SFUSD's delay of algebra 1 has created a nightmare of workarounds(sfexaminer.com)
sfexaminer.com
SFUSD's delay of algebra 1 has created a nightmare of workarounds
https://www.sfexaminer.com/forum/put-algebra-1-back-in-eighth-grade/article_01ca608e-be01-11ed-9d12-5fb4111a4db8.html
348 comments
**DISCLAIMER: The numbers don't add up, someone's numbers are wrong see Jesson's child comment
>US is below the mean for average mathematical performance and this isn't helping.
This depends on whether or not you control for race [0]:
- Asian (556)
- White (531)
- Hispanic (481)
- Black (448)
- Mixed Race (501)
Despite the euroworship in this thread, White-American and Asian-American students outperform Europeans and Asians, respectively (although I don't have data that breaks down those countries' scores by race, so take this with a grain of salt). Quite interesting how people in this thread (whom I suspect are mostly white- and Asian- American males given the hours/site) are talking about how bad the US education system is and how their European friends were all learning Riemann sums in kindergarten.
The system is only failing black and hispanic students. Really tough problem to solve, but the data does not support the conclusion that the American maths education system is "behind" or "failing" as a whole. I would also like to see the scores stratified by income, which my linked paper did not provide.
[0]: https://nces.ed.gov/surveys/pisa/pisa2018/pdf/PISA2018_compi...
>US is below the mean for average mathematical performance and this isn't helping.
This depends on whether or not you control for race [0]:
- Asian (556)
- White (531)
- Hispanic (481)
- Black (448)
- Mixed Race (501)
Despite the euroworship in this thread, White-American and Asian-American students outperform Europeans and Asians, respectively (although I don't have data that breaks down those countries' scores by race, so take this with a grain of salt). Quite interesting how people in this thread (whom I suspect are mostly white- and Asian- American males given the hours/site) are talking about how bad the US education system is and how their European friends were all learning Riemann sums in kindergarten.
The system is only failing black and hispanic students. Really tough problem to solve, but the data does not support the conclusion that the American maths education system is "behind" or "failing" as a whole. I would also like to see the scores stratified by income, which my linked paper did not provide.
[0]: https://nces.ed.gov/surveys/pisa/pisa2018/pdf/PISA2018_compi...
Yes I’ve seen these statistics a number of times and it really goes against so much of the “lol Americans are bad at math” meme all over the internet.
America is a society of disparate cultures, regions, communities, and outcomes (often in the same cities) that is far too fine grained to reduce it to generalities (with a few exceptions such as heavily nationally influenced/consistent things like health care insurance, defence spending, Wall St/banking policies, etc).
Some people try to minimize it all to “class” like they found some Pandora’s box for all of life’s problems but that’s just as often flawed as any other generalization.
America is a society of disparate cultures, regions, communities, and outcomes (often in the same cities) that is far too fine grained to reduce it to generalities (with a few exceptions such as heavily nationally influenced/consistent things like health care insurance, defence spending, Wall St/banking policies, etc).
Some people try to minimize it all to “class” like they found some Pandora’s box for all of life’s problems but that’s just as often flawed as any other generalization.
Poverty is different from class. The poverty achievement gap is 2x the race achievement gap. The following article describes a study that claims that poverty “entirely accounts” for racial gaps.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/achievement-g...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/achievement-g...
I can't read the article, but does it control for race within poverty? A lot of poverty conclusions are confounded by race, yet even within poor cohorts you will find significant disparities by race. For example,
> Whites from families with incomes of less than $10,000 had a mean SAT score of 993. This is 130 points higher than the national mean for all blacks.
https://www.jbhe.com/features/53_SAT.html
This chart visualizes that point: SAT scores of whites in the poorest segment exceed those of blacks from all but the richest segment, and Asians exceed them no matter their income:
https://resources.corwin.com/sites/default/files/singleton_2...
> Whites from families with incomes of less than $10,000 had a mean SAT score of 993. This is 130 points higher than the national mean for all blacks.
https://www.jbhe.com/features/53_SAT.html
This chart visualizes that point: SAT scores of whites in the poorest segment exceed those of blacks from all but the richest segment, and Asians exceed them no matter their income:
https://resources.corwin.com/sites/default/files/singleton_2...
I'm not sure you read your own source. It seems you just cherry-picked a couple of passages that support racist views and decided to ignore everything else.
Your own source mentions not only the correlation between income and SAT scores, but it also points out a link between quality of the education services provided to some communities and social pressure. It's also telling that the outliers are explained in a way that boils down to "they succeed in spite of everything we throw at them".
Your own source mentions not only the correlation between income and SAT scores, but it also points out a link between quality of the education services provided to some communities and social pressure. It's also telling that the outliers are explained in a way that boils down to "they succeed in spite of everything we throw at them".
It seems like you’re projecting racist views onto the parent comment. It never discounted the possibility of other race-related factors being the cause of the achievement gap, it was just challenging whether all of it could be accredited to wealth disparities.
> It seems like you’re projecting racist views onto the parent comment.
What? OP's argument was purely race-based. OP made absolutely no point other than underlining race-based correlations. If you remove all race-based remarks from OP's post, nothing is left.
> It never discounted the possibility of other race-related factors (...)
In your own words, you describe OP's post as focusing on "race-related factors", and even then you try to accuse those who point that out of "projecting racist views"?
Are you serious?
What? OP's argument was purely race-based. OP made absolutely no point other than underlining race-based correlations. If you remove all race-based remarks from OP's post, nothing is left.
> It never discounted the possibility of other race-related factors (...)
In your own words, you describe OP's post as focusing on "race-related factors", and even then you try to accuse those who point that out of "projecting racist views"?
Are you serious?
For example, the differences in scores that is not explained by income could be caused entirely by disparate treatment of children by adults based on the child's race. That would be a race-related factor.
That's quite some stretching you're doing.
1. I'm pointing out that poverty and racial factors often confound each other. The comment I was replying to made it seem like racial effects disappear when you control for income. If you care about racial equality, then I would think it's in your favor to argue against someone who says racial effects don't exist.
2. It's not racist to point out that certain outcomes correlate with race.
1. I'm pointing out that poverty and racial factors often confound each other. The comment I was replying to made it seem like racial effects disappear when you control for income. If you care about racial equality, then I would think it's in your favor to argue against someone who says racial effects don't exist.
2. It's not racist to point out that certain outcomes correlate with race.
Sure but I’d still rather not use that as the defining metric. Unless there’s some evidence throwing money at public schools in lower class neighborhoods is the solution to the problem. Every time I’ve looked into that subject in the US the biggest complaint by the teachers on the ground, in those neighborhoods, say they feel like they need to be teacher + daycare + parent for a subset + law enforcement officer etc. I grew up in a small town in Canada with mostly poorer lower/lower-mid class student but my school never had such an obligation (not overt expectation) to be parental replacements/invested psychologist/serious enforcers.
At a pretty sudden level focusing on education alone is the fault not the solution. When teachers actually get to be teachers it seems US schools do just fine or better than most of the world (not simply comparing to subsets of small homogenous European countries).
At a pretty sudden level focusing on education alone is the fault not the solution. When teachers actually get to be teachers it seems US schools do just fine or better than most of the world (not simply comparing to subsets of small homogenous European countries).
It may point to issues that are not race or class but structural in a way that suggests deeper issues. Indeed “throwing money at schools” is unlikely to improve situations at home. But poverty has a big effect on kids ability to learn. It isn’t just money—poverty is a multidimensional deficit in wellbeing. Kids who are stressed, abused, neglected, etc — it’s hard for them to learn effectively.
> say they feel like they need to be teacher + daycare + parent for a subset + law enforcement officer etc. [...] When teachers actually get to be teachers it seems US schools do just fine or better than most of the world
Some of it is definitely because of the lack of a support system at home (poverty, absent fathers...). But I think a lot of it boils down to culture. And if we're to look at it based on race, White Blacks and Hispanics could all improve.
There's a lot of families where school is seen as unimportant, and where education isn't as valued as it could be.
Some of it is definitely because of the lack of a support system at home (poverty, absent fathers...). But I think a lot of it boils down to culture. And if we're to look at it based on race, White Blacks and Hispanics could all improve.
There's a lot of families where school is seen as unimportant, and where education isn't as valued as it could be.
> Unless there’s some evidence throwing money at public schools in lower class neighborhoods is the solution to the problem. Every time I’ve looked into that subject in the US the biggest complaint by the teachers on the ground, in those neighborhoods, say they feel like they need to be teacher + daycare + parent for a subset + law enforcement officer etc.
You wrote this down yourself, and you still didn't get it?
You wrote this down yourself, and you still didn't get it?
The article and study are a lie. It leave out Asians because when you them then poverty stops explaining the achievement gap. They are blatantly cherry picking their data.
Which part of the article and study are a "lie"? Hand-waving wealth as being irrelevant to achievement by highlighting Asian success ignores other resource-related factors.
One easy factor to distinguish is the percentage of immigrants in the Asian population."Around six-in-ten Asian Americans (57%), including 71% of Asian American adults, were born in another country"[1]. The background of a lot of these immigrants made them well-qualified to succeed despite their American socio-economic status on arrival [2].
If you compare that to black people in America, many of who's ancestors were brought here in unsavory ways, only "One-in-ten Black people in the U.S. are immigrants". There's no comparison of the ingress of black people in this country when compared to Asian populations, and consequently we don't see the same US immigrant selectivity boosting the numbers of an already disadvantaged race in the same way.
This is not to say that culture has no effect, since I doubt the high participation rate of Asian children in after-school tutoring necessarily hurts those children [5], but it may represent a smaller part of the overall picture than most people think. Choosing minority races from opposite sides of the success spectrum and underlining some of their differences in a data-driven way may help us better understand and combat the problem of equity.
[1] https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/04/29/key-facts-a...
[2] https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2015/08/04/authors-discu...
[3] https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/features/aap-aap0000069.pd... (A more in-depth research paper from the authors of the referenced book in [2])
[4] https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/01/27/key-finding...
[5] https://www.edworkingpapers.com/sites/default/files/ai21-367... ("Third, even conditional on income and parental education, private tutoring centers tend to locate in areas with many immigrant and Asian-American families")
One easy factor to distinguish is the percentage of immigrants in the Asian population."Around six-in-ten Asian Americans (57%), including 71% of Asian American adults, were born in another country"[1]. The background of a lot of these immigrants made them well-qualified to succeed despite their American socio-economic status on arrival [2].
If you compare that to black people in America, many of who's ancestors were brought here in unsavory ways, only "One-in-ten Black people in the U.S. are immigrants". There's no comparison of the ingress of black people in this country when compared to Asian populations, and consequently we don't see the same US immigrant selectivity boosting the numbers of an already disadvantaged race in the same way.
This is not to say that culture has no effect, since I doubt the high participation rate of Asian children in after-school tutoring necessarily hurts those children [5], but it may represent a smaller part of the overall picture than most people think. Choosing minority races from opposite sides of the success spectrum and underlining some of their differences in a data-driven way may help us better understand and combat the problem of equity.
[1] https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/04/29/key-facts-a...
[2] https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2015/08/04/authors-discu...
[3] https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/features/aap-aap0000069.pd... (A more in-depth research paper from the authors of the referenced book in [2])
[4] https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/01/27/key-finding...
[5] https://www.edworkingpapers.com/sites/default/files/ai21-367... ("Third, even conditional on income and parental education, private tutoring centers tend to locate in areas with many immigrant and Asian-American families")
> The background of a lot of these immigrants made them well-qualified to succeed despite their American socio-economic status on arrival
Immigration filtering explains a lot, but the general trend holds even for subgroups that aren’t subject to those filters.
Some Asian groups, like Vietnamese, came to the US as refugees, not skilled workers. In 1980, poverty rates among Vietnamese people were among the highest off any ethnic group. Today, Vietnamese have similar income levels to non-Hispanic whites.
Moreover, the kids of poor Asians have much more income mobility than the kids of similarly placed whites. Asian children who grow up in the bottom 20% of the income distribution have a 25% chance of ending up in the top 20%, compared to an 11% chance for white kids. These poor Asians are typically in America as a result of family reunification. Thus, neither the kids nor the parents are subject to filters such as H1B job requirements.
How do you escape the conclusion that culture makes the difference?
Immigration filtering explains a lot, but the general trend holds even for subgroups that aren’t subject to those filters.
Some Asian groups, like Vietnamese, came to the US as refugees, not skilled workers. In 1980, poverty rates among Vietnamese people were among the highest off any ethnic group. Today, Vietnamese have similar income levels to non-Hispanic whites.
Moreover, the kids of poor Asians have much more income mobility than the kids of similarly placed whites. Asian children who grow up in the bottom 20% of the income distribution have a 25% chance of ending up in the top 20%, compared to an 11% chance for white kids. These poor Asians are typically in America as a result of family reunification. Thus, neither the kids nor the parents are subject to filters such as H1B job requirements.
How do you escape the conclusion that culture makes the difference?
Asians are actually a huge problem for Critical Race Theory supporters, because almost every measurable statistic about them contradict CRT.
Hence, some scholar coined the term "white-adjacent" so they can conveniently cherry-pick and ignore Asians when it's convenient. [0] [1]
[0] https://www.newsweek.com/critical-race-theory-has-no-idea-wh...
[1] https://www.asian-dawn.com/2020/11/17/school-district-catego...
Hence, some scholar coined the term "white-adjacent" so they can conveniently cherry-pick and ignore Asians when it's convenient. [0] [1]
[0] https://www.newsweek.com/critical-race-theory-has-no-idea-wh...
[1] https://www.asian-dawn.com/2020/11/17/school-district-catego...
Your examples are two opinion pieces that seem to not actually understand what critical race theory even is. Asians aren't a problem for the people who study critical race theory, it's really only a problem for people who have no clue what they're talking about.
Asians and Hispanics create two problems for critical race theory, one pretty easily fixable another less so.
1) CRT, originally developed in the 1970s, generally assumes a black-white dichotomy. Insofar as it addresses Hispanics and Asians, it does so by putting them in the “black” column—victims of oppression in a system of “white supremacy.” But that’s plainly not true. If you look at the statistics, the closest comparison to the experience of poor Latino and Asian immigrants is poor white immigrants like Italians. They are achieving economic parity with whites within a couple of generations. They don’t face persistent multi-generational gaps like black and indigenous people do.
2) Asians (and to a lesser extent Latinos) broadly do not share the political premise of CRT: that our economic and political systems are tainted by “white supremacy” and must be fundamentally changed. That flows partly from culture. Animosity between different ethnic and cultural groups is widespread in Asia and Latin America. Generally speaking, it’s perceived as bad manners, not an existential threat to prosperity. My parents never talked to me about racism growing up, and I suspect that’s pretty typical in Asian and Latino families. By contrast, I think such conversations is very common among black Americans. That attitude is reinforced by the economics. The experience of the overwhelming majority of the kids of Asian and Latino immigrants is closing the gap with whites as compared to their parents. The notion, fundamental to CRT, that non-whites can only make progress through coordinated changes to the system isn’t compatible with their lives experience.
1) CRT, originally developed in the 1970s, generally assumes a black-white dichotomy. Insofar as it addresses Hispanics and Asians, it does so by putting them in the “black” column—victims of oppression in a system of “white supremacy.” But that’s plainly not true. If you look at the statistics, the closest comparison to the experience of poor Latino and Asian immigrants is poor white immigrants like Italians. They are achieving economic parity with whites within a couple of generations. They don’t face persistent multi-generational gaps like black and indigenous people do.
2) Asians (and to a lesser extent Latinos) broadly do not share the political premise of CRT: that our economic and political systems are tainted by “white supremacy” and must be fundamentally changed. That flows partly from culture. Animosity between different ethnic and cultural groups is widespread in Asia and Latin America. Generally speaking, it’s perceived as bad manners, not an existential threat to prosperity. My parents never talked to me about racism growing up, and I suspect that’s pretty typical in Asian and Latino families. By contrast, I think such conversations is very common among black Americans. That attitude is reinforced by the economics. The experience of the overwhelming majority of the kids of Asian and Latino immigrants is closing the gap with whites as compared to their parents. The notion, fundamental to CRT, that non-whites can only make progress through coordinated changes to the system isn’t compatible with their lives experience.
> Insofar as it addresses Hispanics and Asians, it does so by putting them in the “black” column—victims of oppression in a system of “white supremacy.”
Can you point to CRT works that do this? I'd like to read them.
Can you point to CRT works that do this? I'd like to read them.
Sure, look at the California Model Ethnic Studies Curriculum: https://www.cde.ca.gov/ci/cr/cf/documents/esmcchapter4.pdf. It takes Kendi's black-white oppressed-oppressor dichotomy, and simply shuffles asians into the oppressed, non-white category.
