You're optimistic while I simply don't see any evidence we are doing better or even trying to do better. It's not the effort that counts...it's the results!! And quite frankly I don't see the results! Never in my life, no matter society and culture and government, has the public education system achieved anything much different than it does today. When I was in elementary school, and high school, there were strict dress codes, no long hair, little tardiness and absence, no monkey-business in class or hallways or cafeteria, mostly stay-at-home moms, etc. and even with all of this, some kids excelled and some kids failed, probably similar to today. Each of us has different interests, different capabilities mentally and physically, and different environmental and family conditions, and IMO you cannot mandate that all of them will learn the same things at equal rates. So I continue to believe that it's just possible that what we have today is about as good as it's going to get. And to facilitate change on the status quo, assuming we are up to the challenge of creating effective and productive change, IMO will take many decades or centuries...
The problem with that is that we're actually not even reaching the same levels that we would have even when I was in school in the 1980's. I went to a private school in the 1980's and I was reading at grade level from the start. We learned geography in school and the main natural features of an entire continent, and were expected to know the main economic outputs of the major regions of the US. I don't think most HS grads of the 2000s could find Vermont on an unlabelled map -- let alone know that lumber is a major "export" of the state. So, what I think is important to realise is just how bad our schools are. We not only are failing to educate lots of kids, but those that we do "educate" are unable to do basic things that were taken for granted 20 years ago. I don't know of anyone in my high school that graduated functionally illiterate. Now, it seems much more common. If the schools were no better or worse than they were in 1980, let alone 1950, I'd agree, but the evidence clearly shows that not only are we failing lots of kids, but we're doing a worse job of educating those kids that "succeed".
To understand the trends we need to look at percentages and I don't know the numbers. But I do know that 10% of 250 million is 25 million and 10% of 310 million is 31 million, which means if the percentages are the same today as 30-40 years ago, then today we are placing 6 million more kids on the streets with little capability to create a reasonable life. Regarding failing to educate kids who actually pass through today's system, I'm going to say I believe we also did this years ago as well. But a major difference between the 50's-80's and today is that most people with a high school diploma, or less, could find employment which paid enough to create a good life; today these types and numbers of jobs simply do not exist. So today those with only high school diplomas are struggling to survive which makes it appear like we are less educated than decades ago. If anything, with the Internet and other changes, kids today have little excuse for being stupid...
Which is why the decline of education is such a major problem. We did a better job educating kids in the 1950's, when uneducated kids could survive. Now they really can't and we're doing a worse job. That's criminal. If an outside dictator decided that 20% of our population would be living on sub-survival wages, there would be a revolution. When the schools do so by failing to educate the kids, it's not a big enough deal. We're complacent, and we shouldn't be -- you say so yourself -- a kid who cannot do college work absent welfare would starve. So why are we not outraged that kids graduate unable to read their diplomas? That kids is either a criminal or a welfare recipient for the rest of his life because he cannot survive any other way. So why is it that we accept that 20% of kids will end up that way?
Because the collective we are too stupid and politically biased to do any better! And even if we could understand how to improve it, we are too greedy and self-serving to fund the program! What you and others continually fail to understand is that the private sector (that place where most jobs exist) is a separate entity from government. Once you can comprehend this, then ask the question 'what is the purpose of government regarding education?'. If government's goal is to give all citizens enough education in order to go into that private sector and earn a living, then government must turn out whatever labor the private sector demands. If government fails to do this, then the private sector will do more off-shore sourcing (fewer jobs), or open more off-shore facilities (fewer jobs), or bring in green card workers (fewer jobs) to fulfill the job requirements. Once these things happen, the government is now faced with having more and more of it's citizens unable to work in the private sector. So the government can hire people to work for the government or just provide them with welfare. Since government cannot grow and grow, ultimately we have more and more people on government welfare. If society ever wishes to eradicate most of these problems, then society must give all citizens the tools they need to go into the private sector, and society must provide the private sector with the best possible environment in order to sustain and grow their business. If society refuses to do this, then society needs to create living situations including shelter, food, medical care, etc. to the growing population without jobs and without hope...
The USA has a welfare society and it is called the public schools education system: 1) A place where unskilled and untalented adults whith a napoleon complex can go to feel like they are important of children. 2) A place where the work is easy and there is no accountability, just pickup the paycheck each month. 3) A place where you have tenure and not even god can touch you and you can do what you want because your union will back you. 4) A place where the power of public employee unions and associations own the politicians and taxpayers. 5) A system with its own courst and police (like a church), so adult criminals can be shift around to different schools. 6) and the hours are to die for, 3 to 6 hours a day and 6 only six months a year, with all the holidays and state holidays. It is a win win system and you don't get the stigmata of being called a welfare recipient. HOW GOOD IS THAT?
I suspect american teachers are paid like their canadian counterparts, they work a 8 hr shift and longer per day...they don't get paid in summer months when schools are out...
Which is exactly what's happening. People were much better off when the government wasn't deciding the curriculum, wasn't hiring the teachers, and wasn't paying for college (the new bubble). One thing about the schools of any point up to about 1900 or so is that they were largely private schools. Jefferson did not attend a government school, and he could figure out things that college graduates would have trouble with. Once the government got in control, it just went downhill, mostly because it was easier to simply give a kid a credential than to teach him. Once high school became a ticket to a good job, most schools gave them out like candy.
