notion. The point of school isn't information; as a high school teacher, I realize that many of my students are never going to remember the short stories we did in grade 10. What more I hope they take away with them are the analytical skills, the discussion skills, the life lessons they've had a chance to ponder (I run a very discussion based English course, especially with short stories; I like to ask questions of my class before each story to get them thinking about the theme before they even know what they're reading. One such question I ask them for one story is "Are there things worth dying for?" and then I let them go at it, as long as they don't start offending each other. It's actually pretty neat to see what kind of ideas and convictions kids have, even the ones who are normally apathetic.)

To come back to the point of this - I quite strongly believe that students and society in general sees education as an information based practice (as it was during most generations up until the last... I'd say 15-20 years or so?) - students are filled with information from their teachers and are expected to reguritate it on tests. This isn't what I learned in teacher's college, and this isn't how I teach my classes. It's all skills based. It doesn't really matter WHAT we're learning about (though the government tells me I have to teach them certain things at certain grade levels) but that students are acquiring, practicing and hopefully mastering certain important skills.

In summary I think the fact that most school children know that if they're not aiming for the top, what they do has little to no impact, is a major factor in their performance.

And this ties in with the society issue we're looking at here. What is it that makes people look so poorly on education? Why as a North American society have we developed such an apathy towards education merely because students can't see the immediate worth of it? If a kid likes a sport, he knows he's gotta practice and play often to maintain and improve his skills. However, there is perhaps a more immediate gain. In education, often there is not going to be an immediately noticeable improvement... with reading and writing skills for example, it's going to be very gradual and you're going to have to compare year to year to see how it's gotten better. Kids seem to not care enough to wait for that.

[Zoot]

If the reward is monetary then the schools in most need of improvement will never recieve aid. If the reward is anything but then there is little incentive.

I believe schools should focus more on the individual than the team. I also believe there should be more of a challenge on students - reward incentives for specific tests bring the focus on how to do well in areas that the child may not specialize in and may also encourage easier curriculum for better grades.

I do not mean schools should rigidly follow the Gardner method of teaching, but continue education in all areas and recognize individual areas of strength and encourage growth in these areas. Having smaller classrooms and a more streamlined approach to helping the student's difficult areas, such as free to the student one on one mentoring (assigned to the student through observation, during school hours in a regulated slot) would be extremelly helpful to impoving a students ability to understand.

Most of the time children in Advanced Placement courses are the only ones recieving challenging material; I think the sliding scale for grading causes more problems than it may seem to. When a child does badly and that is reflected on their report card, it can either have the effect of making them want to do better or having them believe that they cannot improve, which sometimes comes from a cultural belief that they cannot achieve any better. Students try when they have incentive, but they will also respond better if someone is listening to them instead of just being a voice in the crowd, a voice which can easily hide behind apathy and the overwhelming voices of their schoolmates. A way to imrpove this would be to have an overall grade that is based on improvement and effort, and commentary on the students good qualities and bad qualities.

Of course, a major problem with this take would be first that the classes are too large for a teacher to both teach the agenda and watch the students behavior and responses, and also that there is just not enough financial support to have that many teachers staffed.

If you work a classroom in a capitalist manner, you open windows of opportunity but you also leave many behind whom have not learned to be self motivated. There are already individual scholarship opportunities, but many children need more direction because they do not even see that these benefits could apply to them.

[Elesirdur]

Third factor is in the way we teach to begin with. I think this is an area where the U.S. completely lacks creativity. When I was in Iran I encountered a small school where they taught everything in lyrical prose, and I thought this was a brilliant idea...

Just wanted to quote this because it's a seriously awesome idea, and I'm not being sarcastic in the least. Thank you for your input from the experience of a non-North American/UK perspective. Although, when thinking about education in places outside the aforementioned areas, my mind turns to Japan. While the Japanese tend to score very highly on maths, sciences, and literacy scores I really get the feeling that their strict focus on those three major aspects, as well as the crushing pressure of university entrance exams, ends up producing kids that are "smart", but not all that educated.

I most definitely think that there is a difference between being "smart" and "educated", though the two are intertwined. Personally, I defined the quality "smart" as being more linked to profeciency and technical knowledge, the kinds of things that are taught and tested in the sciences, mathematics, and in technical/vocation fields ranging from engineering to mechanics. And then there is "education", a much more nebulous qualifier which I attach to academic and life disciplines that are more qualitatively measurered, though having a quantitative component does not remove it from the category. Literature, history (my background), arts, philosophy, rhetoric, writing, research, and many other academic disciplines derive value from an "educated" pupil more so than one who is "smart." However, intelligent people merge these two qualities to understand and create from technical knowledge and skills, and from higher analytical and contemplative thought processes.

I suppose this has just turned into a bit of a rant from a History BA alumni against the technically profecient, but what I consider to be not that well educated, generic students of the hard sciences (or business for that matter, lol). Nevertheless, the big problem I see with standardized tests being the only measure of a school or teacher's performance is that there is very little in them that measures higher cognitative thought processes, like critical thinking and analytical skills. The ability to develop and cultivate those skills is absolutely crucial if one wishes to be part of the knowledge economy, and frankly to do well at any aspect of life. I do fully realize that these skills are very difficult to 'teach', and in the case of high school students, pupils brains may just not actually be developed to a point at which they can develop higher thinking skills. I think I've meandered enough for now, time to get back to my research job...