Lesson 14:
> It presents a false narrative that Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPIs) have overcome racism and prejudice. It glosses over the violence, harm, and legalized racism that AAPIs have endured, for example, the 1871 Chinese massacre in Los Angeles, the annexation of Hawaii, shooting of Southeast Asian schoolchildren in Stockton.
Lesson 16:
>Chinese Americans are Americans and have played a key role in building this country. Had it not been for this workforce, one of the greatest engineering feats of the nineteenth century (the first transcontinental railroad and others that followed), would not have been achieved within the allotted timeline.
It's a projection of how CRT views black history, where ethnic identity is defined in terms of historical discrimination. Meanwhile, do kids of German, Italian, or Irish descent in California learn about the intense racism their ancestors faced when they came here? Of course not.
What's especially galling is that German, Italian, and Irish Americans are at least the descendants of people who faced intense discrimination when they got to America. Meanwhile, virtually all Asian Americans are descended from people who came here after 1950, and mostly after 1990. California is teaching Asian kids to identify with historically discriminated people who aren't even their ancestors.
Lesson 14:
> It presents a false narrative that Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPIs) have overcome racism and prejudice. It glosses over the violence, harm, and legalized racism that AAPIs have endured, for example, the 1871 Chinese massacre in Los Angeles, the annexation of Hawaii, shooting of Southeast Asian schoolchildren in Stockton.
Lesson 16:
>Chinese Americans are Americans and have played a key role in building this country. Had it not been for this workforce, one of the greatest engineering feats of the nineteenth century (the first transcontinental railroad and others that followed), would not have been achieved within the allotted timeline.
It's a projection of how CRT views black history, where ethnic identity is defined in terms of historical discrimination. Meanwhile, do kids of German, Italian, or Irish descent in California learn about the intense racism their ancestors faced when they came here? Of course not.
What's especially galling is that German, Italian, and Irish Americans are at least the descendants of people who faced intense discrimination when they got to America. Meanwhile, virtually all Asian Americans are descended from people who came here after 1950, and mostly after 1990. California is teaching Asian kids to identify with historically discriminated people who aren't even their ancestors.
I also think the CRT worldview naturally produces a prejudice against Asians. For example: https://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/Alison-Collins-San-F...
The CRT worldview makes slavery the central event of history, and oppression by whites the central theme. That’s what’s going on in the Nikole Hannah-Jones quote above. How do those folks perceive immigrant groups that come here and tell their kids to shut up and work hard? I think that leads straight to the idea that Asians are complicit in “upholding white supremacy.” And even white people like John Oliver get in on that narrative.
Of course from our perspective we are just raising our kids according to our culture. In broad strokes, both east and south Asian cultures tend to be deferential to authority and emphasize an internal locus of control. If you ask my mom why bangladesh is poor, she’ll point to corruption and other moral failings, not British colonialism. Whether that is accurate or not, that’s completely at odds with the CRT worldview, which emphasizes an external locus of control—blaming oppression by whites for everything.
The CRT worldview makes slavery the central event of history, and oppression by whites the central theme. That’s what’s going on in the Nikole Hannah-Jones quote above. How do those folks perceive immigrant groups that come here and tell their kids to shut up and work hard? I think that leads straight to the idea that Asians are complicit in “upholding white supremacy.” And even white people like John Oliver get in on that narrative.
Of course from our perspective we are just raising our kids according to our culture. In broad strokes, both east and south Asian cultures tend to be deferential to authority and emphasize an internal locus of control. If you ask my mom why bangladesh is poor, she’ll point to corruption and other moral failings, not British colonialism. Whether that is accurate or not, that’s completely at odds with the CRT worldview, which emphasizes an external locus of control—blaming oppression by whites for everything.
Nikole Hannah-Jones is a journalist, not a Critical Race Theorist. Find a better descriptor for this (perhaps prevalent) "worldview" than "the CRT worldview". Prompted by a bunch of unproductive discussions like this one, I took some time and actually read a bunch of CRT journal articles, and none of these discussions intersect what actual CRT work says. That may be as much a fault of popular culture and pop sociology as it is HN's, but either way, it's annoying.
It is easy to make a case that Nikole Hannah-Jones essentializes the transatlantic slave trade. But it is unreasonable to generalize from Hannah-Jones to a whole field of study without evidence.
It is easy to make a case that Nikole Hannah-Jones essentializes the transatlantic slave trade. But it is unreasonable to generalize from Hannah-Jones to a whole field of study without evidence.
Nikole Hannah-Jones has a degree in African American Studies, so I think the label is perfectly apt. It's like "supply-side economics." It's a useful label for political ideas that are adjacent to an academic theory of the same name.
Hannah-Jones has a bachelors in history. My sister has a degree in Russian Literature. But she's a lawyer, not a literature critic. Hannah-Jones is not a Critical Race Theorist. That is an actual thing, and your education brought you closer to it than Hannah-Jones' did.
I put a lot of work into my citing the data sources from my comments so that the numbers can be vetted by the institutions they were reported by. Do you have any sources you can reference that show where you get your numbers from?
simplotek(1)
But those numbers are a lie, American whites scored 503, just look at the report page 34, it clearly says that white Americans scored 25 points higher than the average 478 at math. 478 + 25 = 503.
He must have taken the wrong graph.
Edit: Anyway, 503 is pretty average for Europeans, so it means that Americans are pretty average at math, as you'd expect for a large country. So it is still proof that Americans aren't bad, they are typical.
He must have taken the wrong graph.
Edit: Anyway, 503 is pretty average for Europeans, so it means that Americans are pretty average at math, as you'd expect for a large country. So it is still proof that Americans aren't bad, they are typical.
I didn't lie... Page 16 of my OECD link shows that the average was 505 for 2018...
EDIT:: Nevermind I'm a dumbass. that graph is for reading and literacy.... guess I know how I'd score...
EDIT:: Nevermind I'm a dumbass. that graph is for reading and literacy.... guess I know how I'd score...
Fair enough. Although being the median with such a large country is still pretty divergent from the popular narrative I was comparing to. Those sorts of generalized nationwide numbers wasn’t my point anyway, rather proper data analysis and putting data into the wider context of the various communities/finer demographics/etc leads to far more useful conclusions than national level ones alone.
Similar to critiques of the GDP as a metric for success.
It’s not surprising the default critique on Reddit/Twitter is always using some European country with a homogeneous culture and a small population centered around ~2-3 major cities at most vs the entire US.
Similar to critiques of the GDP as a metric for success.
It’s not surprising the default critique on Reddit/Twitter is always using some European country with a homogeneous culture and a small population centered around ~2-3 major cities at most vs the entire US.
> Those sorts of generalized nationwide numbers wasn’t my point anyway, rather proper data analysis and putting data into the wider context of the various communities/finer demographics/etc leads to far more useful conclusions than national level ones alone.
What conclusions would those be?
> It’s not surprising the default critique on Reddit/Twitter is always using some European country with a homogeneous culture and a small population centered around ~2-3 major cities at most vs the entire US.
If you'd prefer you could compare whatever nation you'd like with individual US states. You have plenty of US states to pick and choose from.
Regardless, I don't see this sort of statistics rigour when comparing the US to "Europe" as a whole, in spite of the heterogeneous nature of the whole continent (some countries even have regions where people speak entirely different languages) and the fact that the population of "Europe" is well over twice that of the US.
But I guess the point might just be to shut down discussions to avoid conclusions and introspection.
What conclusions would those be?
> It’s not surprising the default critique on Reddit/Twitter is always using some European country with a homogeneous culture and a small population centered around ~2-3 major cities at most vs the entire US.
If you'd prefer you could compare whatever nation you'd like with individual US states. You have plenty of US states to pick and choose from.
Regardless, I don't see this sort of statistics rigour when comparing the US to "Europe" as a whole, in spite of the heterogeneous nature of the whole continent (some countries even have regions where people speak entirely different languages) and the fact that the population of "Europe" is well over twice that of the US.
But I guess the point might just be to shut down discussions to avoid conclusions and introspection.
There is an entire education consultancy industry whose financial viability depends on convincing people that American public education is in some kind of crisis when it isn't; it's actually a little above average, as we see.
Now, would I like it to be way above average? Sure, and I'm willing to make the public investment to make that happen. But starting from the premise of "we're failing miserably" is going to lead to the wrong conclusions.
Now, would I like it to be way above average? Sure, and I'm willing to make the public investment to make that happen. But starting from the premise of "we're failing miserably" is going to lead to the wrong conclusions.
[deleted]
America also accepts way, way more immigrants than any other developed nation. Japan? None. Norway? Zilch. Netherlands? Come onnnn. They get handfuls but as a percentage of population the USA takes in boatloads and bus loads of immigrants every month.
When you look at statistics that say the US is lower in this or that, remember that America takes in millions of dirt poor immigrants each year, and their circumstances skew the numbers. However they get assimilated and integrated, and a generation later their kids are going to the Ivy League and starting businesses.
When you look at statistics that say the US is lower in this or that, remember that America takes in millions of dirt poor immigrants each year, and their circumstances skew the numbers. However they get assimilated and integrated, and a generation later their kids are going to the Ivy League and starting businesses.
I'm not sure the data matches that line of reasoning. Looking at number of immigrants per capita for various countries, the US is beat out by some of the countries you wouldn't expect from your conclusion. Notably Australia, Switzerland, New Zealand, Canada, Sweden, Austria, Iceland, Germany, Ireland, Belgium, and Norway all have more immigration per capita than the states it seems. https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/immigrati...
An Austrian who immigrates to Germany or even a German (or other EU national) who immigrates to Switzerland has a very different experience, both in terms of legal hurdles and likely relative earnings than someone immigrating from Latin America to the US.
How about if we look at immigration into the US as a whole vs immigration to the EU as a whole? What do the numbers look like, then?
How about if we look at immigration into the US as a whole vs immigration to the EU as a whole? What do the numbers look like, then?
Ironically, as a Dutch tech worker without a degree the USA is one of the very very few countries I can't emigrate to.
The US tech obsession with degrees is stupid and self-defeating. You'll regularly see ads for a web programmer requiring a BS in computer science. Somebody with a BS in comp sci should be able to write a (very simple) operating system, which is not what you need. It's even weirder because some jobs simply require any bachelor's degree, whatsoever, which is how I became a sysadmin after being a classics major. This is just explicit class gatekeeping.
If anything I feel like the US is an outlier in qualification requirements. It feels like every European country requires degrees for every single tech job, whereas in the US you can get by without one or just a BS. The amount of jobs I have seen in the EU that require an MS even though it really shouldn't is insane. I think every single technical ESA role requires an MS at minimum, whereas you can easily work at NASA with just a BS, which doesn't really make much sense.
Also you can still go to community college/a state school to get a BS? Or join the Army or something, take a low risk MOS, get them to fund your bachelors. The US is way less class prohibitive and has far more class mobility than the EU as a whole so I'm not sure what you're talking about.
Also you can still go to community college/a state school to get a BS? Or join the Army or something, take a low risk MOS, get them to fund your bachelors. The US is way less class prohibitive and has far more class mobility than the EU as a whole so I'm not sure what you're talking about.
According to https://www.weforum.org/reports/global-social-mobility-index..., the US ranks 27th in social mobility, behind 21 European countries, and ahead of 14 of them.
On the "Education Access" pillar, the Netherlands scored highest, while the US ranks 40th. So I don't think your conclusion is accurate.
On the "Education Access" pillar, the Netherlands scored highest, while the US ranks 40th. So I don't think your conclusion is accurate.
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The US has significantly lower social mobility than most of Europe, though I think people kind of ignore that and pretend the opposite is true.
It's a lot easier to get in to college in the US than in most of Europe, but it costs a whole lot more (like requiring a degree in the first place, it's a kind of social gatekeeping). I think nowadays like 60% of high school grads attend some amount of college, but only about half of those get an actual degree.
It's a lot easier to get in to college in the US than in most of Europe, but it costs a whole lot more (like requiring a degree in the first place, it's a kind of social gatekeeping). I think nowadays like 60% of high school grads attend some amount of college, but only about half of those get an actual degree.
Are you serious? There are quite a few more developed nations other than the three you've listed (and I'm not even sure if the claim is accurate for all three, when adjusting for size).
Just last year, Germany has accepted more than a million Ukrainian immigrants – at a population of under 100 million. Yes, exceptional circumstances, but there have been a lot of these in the past decade (consider e.g. the Syrian war). And the number the US accepted in the same year? Just short of 2000. Yes, two thousand, not two millions – at four times the population.
Looking at the statistics, the balance is something like half a million in net(!) arrivals per year in the last decade. (I couldn't find comparable numbers for the US, but granted green cards seems like a reasonable proxy, and that's also less than a million per year, and that's not even accounting for people moving away.) And if you look at the larger EU, the "more than any other developed nation" claim completely falls apart.
The US also gets to cherry-pick immigrants based on skill to a much larger extent than the EU does due to geography alone (requesting asylum generally requires physical presence, and the EU's land and sea borders are a lot easier to cross).
Just last year, Germany has accepted more than a million Ukrainian immigrants – at a population of under 100 million. Yes, exceptional circumstances, but there have been a lot of these in the past decade (consider e.g. the Syrian war). And the number the US accepted in the same year? Just short of 2000. Yes, two thousand, not two millions – at four times the population.
Looking at the statistics, the balance is something like half a million in net(!) arrivals per year in the last decade. (I couldn't find comparable numbers for the US, but granted green cards seems like a reasonable proxy, and that's also less than a million per year, and that's not even accounting for people moving away.) And if you look at the larger EU, the "more than any other developed nation" claim completely falls apart.
The US also gets to cherry-pick immigrants based on skill to a much larger extent than the EU does due to geography alone (requesting asylum generally requires physical presence, and the EU's land and sea borders are a lot easier to cross).
Pretty intellectually dishonest to ignore the massive amount of “undocumented” immigration happening in the US. Nobody absorbs more immigrants. Full stop.
I'm willing to believe that that number is (much) larger than granted green cards or visas – but are there any reliable estimates? Otherwise it's just a baseless claim.
One number I've found puts the estimated number of unlawful entries to the US per year at under 100k, for a total population of around 10 million. The EU sees around 2.5 million immigrants, vs. around 1.5 million emigrants, per year.
GPs claim of "millions of dirt-poor immigrants per year" skewing the numbers doesn't seem realistic to me.
One number I've found puts the estimated number of unlawful entries to the US per year at under 100k, for a total population of around 10 million. The EU sees around 2.5 million immigrants, vs. around 1.5 million emigrants, per year.
GPs claim of "millions of dirt-poor immigrants per year" skewing the numbers doesn't seem realistic to me.
Border patrol has averaged around 200K apprehensions per month for 2 years now at the southern border, that doesn't even account for the people they didn't apprehend. Not sure where you got the 100K annual number but it isn't even close to accurate
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/immigration-border-crossings-us...
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/immigration-border-crossings-us...
Well the question is what is the number who make it through? The number captured isn't relevant. If they captured 100% then the undocumented immigration number would be 0. Then we also need to know how many self-deport back over the border.
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It's estimated to be net negative (more people leave illegally than enter illegally). It peaked late in George W Bush's 2nd term and has been falling steadily ever since, crossing the zero point some time during Obama's admin.
It's an entirely made-up "crisis", but a reliably effective one politically.
It's an entirely made-up "crisis", but a reliably effective one politically.
Not to mention Obama deported almost 1% of the entire American population (some 2.5M between 2009 and 2015) - more than any other president either in actual numbers or as a percentage of the population.
I mean, no. Net illegal migration has been negative since Obama's second term. It's basically an entirely made-up "crisis" and has been for a decade now.
> Yes I’ve seen these statistics a number of times and it really goes against so much of the “lol Americans are bad at math” meme all over the internet.
I never came across any of the sort.
What I come across frequently is the extension of the American exceptionalism mindset that leads some US natives to believe they are exceptional at math in spite of evidence failing to support their exceptionalism views.
> America is a society of disparate cultures, regions, communities, and outcomes (often in the same cities) that is far too (...)
I also see this all too often: the follow-up to the exceptionalism mindset failing to support their beliefs in a rational basis, and proceeding to cherry-pick subsets that suit their exceptionalism views.
It's like claiming that Americans are all tall athletic and exceptional basketball players, and supporting that exceptionalism view by pointing out that Michael Jordan and LeBron James are US citizens. Meanwhile, ignoring that the average us citizen might have more in common with Danny DeVito.