Not exactly, in the USA some public school educators work about 3 to 4 real hours a day an get a break to prep. And because there is no accountability or supervision, the teachers can screw off for the remaing 2 hours a day. With class sizes of, in some schools, 8 to 12 kids, the teachers got it made. Especially with tenure. Not even god can touch them. But in Private schools the teachers are held to higher standards and do work over 6 hours a day. That is why in the USA the best grade schools are the private ones. After all, that is where the wealthy and elite send their kids. For one outside the USA to understand the USA public school industry, one must understand that it is not about education, it is about grabbing tax money from each State government, and using the Unions power over the politicians to maipulate the rules and policies to make life good for the adults in the education system. The USA has the best public employee retirement plans in the world. Retired State governemnt workers (i.e public school employees) make more on retirement than they did when they were working. No corporation or monopoly can offer their common workers that kind of benifit.
To be fair, at least 50% of the kids attending public schools pay attention, learn, and move on to decent jobs and/or college. The other 50% have a real struggle in life. I believe we can do so much more for the failing 50% and also provide more for the passing 50%, including public college educations, but there are a (*)(*)(*)(*)load of problems outside of education that also need fixing to allow those failing 50% kids a higher success rate. For example, in hundreds of places around the USA, in our neighborhoods, people are being killed, guns being shot, guns in schools, crime running rampant, gangs, etc. and what are the cities doing about this? How can a kid study and sleep and attend school in this environment? All cities with these environments, the officials of those cities, are 100% failures! In the USA we never solve anything; we just place political Band-aids and hope the masses don't see what's really going on and how derelict our governments actually are. We refuse to properly fund the governments that we demand then complain about all the failure. Public education is a huge issue but so is everything adjacent to public education so we've got a lot to do and quite frankly our government leaders are not and will not be up to the tasks...
In the USA kids do not need to be taught that private schools are better, they all ready know that. Plus, the USA pubic education welfare system is a complete failure and lacks the ability to teach anything.
You know what is so sickening, our education system is constantly being blamed but our parenting is never looked at. I do not say the schools/curriculum/administrators are blameless, but consider this: Children from other countries are coached from early childhood in academics, responsibility, citizenship. They are expected to do several hours of home work every night. In some countries the schools have no cleaning staff, but the childen are responsible to sweep, wash, wipe up and keep the school clean. American parents expect that their TV watching, sleep when you want to, eat what you want, bring your cell phone to school children learn every thing at school. Impossible task.
Without question.My special education students learned the meaning behind the Pledge of Allegiance, all about the Constitution, acted out court cases, practiced what it meant to be a good citizen, knew who all the elected officials were, along with other things every American kid should know. I am appalled at adults who do not even know how our government works. Many of them post here.
Although I agree that parents/guardians 'can' play a role in supporting public education, I don't believe we should design a public education system which requires the involvement of parents/guardians. Obviously the reason is too many parents simply are not programmed to have this responsibility, and it really does not make any difference the reasons since they are pervasive in society. Likewise, I also don't believe a public education system should require home work. This is because of similar reasons to above in which too many students do not have conducive environments at home for study. How many have no parents, or working parents, or absentee parents, or live in crime-ridden neighborhoods with bullets flying everywhere, or drug/alcohol habits, etc.? IMO those municipalities who cannot provide safe neighborhoods and schools are a huge part of the education problems...
I would not be so judgmental about others regarding what people know and don't know. People are diverse in their interests, capabilities, limitations, environments, etc. and although I also prefer Americans to be a lot smarter, I also know this can't change except over a long period of time...like generations/decades and this is only if we focus on this as a goal. How can we expect smarter adults when our current public education system is basically failing 50% of our kids? How can we expect smarter adults when few of them can afford continuing education? We can acknowledge that we have a broken school system, a broken parental system, a broken government system, in many areas a questionable societal system, and at all levels it appears we never have adequate funding. So where do we start...
Then you would have to have the govenment/schools practically raising these children. School during the day/supervised homework at night/nutritional programs/citizenship programs...is this what you want??? Is this what you are willing to pay for???
We have to change the whole mindset that parents can raise a child for 5 years, do nothing but feed and cloth them, push them out the door, and expect that the school will do the rest. It is an impossible job. Schools can be eductors and parents. US parents have very low expectations when it comes to education. I ran into parents who said, "Well, my kid can milk the cows, that was good enough for me and that's good enough for her." Or others who just blamed me when their child just slept all day. Teachers can only work with what is sent to us each day. Hungry, sleepy, ignored, cold, dirty, sick kids start way behind. Kids who spend all their time out of school in organized activities or on the computer have very little left to bring to studying. I've seen both sides off the spectrum and neither is ready to learn, no matter how much I want to teach them.
I you read what I said, all I implied was if you design a public education system requiring parental involvement and/or homework, you are starting with a failed program! It will fail, just as it fails today, because of everything I mentioned about parents and home-study environments. Why create or sustain a program with built in failure??
YOUR problem is YOU are not going to force others to do something in their 'personal' lives that YOU want! You are ignoring the random and diverse behavior of humans. And don't say 'it's an impossible job' when in fact many kids live in non-parent involved lives and excel in school and onto college. If teachers and education administrators are so smart, then figure out how to educate without parental involvement and without home-study? If you cannot do this, or refuse to do this, then you are ignoring a huge percentage of our kids today who live in these exact situations...
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