The US population is over 330M people, and its an unrivaled economic and technological powerhouse. Of course you can find hundreds of exceptional individuals. But being able to find a champion among the masses is not the point of a statement like "Americans are good at math". Baselines matter a lot, and even you admit that the US does not look great by attempting to cherry pick your way out of that.
I never came across any of the sort.
What I come across frequently is the extension of the American exceptionalism mindset that leads some US natives to believe they are exceptional at math in spite of evidence failing to support their exceptionalism views.
> America is a society of disparate cultures, regions, communities, and outcomes (often in the same cities) that is far too (...)
I also see this all too often: the follow-up to the exceptionalism mindset failing to support their beliefs in a rational basis, and proceeding to cherry-pick subsets that suit their exceptionalism views.
It's like claiming that Americans are all tall athletic and exceptional basketball players, and supporting that exceptionalism view by pointing out that Michael Jordan and LeBron James are US citizens. Meanwhile, ignoring that the average us citizen might have more in common with Danny DeVito.
The US population is over 330M people, and its an unrivaled economic and technological powerhouse. Of course you can find hundreds of exceptional individuals. But being able to find a champion among the masses is not the point of a statement like "Americans are good at math". Baselines matter a lot, and even you admit that the US does not look great by attempting to cherry pick your way out of that.
Other societies are also societies of disparate cultures.
Most other societies also don’t tend to have every group at average, but some groups above average and others lower.
If you break other societies with higher average scores down by groups along fault lines in those societies, the top groups in those societies will also be doing much better than the bottom groups, and considering they have higher average scores, the top groups will likely be doing better than the top groups in the US.
Most other societies also don’t tend to have every group at average, but some groups above average and others lower.
If you break other societies with higher average scores down by groups along fault lines in those societies, the top groups in those societies will also be doing much better than the bottom groups, and considering they have higher average scores, the top groups will likely be doing better than the top groups in the US.
> America is a society of disparate cultures, regions, communities, and outcomes (often in the same cities)
There are cities in Europe with histories spanning thousands of years, but were apart until only 30 years ago. There are countries with multiple ethnicities, multiple official languages.
There are cities in Europe with histories spanning thousands of years, but were apart until only 30 years ago. There are countries with multiple ethnicities, multiple official languages.
I bet everyone can guess who leads the US Math league to victory?
Those numbers doesn't add up, USA average was 478, how could whites that are a majority score all the way up at 531? There aren't enough black people to drag 531 down to 478, and only black people are below average here.
Edit: Yes, look at page 34 in that report, it says that white kids scored 25 higher than average, so 503. Where did you get those numbers from, those are wrong.
Edit: Yes, look at page 34 in that report, it says that white kids scored 25 higher than average, so 503. Where did you get those numbers from, those are wrong.
Yeah I just looked at the two sources. Somethings up will add a disclaimer in my comment
Yeah, somewhat ironically you were looking at the reading comprehension scores.
Whites skew older, and I believe they aren’t majority for younger cohorts. Is the education data from a recent cohort?
Does anyone else feel weird about comparisons that match a subgroup of people in the US against whole continents? Why is it normal to smash all the countries of a continent into one? What “asian” or “European” student is making it into these standards? The ones with money to come to the US and be surveyed?
1. When people compare with “Europe” they usually mean western and northern Europe. Wealthy democratic countries that were NATO members or aligned during the Cold War.
2. These countries pretty much all (to varying degrees) have a strong social democratic movement that has been able to set policy during the 20th century, resulting in fairly uniform (compared with USA) support for universal education, healthcare, and other things Americans can’t take for granted.
There is huge variation within Europe for sure, but western/northern european countries do largely cluster together when looked at the world as a whole.
2. These countries pretty much all (to varying degrees) have a strong social democratic movement that has been able to set policy during the 20th century, resulting in fairly uniform (compared with USA) support for universal education, healthcare, and other things Americans can’t take for granted.
There is huge variation within Europe for sure, but western/northern european countries do largely cluster together when looked at the world as a whole.
I agree (and point out in my comment) that this is not a 1:1 comparison.
I'm sure in every educational system you can use some form of metric to exclude low SES students and conclude that the system isn't behind or failing.
totally agree with you. was just pointing out a statistical quirk I thought added value to the discussion.
I'll even retract my point that the US maths education system isn't failing as a whole. When two demographics (30% of the country and growing) are being left behind by the system, then the system is failing as a whole. I really hope to see this change in the future.
I'll even retract my point that the US maths education system isn't failing as a whole. When two demographics (30% of the country and growing) are being left behind by the system, then the system is failing as a whole. I really hope to see this change in the future.
…or maybe always attempting to look at systems as a whole and fix it as a homogenous unit might be exactly why it’s failing in the first place.
>Really tough problem to solve, but the data does not support the conclusion that the American maths education system is "behind" or "failing" as a whole.
Wait, what? That is exactly what it means. If the groups that are least likely to get external support (ie a tutor, prep, whatever) are under-performing that implies the _standalone_ system is broken. Sure, it is not so broken that it can't be patched with outside aid, but that is true of many things we consider "a failure."
This is akin to saying "Of course my car can get across the country. All I need is the occasional tow-truck, you know, for when it overheats."
Wait, what? That is exactly what it means. If the groups that are least likely to get external support (ie a tutor, prep, whatever) are under-performing that implies the _standalone_ system is broken. Sure, it is not so broken that it can't be patched with outside aid, but that is true of many things we consider "a failure."
This is akin to saying "Of course my car can get across the country. All I need is the occasional tow-truck, you know, for when it overheats."
>If the groups that are least likely to get external support (ie a tutor, prep, whatever) are under-performing that implies the _standalone_ system broken.
Is there reasonable evidence to show that whites and asians receive "external support" at a rate high enough to convincingly explain a 50 to 100 point disparity on this test?
Is there reasonable evidence to show that whites and asians receive "external support" at a rate high enough to convincingly explain a 50 to 100 point disparity on this test?
One second google search: https://www.edworkingpapers.com/sites/default/files/ai21-367...
I only skimmed it (read the abstract, checked the graphs, reviewed what stuck out as I scrolled), but quick take aways:
(1) The # of private tutoring centers has tripled to 10k since 1997!
(2) The utilization of the _new_ tutoring centers is primarily by the wealthy (which obviously skews white). In fact, utilization of private tutors by low income folks has gone down in the same period.
(3) They have a section summarizing how Asian-American utilization of tutoring center is high. They even summarize/mention other work that implies tutor usage as primary factor for the high test scores of Asian American students.
I'm not sure how comfortable I am with the second-half of that last point, but finding information from a credible source (Harvard/BU/Brown) wasn't hard.
I only skimmed it (read the abstract, checked the graphs, reviewed what stuck out as I scrolled), but quick take aways:
(1) The # of private tutoring centers has tripled to 10k since 1997!
(2) The utilization of the _new_ tutoring centers is primarily by the wealthy (which obviously skews white). In fact, utilization of private tutors by low income folks has gone down in the same period.
(3) They have a section summarizing how Asian-American utilization of tutoring center is high. They even summarize/mention other work that implies tutor usage as primary factor for the high test scores of Asian American students.
I'm not sure how comfortable I am with the second-half of that last point, but finding information from a credible source (Harvard/BU/Brown) wasn't hard.
Controlling for race is stupid and is the source of many of our problems. One should control for socioeconomic factors instead such as family income, whether both parents present, parents’ education.
People have done this. It either has no effect or makes the disparities more stark with regard to Asian-Americans.
‘The system is only failing black and hispanic students.’
What is “the system”? you mean to say the school is racist or unfair to black kids..hispanic kids? who is responsible in your opinion?
What is “the system”? you mean to say the school is racist or unfair to black kids..hispanic kids? who is responsible in your opinion?
Outside of the funding issue, most of this comes down to socioeconomic status and cultures of ethic groups. For example, a student in a wealthy household might be given support and the space to not have any other responsibility outside of academic achievement while a student in a lower income household might be expected to contribute to their household by doing more domestic chores and child/elder care. The student in the later situation will obviously have less free time for studying but, perhaps the more damaging aspect, may also be less engaged at school because they already have a mountain of responsibilities at home.
6 hours a day, 5 days a week, in class is plenty of time to learn math. Far more than enough.
That's undoubtedly true, but time alone isn't enough. Achievement in poorer schools is lower as well; in some schools the only math that students really care about is decreasing their odds of being assaulted between classes, and doing well in class (esp math) isn't helping those odds
As long as you want to do it
Teenagers aren't really aware of how not learning fucks their chances
I've learned math mostly outside the school.
Teenagers aren't really aware of how not learning fucks their chances
I've learned math mostly outside the school.
If you've had enough food, enough sleep, etc.
None of which you can take for granted in the lower socioeconomic areas.
None of which you can take for granted in the lower socioeconomic areas.
The poor aren't starving in America. Besides, they get the free school lunch.
I don’t think your realize just how out touch you sound. If you grew up in a well-off family where a traditional work ethic is highly valued, I can see how easy it is to arrive at a simplification like this. Getting a menial free lunch does not fix the other problems a student may face when going home, whether that be the parents not able to feed their children properly or maybe they are in an overcrowded house with no space of their own. This family may not have access to health care outside of the most basic of services and similarly, maintenance on their vehicles because they can’t afford that and to eat that month.
Maintaining government benefits quickly becomes a full time job because of arcane requirements written by uncaring people. Those in poverty might find themselves disincentivized from seeking higher paying work due to the “welfare cliff” where once the make over X amount, benefits start to go away. In some cases, if they suddenly make nothing (as if they’ve just lost a job or had hours cut), healthcare benefits are yanked away just when they need it most.
It’s very easy to see this as a moral failing, but if you’ve not lived through this situation, you cannot possibly understand the toll that poverty takes on you both physically and mentally. The truth, like with most things, is more complicated.
Maintaining government benefits quickly becomes a full time job because of arcane requirements written by uncaring people. Those in poverty might find themselves disincentivized from seeking higher paying work due to the “welfare cliff” where once the make over X amount, benefits start to go away. In some cases, if they suddenly make nothing (as if they’ve just lost a job or had hours cut), healthcare benefits are yanked away just when they need it most.
It’s very easy to see this as a moral failing, but if you’ve not lived through this situation, you cannot possibly understand the toll that poverty takes on you both physically and mentally. The truth, like with most things, is more complicated.
The current public school system does not work. My proposal won't solve every problem. But it will do much better.
> Besides, they get the free school lunch.
IF their parents filed a bunch of paperwork--which presupposes the time, literacy and desire to do so. Children don't get to choose their parents.
This is one of the reasons why making school lunches a standard part of school (they're not "free" as they're just part of the budget) is so important.
People dunk on the public schools, but, if there was anything that the webcam schooling of Covid lockdowns showed us, it's that the home lives of a LOT of children in lower socioeconomic areas are really terrible (and also how bad the home lives of a lot of children who nominally aren't in lower socioeconomic areas--but that's a totally different discussion). The fact that public schools tended to provide an oasis in the middle of that chaos became terribly apparent.
IF their parents filed a bunch of paperwork--which presupposes the time, literacy and desire to do so. Children don't get to choose their parents.
This is one of the reasons why making school lunches a standard part of school (they're not "free" as they're just part of the budget) is so important.
People dunk on the public schools, but, if there was anything that the webcam schooling of Covid lockdowns showed us, it's that the home lives of a LOT of children in lower socioeconomic areas are really terrible (and also how bad the home lives of a lot of children who nominally aren't in lower socioeconomic areas--but that's a totally different discussion). The fact that public schools tended to provide an oasis in the middle of that chaos became terribly apparent.
The system in this case is using property taxes as the primary funding for schools, so children in poorer neighborhoods get worse funding and worse outcomes.
San Francisco busses kids across the city all over the place to ensure the students are evenly mixed and ensure the best outcome for all students.
The result is that one third of students (22,000) are now in private schools, the remainder (50,000) are in public schools. A lot of SF parents move out of the city 1) for a bigger house and 2) more reliable schooling solution 3) access to GATE programs.
There is a lot of value in being walking distance from your child's elementary school. In SF there is no guarantee where in the city your child will go to school.
The result is that one third of students (22,000) are now in private schools, the remainder (50,000) are in public schools. A lot of SF parents move out of the city 1) for a bigger house and 2) more reliable schooling solution 3) access to GATE programs.
There is a lot of value in being walking distance from your child's elementary school. In SF there is no guarantee where in the city your child will go to school.
You see the same phenomenon in California and funds have been allocated Statewide since the 70s or 80s. The problem is more complicated than that
WA is the same since 2013. A lot correlation is simply in socio economic demographics when the schools are well funded all around. Also, richer schools will have more parents volunteering for things, but that reflects in a better home life as well. Rich people can just afford to spend more time and resources on their kids even when the schools are funded equally.
Only ~50-60% of the money comes from the state. ~30-40% comes from the local governments. (The last ~10% comes from the federal government).
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Incorrect. Half of school funding comes from property taxes. The other half comes from state and federal sources to offset the disparity from property taxes. Here is a good breakdown of per student spending in Maryland as an example: https://conduitstreet.mdcounties.org/2019/02/20/funding-per-.... Notice how federal and state funding is used to offset (often more than offset) differences in local funding.
There's nothing "incorrect" about what the parent commenter said. Compare Frederick Douglas Academy in Austin to OPRF in Oak Park, a 15 minute walk away. Urban schools get state and federal dollars --- but so do wealthy suburban schools. It is in fact the case that wealthy families opt in to de facto private school systems; no jazz-hands about subsidies and mismanagement gets you around that fact.
Yes. To give a concrete example, California schools on the whole spend about $14,913 per student [1], while Palo Alto spends $23,038 [2].
[1]: https://www.ppic.org/publication/financing-californias-publi...
[2]: https://papie.org/about/f-a-q/
[1]: https://www.ppic.org/publication/financing-californias-publi...
[2]: https://papie.org/about/f-a-q/
A more accurate and comparable figure is $16,085 per pupil[0]. And that has grown very much since then to now $20,855 per pupil, a record-breaking figure (like all the years in the preceding decade--just look at that chart!)[1]. Also consider that in California under-privileged (low-income, ESL, foster children) schools do indeed get lots of extra resources and grants[2].
Your figure is apparently only for "current operations (e.g., staff, materials)" from 2018-19. But that doesn't reflect the already-absurd and ever-growing true cost of California's broken education system. And it isn't directly comparable to your figure for PAUSD's total budget.
"Reflecting the changes to Proposition 98 funding noted above, total per-pupil expenditures from all sources are projected to be $15,654 in 2017-18 and $16,085 in 2018-19"[0]
"K-12 per-pupil funding [in 2022-23] totals $15,261 Proposition 98 General Fund—its highest level ever—and $20,855 per pupil when accounting for all funding sources."[1]
[0]: https://ebudget.ca.gov/2018-19/pdf/BudgetSummary/K-12Educati... (p. 2)
[1]: https://www.ebudget.ca.gov/2022-23/pdf/BudgetSummary/K-12Edu... (p. 3)
[2]: https://www.ebudget.ca.gov/2021-22/pdf/BudgetSummary/K-12Edu... (pp. 11-16)
Your figure is apparently only for "current operations (e.g., staff, materials)" from 2018-19. But that doesn't reflect the already-absurd and ever-growing true cost of California's broken education system. And it isn't directly comparable to your figure for PAUSD's total budget.
"Reflecting the changes to Proposition 98 funding noted above, total per-pupil expenditures from all sources are projected to be $15,654 in 2017-18 and $16,085 in 2018-19"[0]
"K-12 per-pupil funding [in 2022-23] totals $15,261 Proposition 98 General Fund—its highest level ever—and $20,855 per pupil when accounting for all funding sources."[1]
[0]: https://ebudget.ca.gov/2018-19/pdf/BudgetSummary/K-12Educati... (p. 2)
[1]: https://www.ebudget.ca.gov/2022-23/pdf/BudgetSummary/K-12Edu... (p. 3)
[2]: https://www.ebudget.ca.gov/2021-22/pdf/BudgetSummary/K-12Edu... (pp. 11-16)
I'm not sure how you're getting that figure for $23,038. Also, accordion drop downs from an FAQ page may not be the best place to cite information from (too much irrelevant information to sift through)
It’s incorrect to say local property taxes are the “primary” mechanism for school funding because state funding exceeds local funding. https://educationdata.org/public-education-spending-statisti...
> States contribute a total of $357.0 billion to K-12 public education or $7,058 per student.
> Local governments contribute $347.4 billion total or $6,868 per student.
I’m assuming the “system” here is talking about the national education system, since that seems to be the topic of the immediately preceding posts. California and SFUD might be different.
> States contribute a total of $357.0 billion to K-12 public education or $7,058 per student.
> Local governments contribute $347.4 billion total or $6,868 per student.
I’m assuming the “system” here is talking about the national education system, since that seems to be the topic of the immediately preceding posts. California and SFUD might be different.
Okay, I am corrected. Only ~$350 billion out of ~$750 billion is local. So it's not the majority nationwide. It's still 7 out of 15 dollars. That's a substantial enough minority to have very disparate outcomes.
You can just take pairs of schools in adjoining neighborhoods/municipalities and compare. Their budgets are all public. That's what I did here.
I know people who go to private schools because they don't want to put a burden on the state.
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"The system is only failing black and hispanic students. "
Black students of African heritage, unless the group is very specifically selected (Nigerian-Americans come to mind, with their extremely high average education levels), tend to come out on the bottom in all racially mixed societies in the world. Even the Finnish educational system, touted as one of the best in the world, struggles to educate Somali immigrants to Finnish levels.
The very opposite tends to be true about East Asians and Ashkenazi Jewish students. I am not aware of a single educational system worldwide where either of those groups would be considered under-achieving and needing government or private help.
The standard American answer is that the root cause is systemic racism. I don't believe that; the phenomenon is too widespread and there are other ethnicities that face vicious open racism in their countries, while being extremely successful. Some of the most successful groups in the world are actually direct survivors of genocidal campaigns or lost wars; all that murder didn't break them.
Black students of African heritage, unless the group is very specifically selected (Nigerian-Americans come to mind, with their extremely high average education levels), tend to come out on the bottom in all racially mixed societies in the world. Even the Finnish educational system, touted as one of the best in the world, struggles to educate Somali immigrants to Finnish levels.
The very opposite tends to be true about East Asians and Ashkenazi Jewish students. I am not aware of a single educational system worldwide where either of those groups would be considered under-achieving and needing government or private help.
The standard American answer is that the root cause is systemic racism. I don't believe that; the phenomenon is too widespread and there are other ethnicities that face vicious open racism in their countries, while being extremely successful. Some of the most successful groups in the world are actually direct survivors of genocidal campaigns or lost wars; all that murder didn't break them.
The upper segment of the US compares favorably to the average of EU. That doesn’t sound fair. Most EU countries have went through massive immigrant shifts in the last three decades. Like for like comparison would exclude the second and third generation immigrants as well for the EU. (I actually don’t think this is a worthwhile comparison. Just point out a flawed reasoning.)
My two cents.
We do a disservice to students in the US by treating Algebra/Calc as advanced math. Typically, American schools judge student math aptitude prior to algebra based on rote memorization of multiplication tables. Potentially with the added benefit of more rote memorization problems if one is in the honors curriculum. Aptitude for this type of problem does not directly translate into aptitude for higher math.
There is nothing particularly advanced about Algebra or Calculus. At most, it's a question of how much time one is willing and able to put into the subject. The fact that most American students do not exit high school with a functional knowledge of single variable calculus is purely an artifact of our curriculum priorities.
We do a disservice to students in the US by treating Algebra/Calc as advanced math. Typically, American schools judge student math aptitude prior to algebra based on rote memorization of multiplication tables. Potentially with the added benefit of more rote memorization problems if one is in the honors curriculum. Aptitude for this type of problem does not directly translate into aptitude for higher math.
There is nothing particularly advanced about Algebra or Calculus. At most, it's a question of how much time one is willing and able to put into the subject. The fact that most American students do not exit high school with a functional knowledge of single variable calculus is purely an artifact of our curriculum priorities.
I was pretty annoyed when I got to university and figured out that math could be about proofs rather than calculation. If I had been raised with that idea of math, I would have loved it so much sooner and would probably be pretty good at it by now.
Same. I feel robbed of something that could have radically changed my life. I’ve always suspected that I could have had an aptitude for math, but was too young to be able to articulate it. I just knew that something was wrong with how it was being taught.
It’s a bit late for me now at 38, or at least it feels that way. I never took college math so HS-level algebra and geometry is my current level of understanding and sometimes it really hampers my programming ability.
It’s a bit late for me now at 38, or at least it feels that way. I never took college math so HS-level algebra and geometry is my current level of understanding and sometimes it really hampers my programming ability.
If you find it too tedious to self-study on your own (there are books for this purpose), then you can consider taking a trig or calc course at a local community college. Just think of it as a temporary hobby.
Or go for one of these gamified math tutorials.
For instance: this one teaches geometric proofs without mentioning the formalism, just letting you "unlock" the tools from a few "axiom" starter tools.
https://www.euclidea.xyz/
For instance: this one teaches geometric proofs without mentioning the formalism, just letting you "unlock" the tools from a few "axiom" starter tools.
https://www.euclidea.xyz/
This is very nicely done. I run a training group and I will use this for my students. Thank you for posting this resource.
Wtf this is awesome! This should be better publicized. Thank you!!
I consider the whole math educational curriculum a waste of time because no math teacher or textbook ever taught me WTF math is supposed to mean. There was an absolute lack of context to basically everything beyond very basic arithmetic, and I ended up hating math.
It was only when I got into programming and it taught me math is actually much more than just meaningless letters and numbers that I finally came around to appreciating it. Programming taught me math is the language spoken by the universe, anything in this universe could be explained with math and it was truly a mindblowing paradigm shift.
Math education needs a complete redo from the ground up, it teaches nothing of value and only serves to mass-produce math-haters to the detriment of us all.
It was only when I got into programming and it taught me math is actually much more than just meaningless letters and numbers that I finally came around to appreciating it. Programming taught me math is the language spoken by the universe, anything in this universe could be explained with math and it was truly a mindblowing paradigm shift.
Math education needs a complete redo from the ground up, it teaches nothing of value and only serves to mass-produce math-haters to the detriment of us all.
I feel for you.
I stopped after discrete math and analysis-lite class but I wish I took more algorithm and higher level math classes to be better at my craft. It's also hard to take classes when you have competing priorities when you're 30+. I don't know your current situation but I feel like you can totally do it since you have renewed determination for learning.
I stopped after discrete math and analysis-lite class but I wish I took more algorithm and higher level math classes to be better at my craft. It's also hard to take classes when you have competing priorities when you're 30+. I don't know your current situation but I feel like you can totally do it since you have renewed determination for learning.
IMO, good math ed is balanced:
- Enrichment, visual, and speedy stuff to build intuition
- Proofy stuff to build rigor and reasoning ability
- Rote stuff to build arithmetic and symbolic manipulation skills
Ideally, it would be balanced this way from kindergarten to mid-undergrad. In practice, most students rotate through these.
- Enrichment, visual, and speedy stuff to build intuition
- Proofy stuff to build rigor and reasoning ability
- Rote stuff to build arithmetic and symbolic manipulation skills
Ideally, it would be balanced this way from kindergarten to mid-undergrad. In practice, most students rotate through these.
Yeah, people who say the rote stuff isn't part of math don't get it, or they have a simplistic view of math that isn't as bad as the ones who don't know of the proofy side of math and think it is only rote and bland calculation. It's all of it and you need the rote stuff to build intuition too in addition to the things like visual "proofs" and graphs.
You do not build intuition about things without having some amount of those things in your head which is memorization.
You do not build intuition about things without having some amount of those things in your head which is memorization.
Unfortunately there are not sufficient good mathematics teachers around to impart this level of understanding to students in school. Not that the teachers we have are trying to be bad, just realistically if you have a mathematics competency and good critical thinking skills, you are able to earn 2-3X as much not being a teacher, so most people do that.
I was also annoyed for the opposite reason. I had assumed until then that math was more about application of what’s been proven rather than revisiting the proofs. I think the majority of students feel what I felt; that math got a lot less applied and a lot more esoteric in the academia.
Some people out there do both. As a physicist, I mainly use applications of what's been proven.
you do get proofs in HS geometry
That's more your parents' job since a career or hobby as a mathematician is extremely niche. School math is really a foundation to enable you do to all sorts of other things, as well as being directly useful. You can go a long way in engineering with only high-school calculus and engineer is a hugely popular profession and trade. Proofs are almost completely useless there. An engineer can usually "prove" something satisfactorily by testing it in a couple of cases and guessing that it generalizes to all real-world-scale numbers. That takes a kind of intuition about how typical equations typically behave which you get from doing all those tedious exercises at school.
> We do a disservice to students in the US by treating Algebra/Calc as advanced math.
My eastern European Calc II professor once complained when the class wasn't immediately grasping Riemann Sums, "This is grade school calculus!"
My eastern European Calc II professor once complained when the class wasn't immediately grasping Riemann Sums, "This is grade school calculus!"
Fond memories of my parents trying to teach me the pythagorean theorem and algebraic manipulation in second or third grade.
Ended in shouting and tears. Every. Single. Time.
Ended in shouting and tears. Every. Single. Time.
You made your parents cry?!? </sarc>
We certainly covered it about age 15/16 in the UK.
A college math professor who taught calculus told me that on the first day of class he gave students a quiz on basic arithmetic. The questions were easy enough that most students could score 100%. But he found that the speed with which students completed the quiz was a reliable predictor of their final course grade. Rote memorization of basic concepts does have some value in reducing the mental load and making it easier to focus on more complex concepts.
As a practical matter though, I think that most people working in STEM fields — including engineers — would benefit more from learning statistics instead of calculus.
As a practical matter though, I think that most people working in STEM fields — including engineers — would benefit more from learning statistics instead of calculus.
> But he found that the speed with which students completed the quiz was a reliable predictor of their final course grade. Rote memorization of basic concepts does have some value in reducing the mental load and making it easier to focus on more complex concepts.
Maybe. Or maybe it's useless but skill at it is a good measure of how conscientious those students were in high school (e.g. the extent to which they bothered to do their homework). Or any number of other possible explanations.
Maybe. Or maybe it's useless but skill at it is a good measure of how conscientious those students were in high school (e.g. the extent to which they bothered to do their homework). Or any number of other possible explanations.
> But he found that the speed with which students completed the quiz was a reliable predictor of their final course grade
Funnily all my college math professors and their TAs were notoriously bad at arithmetic. They regularly joked that arithmetic isn’t real math so not a big deal.
My physics professor was an arithmetic magician though. The way he could take a ridiculously complex equation covering the whole blackboard and guesstimate the solution in his head was a marvel to behold.
Funnily all my college math professors and their TAs were notoriously bad at arithmetic. They regularly joked that arithmetic isn’t real math so not a big deal.
My physics professor was an arithmetic magician though. The way he could take a ridiculously complex equation covering the whole blackboard and guesstimate the solution in his head was a marvel to behold.
You can have either calculus or arithmetic in your head. But, it sounds like it's good to have arithmetic in your head before you replace it with calculus.
I never memorized anything in math. After working enough problem sets, you just know it. Frankly, rote memorization of math is a worthless endeavor.
Isn't that what memorizing is? Repeating something until you just know it? I don't understand the distinction you're making.
> Isn't that what memorizing is? Repeating something until you just know it?
Memorizing is a directed effort to remember something. Remembering something as a side effect of some other task is not memorization.
Memorizing is a directed effort to remember something. Remembering something as a side effect of some other task is not memorization.
Yes, this. I knew how to do derivatives in 8th grade, came to the US in 10th grade and took AP Calculus because I was more than ready for it. I took differential equations at a community college in 11th grade, multivariable calculus in 12th.
Some school admins went nuts about letting a student take calculus in 10th grade because they didn't think it was doable. But I tested out of everything else. I was the first person in the history of the school to do this, only because I came from internationally having completed a trig course in 9th grade. In the US they wouldn't have allowed that in the first place, but here I was, having already done it, because I was given the opportunity outside the US.
I never saw myself having any special learning abilities, I was just moving onto the next thing to learn. I'm not any sort of prodigy, I just hated team sports and liked science and math, and spent lots of my extracurricular time learning about it.* I only moved faster in math because I put so many hours into studying it outside of school, not because I had any innate talent for it. It also made it more fun, because by learning ahead of class, I was learning for myself with much less pressure than learning for some stupid exam.
This "no child left behind" stuff is pure nonsense in the way they are implementing it.
*You see, I was previously growing up in Asia, where STEM is what the "cool kids" do.
Some school admins went nuts about letting a student take calculus in 10th grade because they didn't think it was doable. But I tested out of everything else. I was the first person in the history of the school to do this, only because I came from internationally having completed a trig course in 9th grade. In the US they wouldn't have allowed that in the first place, but here I was, having already done it, because I was given the opportunity outside the US.
I never saw myself having any special learning abilities, I was just moving onto the next thing to learn. I'm not any sort of prodigy, I just hated team sports and liked science and math, and spent lots of my extracurricular time learning about it.* I only moved faster in math because I put so many hours into studying it outside of school, not because I had any innate talent for it. It also made it more fun, because by learning ahead of class, I was learning for myself with much less pressure than learning for some stupid exam.
This "no child left behind" stuff is pure nonsense in the way they are implementing it.
*You see, I was previously growing up in Asia, where STEM is what the "cool kids" do.
I disagree that Calculus is not hard. Integration and differentiation on certain elementary functions, sure. Once you go beyond you can't mechanistically manipulate symbols anymore. The foundation of limits, too, properly treated requires quite a bit of foundational and proof machinery as well. So now you need to talk about how first-order logic is related to mathematics.
You can build intuition without giving a full on analysis class. Also, algebra can be tedious (just look at any spinor calculation in quantum field theory). That's in fact one of the problems, focus on tedious integrals rather than the substance which you can glean as a teenager.
I agree with you on this point, especially the part about rote memorization. I feel like when you get exposed to calculus for the first time, you're almost expected to accept the definitions for what they are (central limit theorem, etc) without really understanding where it's coming from. 3Blue1Brown's videos, fwiw, seem to do better at explaining the core concepts.
On a tangent, I also feel like college math curriculum kinda don't make sense sometimes because you're hit with more computational heavy classes like calc and stats courses and then they break everything down and rebuild you with proof-based and analysis course at the beginning of your junior year.
On a tangent, I also feel like college math curriculum kinda don't make sense sometimes because you're hit with more computational heavy classes like calc and stats courses and then they break everything down and rebuild you with proof-based and analysis course at the beginning of your junior year.
I agree with that. Calculus is made out to be some boogeyman when in reality is not that unapproachable.
Plane Geometry track, on the other hand, was incredibly difficult for me to grasp in university.
Plane Geometry track, on the other hand, was incredibly difficult for me to grasp in university.
> It's absolutely mind-boggling that the administrators try to establish "equity" by pushing all students down, instead of them up.
It's not that surprising, though, given that they've admitted their goal is equality of outcome rather than of opportunity. That's the only way to achieve the former.
It's not that surprising, though, given that they've admitted their goal is equality of outcome rather than of opportunity. That's the only way to achieve the former.
What is "absolutely mind-boggling" is that there are parents who voluntarily send their kids to a school that openly admits it wants to dumb kids down to the lowest common denominator yet claim they care about their kids.
If you know that the school's focus isn't on providing the best education possible to your kids, pull them out of that school immediately. If it is a public school (as it is in this case), complain to the school board, vote them out of office if they don't listen and support local efforts to expand school choice to rescue as many kids as possible from that failing public school system that has proven itself incapable of performing its primary function. Even if you get the school board to reverse insane decisions like banning algebra from middle schools, I still wouldn't trust any school system that would even consider doing such things to properly educate kids. I think it beyond a reasonable doubt that the dysfunction in the SF school district is much deeper than just this algebra ban.
If you know that the school's focus isn't on providing the best education possible to your kids, pull them out of that school immediately. If it is a public school (as it is in this case), complain to the school board, vote them out of office if they don't listen and support local efforts to expand school choice to rescue as many kids as possible from that failing public school system that has proven itself incapable of performing its primary function. Even if you get the school board to reverse insane decisions like banning algebra from middle schools, I still wouldn't trust any school system that would even consider doing such things to properly educate kids. I think it beyond a reasonable doubt that the dysfunction in the SF school district is much deeper than just this algebra ban.
This is one of the quickest way to get your kids into youth services even if you provide better education yourself.
And IN youth services, something like half of kids don't even go to school, and aren't homeschooled, so let's just forget asking about the quality of education.
The purpose of the state here is to sabotage your kids to their own benefit (in this case: make the education system easier to administrate, to underpay teachers, and above all else protect the power and jobs the system has). They will actively fight, to the point of using violence against you and your kids, if you reject the school system. Be very careful with doing this.
And if you do, you're probably better off pretending you're a fundamentalist christian, or better yet, muslim or hindu or ... objecting to sex ed classes. Seriously.
This is with parents and kids rejecting the school system being big exceptions. If ever 10% of kids become homeschooled, it will get a lot worse.
You'd think this wouldn't happen. Statistics are very clear, for example, that a LOT more kids are abused at school than at home. This is 100% the fault of the school system (failure to prevent personnel from plus failure to supervise kids, and please do not: school do traumatize kids, as everyone kind of knows and research confirms. It's just not something talked about), and has an obvious result: actions by youth services to make kids go to school increases child abuse, rather than decrease it. Likewise, it reduces schooling. You would think this strange if you assume their purpose is to protect kids, rather than their real purpose: to protect schools and the state from kids. If they actually intended to protect kids, obviously, they'd refuse to interfere in these cases.
And for the love of God, DO NOT ask help from youth services under any circumstances, but above all, don't ask them to help with your kid being traumatized or bullied at school. They will 100% blame the kid, refuse do take any action whatsoever in school, and most definitely will not make teachers pay attention and prevent bullying in the playground or anything like that.
And IN youth services, something like half of kids don't even go to school, and aren't homeschooled, so let's just forget asking about the quality of education.
The purpose of the state here is to sabotage your kids to their own benefit (in this case: make the education system easier to administrate, to underpay teachers, and above all else protect the power and jobs the system has). They will actively fight, to the point of using violence against you and your kids, if you reject the school system. Be very careful with doing this.
And if you do, you're probably better off pretending you're a fundamentalist christian, or better yet, muslim or hindu or ... objecting to sex ed classes. Seriously.
This is with parents and kids rejecting the school system being big exceptions. If ever 10% of kids become homeschooled, it will get a lot worse.
You'd think this wouldn't happen. Statistics are very clear, for example, that a LOT more kids are abused at school than at home. This is 100% the fault of the school system (failure to prevent personnel from plus failure to supervise kids, and please do not: school do traumatize kids, as everyone kind of knows and research confirms. It's just not something talked about), and has an obvious result: actions by youth services to make kids go to school increases child abuse, rather than decrease it. Likewise, it reduces schooling. You would think this strange if you assume their purpose is to protect kids, rather than their real purpose: to protect schools and the state from kids. If they actually intended to protect kids, obviously, they'd refuse to interfere in these cases.
And for the love of God, DO NOT ask help from youth services under any circumstances, but above all, don't ask them to help with your kid being traumatized or bullied at school. They will 100% blame the kid, refuse do take any action whatsoever in school, and most definitely will not make teachers pay attention and prevent bullying in the playground or anything like that.
“ If you know that the school's focus isn't on providing the best education possible to your kids, pull them out of that school immediately”
Hard to do when you are poor, as many in SF are. SF seems like a rich city on the outside because it has an insane number of rich people but it also has dirt poor people who can’t do anything else.
Hard to do when you are poor, as many in SF are. SF seems like a rich city on the outside because it has an insane number of rich people but it also has dirt poor people who can’t do anything else.
For a long time, schools have been trying to eliminate testing. The reason is simple - with no tests, how can anyone argue that the schools aren't doing a great job teaching?
Schooling is compulsory and parents don't have a whole lot of options. This kind of political idiocy is one of the strongest Arguments for school vouchers
> It's absolutely mind-boggling that the administrators try to establish "equity" by pushing all students down, instead of them
It’s not “mind boggling” if you do a deep dive into the “ethnic studies” curricula that so many teachers and administrators are graduating from these days. It’s a completely parallel value system complete with revisionist history. It’s like the Wahhabist madrassas in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
It’s not “mind boggling” if you do a deep dive into the “ethnic studies” curricula that so many teachers and administrators are graduating from these days. It’s a completely parallel value system complete with revisionist history. It’s like the Wahhabist madrassas in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
> administrators try to establish "equity" by pushing all students down, instead of them up
It's truly disheartening to see the San Francisco school district's actions resemble something straight out of Orwell's 1984. As someone who has lived in this city for years, it's painful to witness the gradual decline and the rise of corruption overshadowing the progressive spirit that once defined it. Instead of addressing the root cause of poor math education, the district has opted for obfuscation and dishonesty.
It's a classic case of doublethink, where they attempt to hold two contradictory beliefs: that they're doing what's best for the students while simultaneously suppressing their educational growth. Much like the Party in 1984, they seem to prioritize maintaining a facade over genuinely improving education. I wish we could challenge this dystopian approach and hope to meaningfully improve the situation, but at this point, I am not even sure how one would go about doing that.
It's truly disheartening to see the San Francisco school district's actions resemble something straight out of Orwell's 1984. As someone who has lived in this city for years, it's painful to witness the gradual decline and the rise of corruption overshadowing the progressive spirit that once defined it. Instead of addressing the root cause of poor math education, the district has opted for obfuscation and dishonesty.
It's a classic case of doublethink, where they attempt to hold two contradictory beliefs: that they're doing what's best for the students while simultaneously suppressing their educational growth. Much like the Party in 1984, they seem to prioritize maintaining a facade over genuinely improving education. I wish we could challenge this dystopian approach and hope to meaningfully improve the situation, but at this point, I am not even sure how one would go about doing that.
I’m getting a more “Harrison Bergeron” feeling than I am 1984: https://www.tnellen.com/cybereng/harrison.html
THE YEAR WAS 2081, and everybody was finally equal. They weren't only equal before God and the law. They were equal every which way. Nobody was smarter than anybody else. Nobody was better looking than anybody else. Nobody was stronger or quicker than anybody else. ...
THE YEAR WAS 2081, and everybody was finally equal. They weren't only equal before God and the law. They were equal every which way. Nobody was smarter than anybody else. Nobody was better looking than anybody else. Nobody was stronger or quicker than anybody else. ...
Yeah agreed, I can totally see that!
Not surprising. This kind of moronism has been happening in India for nearly 100 years.
And look at that society: it's a sub-saharan "shit-hole" that has ruined its own future because of its borrowed obsession with "social justice" (and the political vermin that exploit them); which thinks squeezing out its best talent who then achieve wonderful things outside is something to be "proud" of.
There is enough reason to hate British colonialism, but it is under them that Indians bagged the first Nobel Prizes in Asia. Now, even those universities that produced them are being destroyed due to idiotic tribal dogfighting. Worse, unlike the US case, all this caste-propaganda doesn't even have much historical evidence to begin with!
Such potential wasted.
And look at that society: it's a sub-saharan "shit-hole" that has ruined its own future because of its borrowed obsession with "social justice" (and the political vermin that exploit them); which thinks squeezing out its best talent who then achieve wonderful things outside is something to be "proud" of.
There is enough reason to hate British colonialism, but it is under them that Indians bagged the first Nobel Prizes in Asia. Now, even those universities that produced them are being destroyed due to idiotic tribal dogfighting. Worse, unlike the US case, all this caste-propaganda doesn't even have much historical evidence to begin with!
Such potential wasted.
The problem is that there is absolutely no policy that could be implemented that would bring black students to the performance levels of Asian students. So they have to stop letting the Asian students perform.
Oh, there definitely is. Pay the teachers bonuses based on how many of their students achieve at grade level.
I propose this often, and it inspires massive pushback every time.
Just give the teachers a $1,000 bonus for every such kid. Give the teachers a free hand in how to go about it. It'll be the cheapest and most effective boost to education you've ever seen.
I propose this often, and it inspires massive pushback every time.
Just give the teachers a $1,000 bonus for every such kid. Give the teachers a free hand in how to go about it. It'll be the cheapest and most effective boost to education you've ever seen.
This is just a carrot version of the NCLB policy. Public school administrators already push teachers to focus on low performers. Teachers hate it because the rest of the class stagnates from not getting attention and the low performers often don't improve much because of serious home-life problems that teachers can't fix.
Carrots make all the difference.
Private industry uses monetary incentives all the time. They do it because it works.
Private industry uses monetary incentives all the time. They do it because it works.
A carrot in the right place makes all the difference, the issue here is this is not the place that the carrot needs to be. Most thought-work, learning in this case, is intrinsically motivated. We can classify this motivation as being one or more of the following needs: autonomy, mastery, and purpose. In order for that kind of motivation to function, basic needs must be met. A teacher can have as many carrots dangled in front of them, but you’ve given them an impossible task in a large number of cases.
> this is not the place that the carrot needs to be
The carrot is placed exactly where we want it - results.
> you’ve given them an impossible task
I don't buy that for a minute. It's amazing how people find ways to accomplish impossible tasks when the right motivation is given.
The carrot is placed exactly where we want it - results.
> you’ve given them an impossible task
I don't buy that for a minute. It's amazing how people find ways to accomplish impossible tasks when the right motivation is given.
>They do it because it works.
You're making an assumption that the issue is that the teachers aren't putting in the effort.
Children are not simple input/output machines you program. A food insecure child with illiterate parents is going to require individualized and intensive resources, where a child who has Doctors for parents will generally show up to school with the knowledge they need.
Gamification of schools is a really great way to get teachers to completely ignore the development of most of the class to focus on one or two kids.
It's amazing that after the widely documented failure of NCLB, people are still promoting these 'work harder' systems.
You're making an assumption that the issue is that the teachers aren't putting in the effort.
Children are not simple input/output machines you program. A food insecure child with illiterate parents is going to require individualized and intensive resources, where a child who has Doctors for parents will generally show up to school with the knowledge they need.
Gamification of schools is a really great way to get teachers to completely ignore the development of most of the class to focus on one or two kids.
It's amazing that after the widely documented failure of NCLB, people are still promoting these 'work harder' systems.
> You're making an assumption that the issue is that the teachers aren't putting in the effort.
Not at all. I'm looking at we aren't getting the desired results. We've tried everything but the obvious - pay for results.
> Gamification of schools is a really great way to get teachers to completely ignore the development of most of the class
Quite the opposite. The bonus is per student.
> It's amazing that after the widely documented failure of NCLB, people are still promoting these 'work harder' systems.
NCLB was nothing like I proposed. It's also not about working harder. It's about results.
Not at all. I'm looking at we aren't getting the desired results. We've tried everything but the obvious - pay for results.
> Gamification of schools is a really great way to get teachers to completely ignore the development of most of the class
Quite the opposite. The bonus is per student.
> It's amazing that after the widely documented failure of NCLB, people are still promoting these 'work harder' systems.
NCLB was nothing like I proposed. It's also not about working harder. It's about results.
>Not at all. I'm looking at we aren't getting the desired results. We've tried everything but the obvious - pay for results.
What you're proposing is not "obvious" to anyone who actually studies education.
>Quite the opposite. The bonus is per student.
How familiar are you with education? Children develop at different paces but are grouped by age, at least until high school. Teachers don't just teach to get the kids to the next grade, or at least they shouldn't. Under what you are proposing, it doesn't make sense for a teacher to spend any time on a kid who is already going to go on to the next grade. There is no incentive to challenge them with harder books, or harder math problems.
Like, we literally already tried this with NCLB. The ended in the most obvious way possible. Teachers taught to get test results, standards were lowered to make it easier to move to the next grade, children who were excelling were ignored by their teachers who had to focus on children who were lagging.
The whole concept behind 'pay for results' is that you think teachers are not putting the effort they could in.
>NCLB was nothing like I proposed.
I encourage you to do some reading on this topic. You're literally just describing a positive incentive based NCLB. You have the same operating theory that the designers of NCLB had.
>It's also not about working harder. It's about results.
This is a meaningless statement.
What you're proposing is not "obvious" to anyone who actually studies education.
>Quite the opposite. The bonus is per student.
How familiar are you with education? Children develop at different paces but are grouped by age, at least until high school. Teachers don't just teach to get the kids to the next grade, or at least they shouldn't. Under what you are proposing, it doesn't make sense for a teacher to spend any time on a kid who is already going to go on to the next grade. There is no incentive to challenge them with harder books, or harder math problems.
Like, we literally already tried this with NCLB. The ended in the most obvious way possible. Teachers taught to get test results, standards were lowered to make it easier to move to the next grade, children who were excelling were ignored by their teachers who had to focus on children who were lagging.
The whole concept behind 'pay for results' is that you think teachers are not putting the effort they could in.
>NCLB was nothing like I proposed.
I encourage you to do some reading on this topic. You're literally just describing a positive incentive based NCLB. You have the same operating theory that the designers of NCLB had.
>It's also not about working harder. It's about results.
This is a meaningless statement.
> I encourage you to do some reading on this topic.
I did. The NCLB Act has precisely ZERO monetary incentives for teachers. It has nothing in common with my proposal.
https://www.edweek.org/policy-politics/no-child-left-behind-...
It was obviously written and enacted by people who have no idea how incentives actually work.
I did. The NCLB Act has precisely ZERO monetary incentives for teachers. It has nothing in common with my proposal.
https://www.edweek.org/policy-politics/no-child-left-behind-...
It was obviously written and enacted by people who have no idea how incentives actually work.
>I did. The NCLB Act has precisely ZERO monetary incentives for teachers
They had negative monetary incentives for teachers and schools
>It was obviously written and enacted by people who have no idea how incentives actually work.
It was written by people who don't believe in public education. It's the literal concept you are pushing whether you recognize that or not.
They had negative monetary incentives for teachers and schools
>It was obviously written and enacted by people who have no idea how incentives actually work.
It was written by people who don't believe in public education. It's the literal concept you are pushing whether you recognize that or not.
> They had negative monetary incentives for teachers and schools
Please provide a reference for negative monetary incentives for teachers.
> It's the literal concept you are pushing
What I'm "pushing" is aligning incentives with the desired results. A system that works every time it's tried.
Besides, if the public schools try my proposal, in no instance will the teachers or schools be worse off. There's literally nothing to lose by trying it.
Please provide a reference for negative monetary incentives for teachers.
> It's the literal concept you are pushing
What I'm "pushing" is aligning incentives with the desired results. A system that works every time it's tried.
Besides, if the public schools try my proposal, in no instance will the teachers or schools be worse off. There's literally nothing to lose by trying it.
>Please provide a reference for negative monetary incentives for teachers.
Again, if you are interested, you should learn, literally, the basic of the subject on which you are speaking
https://www.nber.org/digest/feb15/impact-school-performance-...
You are at this point "debating" the foundation of NCLB, of which it doesn't seem like you know anything about.
Again, if you are interested, you should learn, literally, the basic of the subject on which you are speaking
https://www.nber.org/digest/feb15/impact-school-performance-...
You are at this point "debating" the foundation of NCLB, of which it doesn't seem like you know anything about.
> pay for results.
> The bonus is per student.
Something something about Goodhart's Law and cobras...
But seriously, think about the second order effects of a powerful incentive like this.
At best, you will likely turn schools into test prep centers where average and advanced students are further ignored (an effect NCLB is already criticized for). Worse is that students able to pass the assessments will realize they are a valuable asset worth $1000 per class by simply failing their pretest and passing their posttest and will figure out ways to trade this with teachers for a cut of the profit or for a grade. Given that trading these test scores is purely positive sum for both students and teachers and that both students and teachers are poor, I think you will see a highly efficient market emerge. And why would schools or states care? They are all making more money!
> The bonus is per student.
Something something about Goodhart's Law and cobras...
But seriously, think about the second order effects of a powerful incentive like this.
At best, you will likely turn schools into test prep centers where average and advanced students are further ignored (an effect NCLB is already criticized for). Worse is that students able to pass the assessments will realize they are a valuable asset worth $1000 per class by simply failing their pretest and passing their posttest and will figure out ways to trade this with teachers for a cut of the profit or for a grade. Given that trading these test scores is purely positive sum for both students and teachers and that both students and teachers are poor, I think you will see a highly efficient market emerge. And why would schools or states care? They are all making more money!
And the current system's have an incentive for success?
All of your criticisms of the bonus pay proposal can be easily addressed, as the other ones in this thread.
For example, test the kids once a year at the end of the academic year. There goes the incentive to fail the pretest.
The advanced students can go into the gifted track, which can be operated differently.
> And why would schools or states care?
They don't care now. Proof: Seattle got rid of their gifted programs.
All of your criticisms of the bonus pay proposal can be easily addressed, as the other ones in this thread.
For example, test the kids once a year at the end of the academic year. There goes the incentive to fail the pretest.
The advanced students can go into the gifted track, which can be operated differently.
> And why would schools or states care?
They don't care now. Proof: Seattle got rid of their gifted programs.
You should check out some teacher forums and see what teachers are complaining about to get an idea of what would help. Classes are too big, teachers are pressured to pass unprepared students to the next level, underperforming students are hard to motivate, there isn't enough time to prepare lessons and grade, etc. There are many areas that could be improved with funding, but you should start at the known problems.
Think about this from the perspective of behavioral economics. Teaching is a profession with a high degree of intrinsic motivation given how stressful it is and how little it pays. Paying for performance on some test primarily rewards people who will game the test because that has a better cost/benefit ratio than heroically catching up kids who are performing several grade levels behind and have a difficult home life. Pay for performance tends to damage morale and increases attrition of intrinsically motivated workers (the kind you really want). This is what happens in controlled psychology experiments and it's what happened with NCLB.
Think about this from the perspective of behavioral economics. Teaching is a profession with a high degree of intrinsic motivation given how stressful it is and how little it pays. Paying for performance on some test primarily rewards people who will game the test because that has a better cost/benefit ratio than heroically catching up kids who are performing several grade levels behind and have a difficult home life. Pay for performance tends to damage morale and increases attrition of intrinsically motivated workers (the kind you really want). This is what happens in controlled psychology experiments and it's what happened with NCLB.
> game the test
How are you going to game this test:
> it's what happened with NCLB
Once more, NCLB did *NOT* pay teachers for performance.
How are you going to game this test:
1234
+5678
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?????
> it's what happened with NCLB
Once more, NCLB did *NOT* pay teachers for performance.
> How are you going to game this test:
Plenty of ways. Teacher takes test for student, teacher re-scores test after student is finsihed, student is placed in an IEP that gives them unlimited time and "reading assistance" for test, failing students are placed in small classes and the class size of average students is expanded, failing students are moved from normal schoolwork to test prep, test questions are leaked/sold (we're talking about a multi-billion dollar industry here, right?).
I didn't make up any of these. This is already happening, and it has nothing to do with positive/negative incentive. It's about test-based education and the natural consequence of trying to control a complex system using a simple metric. It's why education theorists are loathed by teachers--because they swoop in with grand theories of how to fix everything without understanding the system and what is and isn't broken.
It's like an outsider thinking a reasonable way to pay a coder is by how many lines of code they write and how many bugs they fix. Or a civil engineer by how many bridges and roads they produce. Because outsiders don't understand the complexity of the system they think the solution must be simple. Since you seem invested in this idea I suggest you go get some input from teachers and see what they say. My guess is you will learn that the problems with public education is multifactorial and that there isn't a simple fix.
Plenty of ways. Teacher takes test for student, teacher re-scores test after student is finsihed, student is placed in an IEP that gives them unlimited time and "reading assistance" for test, failing students are placed in small classes and the class size of average students is expanded, failing students are moved from normal schoolwork to test prep, test questions are leaked/sold (we're talking about a multi-billion dollar industry here, right?).
I didn't make up any of these. This is already happening, and it has nothing to do with positive/negative incentive. It's about test-based education and the natural consequence of trying to control a complex system using a simple metric. It's why education theorists are loathed by teachers--because they swoop in with grand theories of how to fix everything without understanding the system and what is and isn't broken.
It's like an outsider thinking a reasonable way to pay a coder is by how many lines of code they write and how many bugs they fix. Or a civil engineer by how many bridges and roads they produce. Because outsiders don't understand the complexity of the system they think the solution must be simple. Since you seem invested in this idea I suggest you go get some input from teachers and see what they say. My guess is you will learn that the problems with public education is multifactorial and that there isn't a simple fix.
Why not cut out the middleman and pay the kid? Go to the poorest high school in town, tell the kids they each get $1,000 at the end of the school year if their performance is at grade level (and $5,000 if they're in the top 10%), and watch the place transform overnight.
I like the way you think!
In corrupt incompetent institutions that's going to create all sorts of perverse incentives. How about $1,000 bonus for every arrest a cop makes?
It is also insulting to teachers, as if they could have been doing a great job getting the kids to grade level, but chose not to because they weren't financially incentivized enough to do their job.
It is also insulting to teachers, as if they could have been doing a great job getting the kids to grade level, but chose not to because they weren't financially incentivized enough to do their job.
> It is also insulting to teachers, as if they could have been doing a great job getting the kids to grade level, but chose not to because they weren't financially incentivized enough to do their job.
It may not be the same people though. If teaching in the US was a well-paid and highly respected profession it would presumably retain the most qualified teachers instead of driving them away due to having to find a living wage elsewhere.
It may not be the same people though. If teaching in the US was a well-paid and highly respected profession it would presumably retain the most qualified teachers instead of driving them away due to having to find a living wage elsewhere.
Again, that's an insult by implication. That the current failing are due to incompetent teachers and we can fix the problem by paying higher quality teachers to replace them.
> that's going to create all sorts of perverse incentives
That's why you assign the kids to teachers at random, and an independent 3rd party does the assessment.
> It is also insulting to teachers
Only the incompetent ones. The competent ones will be happy to collect those thousand dollar checks.
P.S. Write me a check for $1,000, and I'll cheerfully endure your insults.
That's why you assign the kids to teachers at random, and an independent 3rd party does the assessment.
> It is also insulting to teachers
Only the incompetent ones. The competent ones will be happy to collect those thousand dollar checks.
P.S. Write me a check for $1,000, and I'll cheerfully endure your insults.
You'd have to give a very free hand, and it'd likely end up with many students being kicked out of class. So they'd have fewer students, and close to all of the ones that stayed would be achieving at grade level. Not sure if that's better or worse in the end ...
If they get more achieving grade level, isn't that what we want?
Not necessarily if it means there will be a barbell curve, and we get equal or more students doing even worse. Teachers will quickly bucket kids into 3-4 groups:
1. Doing fine, no need to even pay attention to these kids. Now your top performers don't grow as much. 2. On the edge - where most attention will go 3. Meh - maybe a small percentage jump into category 2, where they will be cared about 4. Let them rot - most of the kids at the bottom will just be let to rot
1. Doing fine, no need to even pay attention to these kids. Now your top performers don't grow as much. 2. On the edge - where most attention will go 3. Meh - maybe a small percentage jump into category 2, where they will be cared about 4. Let them rot - most of the kids at the bottom will just be let to rot
Do you really think that they aren't already letting the bottom quartile rot? It's hard to see how things could be worse.
In my career in public schools, I never noticed any efforts by the teachers to grow the top quartile. Or anyone else, for that matter. I attended 4 public schools in different locales. I was pretty much ignored by all the teachers.
I remember first grade. The teacher would set us up in a circle, each student reading one sentence. I found this very dull, and so read the rest of the book while the other students would grind out the sentences. The teacher then asked what the students guessed the next chapter was about. I of course piped up and dumped a summary of the rest of the book. The teacher was not amused, and curtly told me I was not allowed to read ahead of the class.
Nurtured, my adze.
Things have probably gotten worse since. For example, Seattle got rid of all their gifted tracks.
In my career in public schools, I never noticed any efforts by the teachers to grow the top quartile. Or anyone else, for that matter. I attended 4 public schools in different locales. I was pretty much ignored by all the teachers.
I remember first grade. The teacher would set us up in a circle, each student reading one sentence. I found this very dull, and so read the rest of the book while the other students would grind out the sentences. The teacher then asked what the students guessed the next chapter was about. I of course piped up and dumped a summary of the rest of the book. The teacher was not amused, and curtly told me I was not allowed to read ahead of the class.
Nurtured, my adze.
Things have probably gotten worse since. For example, Seattle got rid of all their gifted tracks.
I went to a public school where the entire motive energy of the staff was applied to the top quartile. Being in that quartile, it was really great. Every class was leveled and the best teachers taught Honors classes. I cannot describe how refreshing it was to be in a class where those 2 or 3 disruptive kids had just... disappeared.
This is also fundamentally a better way to run a country. It really doesn't matter whether the bottom student in the school does or doesn't learn how to add two three-digit numbers by the time he graduates high school. But the top student learning more advanced topics could actually matter.
This is also fundamentally a better way to run a country. It really doesn't matter whether the bottom student in the school does or doesn't learn how to add two three-digit numbers by the time he graduates high school. But the top student learning more advanced topics could actually matter.
Is that average over the country? Because there are regions where almost every student is already above average, and regions where they are below.
This sounds like a way of funneling the best teachers into the already best schools in the richest areas, and making it impossible to employ good teachers in poorer regions -- unless you have a plan to fix this (I realise you've only given a tiny explanation).
This sounds like a way of funneling the best teachers into the already best schools in the richest areas, and making it impossible to employ good teachers in poorer regions -- unless you have a plan to fix this (I realise you've only given a tiny explanation).
You could modify the plan so the bonus only happens for the kids who didn't meet grade level the previous year.
That way, the best teachers would want to teach the low performers, because that's where the max bonuses would be.
That way, the best teachers would want to teach the low performers, because that's where the max bonuses would be.
This would seem to involve independant, standardised testing to be held on all students, every year. Letting teachers, or even the school, evaluate students would obviously make it too easy for biases.
I will admit I'm in the UK, not the US, but we only do huge standardised tests every 3 years or so, as they are very disruptive.
I will admit I'm in the UK, not the US, but we only do huge standardised tests every 3 years or so, as they are very disruptive.
You're right that an independent 3rd party would be needed to administer the tests.
My mind swims with the perverse incentives this would engender.
Terrifying, isn't it? Trying something new!
Of course there is, just as there was a way for poor rural kids in China to go to the top universities: have public schools offer excellent educations. Pay teachers to offer after-school programs. Pay teachers to give challenging course work. Pay teacher to give timely and frequent feedbacks. It's not about leaving no kids behind, as some kids are simply not good at academics. It's about giving the brights kids, no matter where they come from, a chance to succeed.
BTW, there's nothing secret about Asian students' performance. It's just that even the poor families would know to pool the limited resources to educate their kids.
BTW, there's nothing secret about Asian students' performance. It's just that even the poor families would know to pool the limited resources to educate their kids.
Administrators are just doing what people in SF vote for - this idea and implementation of equity has been rolled into the set of positions one adopts as a progressive in CA, which is the only position to take unless you want to be socially ostracized. The ones who don't move away absolutely know they're sacrificing their kids. It's more popular though among this set to just skip having kids in the first place. Or to pay for private school, skip the consequences of this terrible idea, and let the people who can't afford that deal with them. I had my first of 4 kids at St. Lukes in the mission, but we moved out of the city before he was even a year old because of the schools.
I have been calling this behavior out for almost a decade, and all I got for it was being labeled a conservative. People are extremely close minded, and completely blind to what is happening.
I really wish we could all move on from the conservative/liberal false dichotomy. I'm neither (or both), and so is nearly everyone else I know.
I think we need something better than winner-takes-all for all elected positions, because it forces you to pick 'the lesser of two evils', knowing that a vote for the person you like the most is really just a 'protest vote'
I think we need something better than winner-takes-all for all elected positions, because it forces you to pick 'the lesser of two evils', knowing that a vote for the person you like the most is really just a 'protest vote'
Equity is literally about pushing everybody down to the lowest level. Are there any examples where that has not been the outcome? Some advocate it out of ignorance, some out of malice. The result is the same, everybody is worse off.
> It's absolutely mind-boggling that the administrators try to establish "equity" by pushing all students down, instead of them up.
It's unfair that some people develop skills easily when others don't. When equity is the goal this is what happens.
It's unfair that some people develop skills easily when others don't. When equity is the goal this is what happens.
Easily? It's not like you're born with math predisposition. It has everything to do with culture. Asian parents push their kids to greatness. Some other groups do not.
Math always came easy to me up to grad school level. My parents didn't really push me. If I did my homework, it was timeboxed to what I could do on the bus ride, which meant I mostly just didn't do it once I started driving. I spent my afternoons playing video games. I remember my calc 2 teacher scolding me for never doing my homework and telling me I was going to get a C regardless of my AP exam score (most of the AP teachers at my school gave you an A if you got a 5). I didn't really care, got a 5.
My habits and attitude improved somewhat during undergrad (I figured out in junior year that you can actually read those books you buy!), but as a kid I was a horrible student. I took all honors/AP classes because the normal ones were so boring and slow, not because I had tiger parents.
From all of this, I'm forced to conclude that either everyone just likes to complain and actually math is easy, or some people find it easy and some do not, and I was very fortunate to be one of the former.
My habits and attitude improved somewhat during undergrad (I figured out in junior year that you can actually read those books you buy!), but as a kid I was a horrible student. I took all honors/AP classes because the normal ones were so boring and slow, not because I had tiger parents.
From all of this, I'm forced to conclude that either everyone just likes to complain and actually math is easy, or some people find it easy and some do not, and I was very fortunate to be one of the former.
I didn't know there were any pure nurturists left. The Blank Slate by Steven Pinker is worth reading.
"It's absolutely mind-boggling that the administrators try to establish "equity" by pushing all students down, instead of them up"
there is no other way, though. if you desire equal outcomes, you have to shackle the best.
i believe Kurt Vonnegot wrote about this...
there is no other way, though. if you desire equal outcomes, you have to shackle the best.
i believe Kurt Vonnegot wrote about this...
All of this behavior makes perfect sense once you accept they are malicious. Halons razer is not paramount, sometimes it really is malice.
Science is about creating theory that has predictive power, and the malice hypothesis in my experience has predicted future outcomes far better than stupidity.
Science is about creating theory that has predictive power, and the malice hypothesis in my experience has predicted future outcomes far better than stupidity.
That isn't even an elite school thing. That's an any school in the top 100 engineering/math/physics/CompSci thing. Mine was ~50ish and the vast majority of people in the program had at least one semesters worth of AP Calculus credits. Linear algebra was a first or second semester course if you followed the default recommended degree plan. That was only about 10 years ago, and other schools I considered all had similar looking degree plans.
I'm inclined to think the concern (that we will run out of supply of people that can do math or something) is overblown. There are plenty of underemployed engineering and science students that took more advanced mathematics classes than the CS kids.
I'm inclined to think the concern (that we will run out of supply of people that can do math or something) is overblown. There are plenty of underemployed engineering and science students that took more advanced mathematics classes than the CS kids.
> It's absolutely mind-boggling that the administrators try to establish "equity" by pushing all students down
That is simply socialism 101 as portrayed in Rush' "The Trees":
That is simply socialism 101 as portrayed in Rush' "The Trees":
There is unrest in the forest
There is trouble with the trees
For the maples want more sunlight
And the oaks ignore their pleas
The trouble with the maples
And they're quite convinced they're right
They say the oaks are just too lofty
And they grab up all the light
But the oaks can't help their feelings
If they like the way they're made
And they wonder why the maples
Can't be happy in their shade?
There is trouble in the forest
And the creatures all have fled
As the maples scream, "oppression"
And the oaks just shake their heads
So the maples formed a union
And demanded equal rights
"The oaks are just too greedy
We will make them give us light"
Now there's no more oak oppression
For they passed a noble law
And the trees are all kept equal
By hatchet
Axe
And saw
AP calc is basically useless. I took all the math classes in high school and memorized all the formulas but nobody taught me how to use the math to solve problems. You know word problems.
Well now with deep learning I can apply the chain rule. None of those classes prepared me to be a math major or how to do proofs. It’d be better if we taught kids how to model problems and apply the tools.
I think statistics is a better subject to learn early and often. Way more useful across disciplines.
Anyway I think we know that high performing math countries teach math totally different than we do and they produce way better engineers, so why don’t we do what they do?
I mean seriously I work in tech and all the engineers are foreign educated.
I think statistics is a better subject to learn early and often. Way more useful across disciplines.
Anyway I think we know that high performing math countries teach math totally different than we do and they produce way better engineers, so why don’t we do what they do?
I mean seriously I work in tech and all the engineers are foreign educated.
I mean it is pretty obvious what we need to do:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/education/2020/02/28/mat...
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/education/2020/02/28/mat...
> It's absolutely mind-boggling that the administrators try to establish "equity" by pushing all students down, instead of them up.
It's the best way to ensure equal outcomes. Perhaps equal outcomes is just a nasty goal.
It's the best way to ensure equal outcomes. Perhaps equal outcomes is just a nasty goal.
Equal outcomes is a fine goal, and this is a terrible example of a good way to achieve it. It may be the quickest/easiest way (maybe even the only way given the levers they have control over), but that doesn't make it good.
Merit, effort, intelligence, empathy, effort etc. aren’t equally distributed.
Why should a cruel person with tons of advantages and no motivation experience the same as a smart, kind, hard working person? If you’re not for that you can see equal outcomes are a bad goal.
Why should a cruel person with tons of advantages and no motivation experience the same as a smart, kind, hard working person? If you’re not for that you can see equal outcomes are a bad goal.
> It's absolutely mind-boggling that the administrators try to establish "equity" by pushing all students down, instead of them up.
Do you actually mean "pushing them up", or is this code for "filter out underperformers"?
This goes to the root of the issue. What is the whole point of a school? Is it to help students learn and improve? Or is it to serve as a series of challenges to eliminate and filter out people based on arbitrary people?
If the goal is to lift up people, you need to pick them up from down where they are at.
Do you actually mean "pushing them up", or is this code for "filter out underperformers"?
This goes to the root of the issue. What is the whole point of a school? Is it to help students learn and improve? Or is it to serve as a series of challenges to eliminate and filter out people based on arbitrary people?
If the goal is to lift up people, you need to pick them up from down where they are at.
Isn't it the poor but talent kids who got hurt? Family with means will simply send their kids to private tutors or good after schools. What's really mind boggling is that the constituents in the SF school district were okay with these garbage administrators.
Paging Harrison bergeron paging Harrison bergeron
This is absolutely ludicrous, unethical, and borderline criminal.
I took algebra I in the summer between 6th and 7th grade. That allowed me to take geometry in 7th grade, algebra II trig in 8th grade, pre-calc in 9th grade, AP calculus in 10th grade and then IB high math in 11th and 12th grade.
I credit my public, magnet school with giving me a huge leg up in life. All of my peers were middle class, yet a focus on lifting us up, accelerating our education, and challenging us helped me become the successful person I am today.
In contrast, my life almost took a severely different and worse path in elementary school when I was sent to the principal's office often in kindergarten and second grade for distracting the class and causing disturbances.
Thankfully my first grade teacher realized the root cause -- I had already learned the material quickly and was bored and thus distracting others. So she gave me more advanced novels and books to keep me stimulated and learning. If instead I would have had a teacher force me to slow down to the rest of the class, I likely would have ended up suspended and a delinquent.
This holding everyone to the slowest standard in the name of equity is actually very inequitable. It forces children with ADHD like myself to end up as failures instead of recognizing neurodiversity and helping each child succeed in the manner best for him or her.
I took algebra I in the summer between 6th and 7th grade. That allowed me to take geometry in 7th grade, algebra II trig in 8th grade, pre-calc in 9th grade, AP calculus in 10th grade and then IB high math in 11th and 12th grade.
I credit my public, magnet school with giving me a huge leg up in life. All of my peers were middle class, yet a focus on lifting us up, accelerating our education, and challenging us helped me become the successful person I am today.
In contrast, my life almost took a severely different and worse path in elementary school when I was sent to the principal's office often in kindergarten and second grade for distracting the class and causing disturbances.
Thankfully my first grade teacher realized the root cause -- I had already learned the material quickly and was bored and thus distracting others. So she gave me more advanced novels and books to keep me stimulated and learning. If instead I would have had a teacher force me to slow down to the rest of the class, I likely would have ended up suspended and a delinquent.
This holding everyone to the slowest standard in the name of equity is actually very inequitable. It forces children with ADHD like myself to end up as failures instead of recognizing neurodiversity and helping each child succeed in the manner best for him or her.
> This holding everyone to the slowest standard in the name of equity is actually very inequitable.
Math in particular is a subject where there can be such a wide divergence in age where each kid is ready to absorb topics. Having a rigid schedule where topic X is taught in grade N is always going to hurt those who are capable of moving forward faster and hurt those who need more time/maturity to get there (but may well be excellent at algebra/calculus/etc if allowed to take it when ready, not sooner).
I like the schools where kids are allowed to progress through math at their pace, faster or slower, instead of being grouped by class level. Unfortunately that basically means private schools with such an approach, I haven't found any public school in the area (California) that support this.
Math in particular is a subject where there can be such a wide divergence in age where each kid is ready to absorb topics. Having a rigid schedule where topic X is taught in grade N is always going to hurt those who are capable of moving forward faster and hurt those who need more time/maturity to get there (but may well be excellent at algebra/calculus/etc if allowed to take it when ready, not sooner).
I like the schools where kids are allowed to progress through math at their pace, faster or slower, instead of being grouped by class level. Unfortunately that basically means private schools with such an approach, I haven't found any public school in the area (California) that support this.
Mountain View Los Altos High School District takes the opposite approach of Palo Alto Unified School District. There is no test to get into a particular math class. You can sign up for whatever class you want in whatever grade you want. Similarly, the elementary schools provide differentiated learning. Which private schools do this in California? I know Khan Lab School does, but watching presentations from its students didn't give me much confidence in its approach.
[deleted]
As far as I know, there is no proven way to improve equality in a school system. Even in Norway, which has the highest GDP per capita in the world, the students from poor/less educated families still underperform [1]:
>Norway is a wealthy and egalitarian country with a homogeneous educational system, yet achievement gaps between students at the 90th and 10th percentiles of parental income and between students whose parents have at least a master and at most a high school degree are found to be large (0.55–0.93 and 0.70–0.99 SD), equivalent to about 2 to 2.5 years of schooling, and increasing by grade level. Achievement gaps by parental income, but not by parental education, increased over the time period, underscoring the different ways these two socioeconomic status components relate to achievement and the potential for policy to alter gaps.
Part of the answer could be that genetics play a larger role than anyone would like. Plomin for example claims that from twin studies a large part of educational attainment is heritable. I suspect the current school system will burn itself down before admitting that, however.
[1] https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.3102/0013189X221142...
>Norway is a wealthy and egalitarian country with a homogeneous educational system, yet achievement gaps between students at the 90th and 10th percentiles of parental income and between students whose parents have at least a master and at most a high school degree are found to be large (0.55–0.93 and 0.70–0.99 SD), equivalent to about 2 to 2.5 years of schooling, and increasing by grade level. Achievement gaps by parental income, but not by parental education, increased over the time period, underscoring the different ways these two socioeconomic status components relate to achievement and the potential for policy to alter gaps.
Part of the answer could be that genetics play a larger role than anyone would like. Plomin for example claims that from twin studies a large part of educational attainment is heritable. I suspect the current school system will burn itself down before admitting that, however.
[1] https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.3102/0013189X221142...
And also being poor dumbs you down real hard. When you have to worry about your food and don’t have steady sources of mood uplift, when your existence is just daily peppered by stress, your brain goes into power saving survival mode, not allowing you the luxury of deep perception, introspection or longer attention span, and most importantly, curiosity. By stress I mean such mundane things like your parents (or much more often your now single parent) being seemingly unhappy, or wearing the same old clothes and not being able to buy new ones. Why trying to learn anything if it’s just another chore in a life that sucks?
This is so much of the answer. Of the problem in fact.
> Part of the answer could be that genetics play a larger role than anyone would like.
In studies like the Norway study you cite this could be controlled for by adoptions. Though adoptees, of course, come with their own non-genetic baggage.
I would hope that, at the very least, IQ testing would be performed to try to match based on that.
In studies like the Norway study you cite this could be controlled for by adoptions. Though adoptees, of course, come with their own non-genetic baggage.
I would hope that, at the very least, IQ testing would be performed to try to match based on that.
>As far as I know, there is no proven way to improve equality in a school system.
What the remainder of your post argues is that there is no way to achieve complete equality in a school system.
But we need to be clear about what that means. Most people believe that success should be rewarded somehow. It's relatively uncommon even among socialists to argue that there should be no inequality of overall consumption opportunity. Most parents want to help their children succeed. It should naturally follow that the parents who have more resources will have more successful children. It would require a massive and likely endless society-scale project to counteract the combined parenting efforts of the whole professional class in order to achieve the questionable goal of literally equal opportunity, genetics notwithstanding. Even the Soviet Union had the nomenklatura.
The real goal should be to understand the process of education and remove all actual structural barriers while providing support to the disadvantaged in ways that are reasonably understood to be effective. Obsessing over romantic ideals that seem attractive from 10000 feet is not the way.
What the remainder of your post argues is that there is no way to achieve complete equality in a school system.
But we need to be clear about what that means. Most people believe that success should be rewarded somehow. It's relatively uncommon even among socialists to argue that there should be no inequality of overall consumption opportunity. Most parents want to help their children succeed. It should naturally follow that the parents who have more resources will have more successful children. It would require a massive and likely endless society-scale project to counteract the combined parenting efforts of the whole professional class in order to achieve the questionable goal of literally equal opportunity, genetics notwithstanding. Even the Soviet Union had the nomenklatura.
The real goal should be to understand the process of education and remove all actual structural barriers while providing support to the disadvantaged in ways that are reasonably understood to be effective. Obsessing over romantic ideals that seem attractive from 10000 feet is not the way.
Funnily enough a pre-print paper was published just two days ago on this very subject, using a twin study, in Norway!
https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/mncet/
TLDR:
> We show that class attainment is strongly influenced by genetics. Shared environmental factors play a modest role. Our study suggests that sociological theories explaining class outcomes in terms of social origins have little explanatory power, and should be reformulated to consider genetics.
https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/mncet/
TLDR:
> We show that class attainment is strongly influenced by genetics. Shared environmental factors play a modest role. Our study suggests that sociological theories explaining class outcomes in terms of social origins have little explanatory power, and should be reformulated to consider genetics.
did you read that paper? it is absolutely terrible, the method section is a mess, the statistics are probably wrong, and there is very little actual natural science behind this.
Another "social studies" pre-determined study, hopefully wont make it past review
Another "social studies" pre-determined study, hopefully wont make it past review
Thanks, yes this adds even more data.
Related story:
"American IQ Test Scores Show Recent Declines, According To New Study" [1]
>American IQ test scores have dropped during a recent 13-year period, a remarkable finding that runs counter to the well-established trend of increasing IQ scores throughout much of the 20th century.
>The study found evidence of a reverse “Flynn effect” in a large U.S. sample of almost 400,000 individuals tested between 2006 and 2018 in several ability areas. The Flynn effect refers to the well-replicated finding that IQ scores increased consistently through much of the 20th century, with increases ranging from three to five IQ points per decade.
[1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeltnietzel/2023/03/23/amer...
"American IQ Test Scores Show Recent Declines, According To New Study" [1]
>American IQ test scores have dropped during a recent 13-year period, a remarkable finding that runs counter to the well-established trend of increasing IQ scores throughout much of the 20th century.
>The study found evidence of a reverse “Flynn effect” in a large U.S. sample of almost 400,000 individuals tested between 2006 and 2018 in several ability areas. The Flynn effect refers to the well-replicated finding that IQ scores increased consistently through much of the 20th century, with increases ranging from three to five IQ points per decade.
[1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeltnietzel/2023/03/23/amer...
Public school is no longer enough, and I don’t see it improving in the short term.
I think the only practical solution is widely-known resources and alternative curricula for low-income families so that they too can get a decent education. Hopefully people are working on these, because otherwise these smart low-income kids are wasting their potential. And when kids apply to college they need a usable metric to be compared, which their “official” high-school transcripts are not, so otherwise admission is just upper-income or lottery.
An upside to over-lenient grading, at least students can half-ass “school” while they take these alternative classes that are actually teaching them.
I think the only practical solution is widely-known resources and alternative curricula for low-income families so that they too can get a decent education. Hopefully people are working on these, because otherwise these smart low-income kids are wasting their potential. And when kids apply to college they need a usable metric to be compared, which their “official” high-school transcripts are not, so otherwise admission is just upper-income or lottery.
An upside to over-lenient grading, at least students can half-ass “school” while they take these alternative classes that are actually teaching them.
Hilarious/sad conversation I had with my wife about this.
Me: You seem to not care at all about public schools dumbing down the curriculum. It could happen here too.
Wife: Why should I? This doesn’t affect us. We’ve already decided our kids are going to private school.
Me: Sure. Just sucks for smart but poor kids.
Wife: Good for us. Weaker competition for our kids.
Me: You seem to not care at all about public schools dumbing down the curriculum. It could happen here too.
Wife: Why should I? This doesn’t affect us. We’ve already decided our kids are going to private school.
Me: Sure. Just sucks for smart but poor kids.
Wife: Good for us. Weaker competition for our kids.
As tantalizing as it may be to be the one eyed king in the world of the blind I assure you that you'd rather live in a world where everyone has two eyes.
I support public education for many reasons, but one of the more selfish reasons is so that I have interesting people to talk to in life. Talking with miseducated, or uneducated dumbasses is one of the most soul crushing things I experience on a semi-frequent basis.
Being able to give your children a world where everyone is intelligent, articulate, and emotionally stable is a priceless gift, and quality public education is a key part of that.
I support public education for many reasons, but one of the more selfish reasons is so that I have interesting people to talk to in life. Talking with miseducated, or uneducated dumbasses is one of the most soul crushing things I experience on a semi-frequent basis.
Being able to give your children a world where everyone is intelligent, articulate, and emotionally stable is a priceless gift, and quality public education is a key part of that.
I agree. I'd prefer to have public schools serve everyone well, whether they are academically strong or not. And being a public school kid myself, I'd rather private schools not be something that the rich send their kids to to get a leg up.
But living in a west coast city, it's quickly becoming apparent that public schools are no longer a good option. I'm not going to put my foot down and send my kids anyway to prove a point. I'll just fork over the money for private school.
But living in a west coast city, it's quickly becoming apparent that public schools are no longer a good option. I'm not going to put my foot down and send my kids anyway to prove a point. I'll just fork over the money for private school.
Makes sense until you realize that your kids will be taxed and paying to support the kids they out competed.
Yeah the rewards of hard work and delayed gratification are becoming more and more marginal as time goes on, but right now it’s still worth it to excel and hopefully that stays true for a while.
GP's point is it's worth it to excel, but having more people excel is worth even more. Your wife doesn't understand this.
I understand that, but we can't change the fact that our society doesn't seem to. So we look on the bright side: at least we have the privilege to ensure our kids can still excel.
If this nonsense comes to our school district, even if we send our kids to private, I'd vote against it to help public school kids excel.
If this nonsense comes to our school district, even if we send our kids to private, I'd vote against it to help public school kids excel.
Sadly many people think of society as more of a competition than a collaboration. Of course it's both, but I certainly find myself happier when focusing on the gains we get from rising all boats instead of the gains I get from kicking the people climbing the ladder up after me.
Wow, actually sad.
She doesn't believe that er kids would outperform regardless of that?
She doesn't believe that er kids would outperform regardless of that?
> I think the only practical solution is widely-known resources and alternative curricula for low-income families so that they too can get a decent education.
And the middle class end up fucked. Too rich to get extra help. Too poor to afford private. Like walking in the middle of the road... splat.
And the middle class end up fucked. Too rich to get extra help. Too poor to afford private. Like walking in the middle of the road... splat.
I should've said "free resources". Limited programs and stipends wouldn't even benefit all low-income anyways: some parents are really hard-to-reach, and some parents don't apply for things and the kid has to take the initiative themselves.
What if tax dollars followed the student? Where all students get the same amount regardless of zip code and they can choose any school.
Currently they do, at least in some states
This creates its own issues, like public schools not sending misbehaving kids to specially-designed schools, and public schools losing money because students are sent to charter and private schools instead. And the private schools still require more money than the tax dollars provide. Furthermore, issues arise when the public schools suck and charter/private schools are the only decent options: these schools can be openly religious, skip over parts of the standard curriculum, and get to pick and choose who gets admitted.
Though, I don't even think giving all the tax money to public schools will help them at this point...
This creates its own issues, like public schools not sending misbehaving kids to specially-designed schools, and public schools losing money because students are sent to charter and private schools instead. And the private schools still require more money than the tax dollars provide. Furthermore, issues arise when the public schools suck and charter/private schools are the only decent options: these schools can be openly religious, skip over parts of the standard curriculum, and get to pick and choose who gets admitted.
Though, I don't even think giving all the tax money to public schools will help them at this point...
I believe George Bush II tried this with No-Child-Left-Behind. Turns out everyone leaves the poor schools and then you have funding issues.
This is known as school vouchers and by advocating it you have labelled yourself a fascist.
Why not give everybody $1000 per month if they enroll in a private school?
About 20 years ago, my public middle school tried to teach this new-fangled thing called “connected math“ that was conceptual and without notation or symbols, so I didn’t start learning real algebra until 9th grade when I went to private school. I was a year or more behind the rest of my peers (and in fact, my school had to open up a special section for me and one other person (!) to teach us algebra) and I constantly felt embarrassed. In college I went on to do well at linear alg and learned enough to hand wave my way through abstract alg so I ended up enjoying myself, but I’ve always felt resentful about being so far behind my peers and feeling like I needed to work harder than them. To this day I feel like I’m still playing catch up.
Hearing about kids being set back in math makes me very personally angry because I always felt that my college CS studies would have been so much easier had I been equipped with the proper math fundamentals. This shit takes a long time to train and you really can do powerful things with it.
Hearing about kids being set back in math makes me very personally angry because I always felt that my college CS studies would have been so much easier had I been equipped with the proper math fundamentals. This shit takes a long time to train and you really can do powerful things with it.
Playing the contrarian, I'm ambivalent about 8th grade algebra. I tend to consider "school math" to be a distinct branch of math unto itself. Nobody knows why we teach it, except that it's a sorting hat for certain college majors. The purpose of each class is to prepare you for the next class.
Most of the people I know who have STEM degrees don't use their college math. The math that they need is programmed into their CAD terminals. The ones who still use math in their jobs, somehow got interested in math, in spite of school math.
Turning math into a competition sucked the soul out of it. Both of my kids got 8th grade math, and top ACT/SAT scores. My daughter skipped pre-calculus with no ill effect. Both are interested in math, but have no interest in taking more math classes.
I breezed through school math, through college and grad school. Whoop-de-doo. Two things made math come alive for me: Proofs, and computers. But proofs are nearly gone from the school math curriculum, and the schools still haven't embraced computers.
I'd actually like to see a refactoring of school math, loosely into 4 disciplines, that are introduced in a cycle, perhaps even starting in 1st grade:
1. Arithmetic -- manual symbol manipulation, up to and including calculus.
2. Computation -- use of computers to explore and solve math problems.
3. Working with data -- self explanatory.
4. Theory -- things like sets, proofs, etc.
I believe this would actually be more representative of how people actually use math in their lives. Many people will use computation and data, even if they struggle through arithmetic and develop no interest in theory. On the other hand, full exposure to all of the disciplines would adequately prepare someone for academic math study.
I don't believe in banning anything. Some kids need to be allowed to get "ahead" so they don't get bored and lose interest, or simply because solving those school math problems can be a fun escape -- as it was for me -- from an otherwise stressful adolescence.
Most of the people I know who have STEM degrees don't use their college math. The math that they need is programmed into their CAD terminals. The ones who still use math in their jobs, somehow got interested in math, in spite of school math.
Turning math into a competition sucked the soul out of it. Both of my kids got 8th grade math, and top ACT/SAT scores. My daughter skipped pre-calculus with no ill effect. Both are interested in math, but have no interest in taking more math classes.
I breezed through school math, through college and grad school. Whoop-de-doo. Two things made math come alive for me: Proofs, and computers. But proofs are nearly gone from the school math curriculum, and the schools still haven't embraced computers.
I'd actually like to see a refactoring of school math, loosely into 4 disciplines, that are introduced in a cycle, perhaps even starting in 1st grade:
1. Arithmetic -- manual symbol manipulation, up to and including calculus.
2. Computation -- use of computers to explore and solve math problems.
3. Working with data -- self explanatory.
4. Theory -- things like sets, proofs, etc.
I believe this would actually be more representative of how people actually use math in their lives. Many people will use computation and data, even if they struggle through arithmetic and develop no interest in theory. On the other hand, full exposure to all of the disciplines would adequately prepare someone for academic math study.
I don't believe in banning anything. Some kids need to be allowed to get "ahead" so they don't get bored and lose interest, or simply because solving those school math problems can be a fun escape -- as it was for me -- from an otherwise stressful adolescence.
I like the approach, but I wouldn't say it's "more representative of how people actually use math in their lives".
I work in STEM and don't think I've every needed the "Theory" category.
Any kind of computation beyond a calculator is beyond what most people use, and involves half a Computer Science degree.
Working with data is nice and probably somewhat useful to white collar people, but most of them are going to use a half dozen Excel commands to get there. Most people don't really have a use for learning R or anything like that.
Arithmetic is basically the only thing most people are going to use, and even calculus is beyond what most people actually use. Single variable algebra is about the extent of what's useful to the vast majority of people.
I'm doubtful any extension of math classes is going to go well. People forget the things they don't use, and the swaths of adults that only remember simple arithmetic and basic algebra are telling a story that the rest isn't useful.
I work in STEM and don't think I've every needed the "Theory" category.
Any kind of computation beyond a calculator is beyond what most people use, and involves half a Computer Science degree.
Working with data is nice and probably somewhat useful to white collar people, but most of them are going to use a half dozen Excel commands to get there. Most people don't really have a use for learning R or anything like that.
Arithmetic is basically the only thing most people are going to use, and even calculus is beyond what most people actually use. Single variable algebra is about the extent of what's useful to the vast majority of people.
I'm doubtful any extension of math classes is going to go well. People forget the things they don't use, and the swaths of adults that only remember simple arithmetic and basic algebra are telling a story that the rest isn't useful.
San Francisco is a parody of itself but this is not specific to it. There is a concerted effort in California to dumb down math standards under spurious claims of advancing “equity”. Needless to say, the only people who benefit are the kids of parents rich enough to send them to private school, who will now face less competition from bright but poor Asian kids who were served by institutions like Lowell High School.
https://stanfordreview.org/review-investigation-jo-boaler-is...
https://stanfordreview.org/review-investigation-jo-boaler-is...
I am afraid there is an evil lurking just around the corner: mass private tuitions. I grew up in another country where public
and private education kept falling in standards and eventually there was a gap between what was expected in college and standardized tests, was no longer being taught in schools.
Solution: Private tutors to fill the gap. The kids who couldn’t afford it, kept falling behind. It got so bad that at some point school teachers would teach completely different subjects to their own students, but in private tuitions outside the school. Seems that is the way forward if nothing changes.
Solution: Private tutors to fill the gap. The kids who couldn’t afford it, kept falling behind. It got so bad that at some point school teachers would teach completely different subjects to their own students, but in private tuitions outside the school. Seems that is the way forward if nothing changes.
This reminds me of bloom’s 2 sigma problem
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloom's_2_sigma_problem
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloom's_2_sigma_problem
That's an interesting contrast to the Proof School (https://www.proofschool.org/), a private school also in San Francisco, which is the best 6-12th grade math environment for kids who love math that I've ever seen.
Middle school tuition: $43,790 per year
That’s more than what I paid for university.
That’s more than what I paid for university.
I was such a mathcel growing up I took high school algebra in sixth grade. So I have every right to be assmad about things like this. And past me maybe would have been.
But I'm not, and the reasons why are complex.
First of all, algebra is hard. And not every kid can learn it in the eighth grade. Furthermore, not every teacher qualified to teach eighth grade stuff is qualified to teach algebra. What the studies have shown is that teaching algebra to everyone in grade 8 leads to worse math outcomes.
And if you agree to teach some of the kids algebra in eighth grade, you're back in the sticky wicket of tracking and "gifted kids". Show me a gifted classroom and I'll show you a classroom full of mainly rich whites and Asians -- who are depriving the poorer and more socially disadvantaged students of valuable resources.
The whole point of public education is democratic access -- to all -- of sufficient educational resources and service for basic functioning as an adult citizen, NOT educating every child to the maximum of their potential. It's kind of like how capitalism is really good if and only if you want to get as rich as possible and have the means to do so, and under social democracy you will be less rich, but the tradeoff is there are far fewer economic losers. In light of this, leaving algebra until ninth grade was the best choice for the San Francisco school system for equitable availability of education to all, given the resources and framework they have to work with.
But I'm not, and the reasons why are complex.
First of all, algebra is hard. And not every kid can learn it in the eighth grade. Furthermore, not every teacher qualified to teach eighth grade stuff is qualified to teach algebra. What the studies have shown is that teaching algebra to everyone in grade 8 leads to worse math outcomes.
And if you agree to teach some of the kids algebra in eighth grade, you're back in the sticky wicket of tracking and "gifted kids". Show me a gifted classroom and I'll show you a classroom full of mainly rich whites and Asians -- who are depriving the poorer and more socially disadvantaged students of valuable resources.
The whole point of public education is democratic access -- to all -- of sufficient educational resources and service for basic functioning as an adult citizen, NOT educating every child to the maximum of their potential. It's kind of like how capitalism is really good if and only if you want to get as rich as possible and have the means to do so, and under social democracy you will be less rich, but the tradeoff is there are far fewer economic losers. In light of this, leaving algebra until ninth grade was the best choice for the San Francisco school system for equitable availability of education to all, given the resources and framework they have to work with.
> What the studies have shown is that teaching algebra to everyone in grade 8 leads to worse math outcomes.
> And if you agree to teach some of the kids algebra in eighth grade, you're back in the sticky wicket of tracking and "gifted kids". Show me a gifted classroom and I'll show you a classroom full of mainly rich whites and Asians -- who are depriving the poorer and more socially disadvantaged students of valuable resources.
If you're worried about resources, put the best teachers in with the "typical" kids, and give them smaller classes than the "gifted" kids. I took 8th grade algebra in 7th grade at my public school, and my kid is going to get that next year too; if we had to wait for 9th grade, it would be an amazing waste of resources, because we'd be so bored and tempted to cause trouble. I don't know that my parents would have been able to put me in private school to get the math I needed (they were able to convince the school system to let me into to algebra a year early), but I have the means to do it for my kid, but this school system is setup to meet kids where they are.
I suspect this change is just another thing driving parents with means out of SFUSD, which only further reduces the resources they have.
> And if you agree to teach some of the kids algebra in eighth grade, you're back in the sticky wicket of tracking and "gifted kids". Show me a gifted classroom and I'll show you a classroom full of mainly rich whites and Asians -- who are depriving the poorer and more socially disadvantaged students of valuable resources.
If you're worried about resources, put the best teachers in with the "typical" kids, and give them smaller classes than the "gifted" kids. I took 8th grade algebra in 7th grade at my public school, and my kid is going to get that next year too; if we had to wait for 9th grade, it would be an amazing waste of resources, because we'd be so bored and tempted to cause trouble. I don't know that my parents would have been able to put me in private school to get the math I needed (they were able to convince the school system to let me into to algebra a year early), but I have the means to do it for my kid, but this school system is setup to meet kids where they are.
I suspect this change is just another thing driving parents with means out of SFUSD, which only further reduces the resources they have.
Even California does not think the point of public education to be basic functioning as an adult citizen. The vision statement is “All California students of the 21st century will attain the highest level of academic knowledge, applied learning and performance skills to ensure fulfilling personal lives and careers and contribute to civic and economic progress in our diverse and changing democratic society.”
Irrespective of what one thinks the purpose of public education to be, the effect of this equity mindset is to hurt poorer but capable kids thus having the opposite effect of less equity. Richer parents are already bypassing these restrictions by opting for private school, moving out of the district to other public schools, or getting additional instruction outside regular schooling.
What the commenter is actually arguing for is holding back poor, mostly Asian kids so that they aren’t ahead of poor black and brown kids. All the while rich kids are entrenched ahead of both.
What I think would work better is food safety, tutoring starting at early grade levels, and safe and quiet places to study.
Irrespective of what one thinks the purpose of public education to be, the effect of this equity mindset is to hurt poorer but capable kids thus having the opposite effect of less equity. Richer parents are already bypassing these restrictions by opting for private school, moving out of the district to other public schools, or getting additional instruction outside regular schooling.
What the commenter is actually arguing for is holding back poor, mostly Asian kids so that they aren’t ahead of poor black and brown kids. All the while rich kids are entrenched ahead of both.
What I think would work better is food safety, tutoring starting at early grade levels, and safe and quiet places to study.
> Even California does not think the point of public education to be basic functioning as an adult citizen. The vision statement is “All California students of the 21st century will attain the highest level of academic knowledge, applied learning and performance skills to ensure fulfilling personal lives and careers and contribute to civic and economic progress in our diverse and changing democratic society.”
Ohhh, if wishes were horses, my friend.
Have you ever worked at a place where the mission statement contained things like "a commitment to excellence" and yet most everybody around you (quite possibly including yourself) was decidedly mediocre, employing practices (like doctrinaire Scrum) that precluded excellence and were intended to manage mediocre workers?
California's education system, like nearly all USA education systems, is based on the Prussian model, which was devised by Industrial Revolution magnates as a way to mass-train children into future workers for their factories. Any pretense to excellence, or education to the highest level, is aspirational at best, a fig leaf at worst.
Ohhh, if wishes were horses, my friend.
Have you ever worked at a place where the mission statement contained things like "a commitment to excellence" and yet most everybody around you (quite possibly including yourself) was decidedly mediocre, employing practices (like doctrinaire Scrum) that precluded excellence and were intended to manage mediocre workers?
California's education system, like nearly all USA education systems, is based on the Prussian model, which was devised by Industrial Revolution magnates as a way to mass-train children into future workers for their factories. Any pretense to excellence, or education to the highest level, is aspirational at best, a fig leaf at worst.
I went to SF schools including Lowell. Lowell, at the time, was blessed with strong science and mathematics teachers and a particularly great English composition teacher. Lowell possesses an extremely strong alumni community who are grateful for the education they received. If you look at school rankings at the time, Lowell was ranked in the top 100 high schools in the nation. Lowell has more Nobel Prize winners than most colleges and universities. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Lowell_High_School_(Sa...
My proposed solutions aren’t whimsy. They are proposed solutions to problems that a classmate of mine at Lowell encountered. He and I were both low income, so we had free lunch. He complained that there was no quiet place for him to study at home. He is Hispanic. I am Asian.
Teachers preferred teaching at Lowell because the students wanted to learn and because they didn’t like the chaos found at other high schools including fights, gangs, and truancy.
> California's education system, like nearly all USA education systems, is based on the Prussian model, which was devised by Industrial Revolution magnates as a way to mass-train children into future workers for their factories.
Are you sure about that? If anything, I would expect the Prussians to worry about training future soldiers and good Royal subjects. Especially since Prussia introduced mandatory public schooling in 1717; that's long before industrialisation hit the country. (Even in Britain, Wikipedia has the Industrial Revolution start about 1760.)
Are you sure about that? If anything, I would expect the Prussians to worry about training future soldiers and good Royal subjects. Especially since Prussia introduced mandatory public schooling in 1717; that's long before industrialisation hit the country. (Even in Britain, Wikipedia has the Industrial Revolution start about 1760.)
I feel conflicted about this. I started learning algebra around grade 6 in Europe, so I think pushing it back to grade 9 is a bit far.
But on the other hand, I was always amazed by how much skipping just a week or two of school a year could impact one’s education. It’s very difficult to catch up (in Central European schools at least). A bout of pneumonia could negatively impact your whole life if you miss a week of school and you don’t have the time or teaching to catch up. Education can be very rushed, maybe it shouldn’t be. Pupils should be given time to catch up when various life events happen to them. And if this means a more spaced out curriculum, so be it.
But on the other hand, I was always amazed by how much skipping just a week or two of school a year could impact one’s education. It’s very difficult to catch up (in Central European schools at least). A bout of pneumonia could negatively impact your whole life if you miss a week of school and you don’t have the time or teaching to catch up. Education can be very rushed, maybe it shouldn’t be. Pupils should be given time to catch up when various life events happen to them. And if this means a more spaced out curriculum, so be it.
Does summer vacation exist in Central Europe?
In high school (USA) I was tracked into a two year remedial math course following an abysmal performance in pre-calc, so after 1 year of that I spent the summer taking an online course and tested back onto the normal track.
The Summer break is often derided as a time when students forget everything, but without it I likely would not have ended up studying mathematics in college.
In high school (USA) I was tracked into a two year remedial math course following an abysmal performance in pre-calc, so after 1 year of that I spent the summer taking an online course and tested back onto the normal track.
The Summer break is often derided as a time when students forget everything, but without it I likely would not have ended up studying mathematics in college.
Things are very different in Europe and in the US. And even in different countries in Europe, I suspect. Summer vacations exist but opportunities for catching up during them might be limited in public schools. Many don't have remediation learning tracks for students who have fallen behind.
Where I was growing up in the 90s, some teachers would stay after work in their classrooms mostly out of the goodness of their hearts and help pupils who fell behind. Not all teachers would do this and sometimes your school wouldn't have a teacher helping kids in a certain discipline, so you would go to your friends' schools if they had that. Sometimes money was involved, which created conflicts of interest. Commercial tutoring schools popped up in the region later that formalized and democratized the process a little bit. The internet was there in the late 90s already, but obviously things like Khan Academy arrived much later.
I appreciate that kids these days have more resources and it's not an "every kid for themselves" as it was in my childhood. But I still think it would be best if the tempo at schools was reduced so there's time to catch up. Spaced out learning is more effective in terms of retention anyways. It just takes more time.
Where I was growing up in the 90s, some teachers would stay after work in their classrooms mostly out of the goodness of their hearts and help pupils who fell behind. Not all teachers would do this and sometimes your school wouldn't have a teacher helping kids in a certain discipline, so you would go to your friends' schools if they had that. Sometimes money was involved, which created conflicts of interest. Commercial tutoring schools popped up in the region later that formalized and democratized the process a little bit. The internet was there in the late 90s already, but obviously things like Khan Academy arrived much later.
I appreciate that kids these days have more resources and it's not an "every kid for themselves" as it was in my childhood. But I still think it would be best if the tempo at schools was reduced so there's time to catch up. Spaced out learning is more effective in terms of retention anyways. It just takes more time.
Yes it exists. (~2 months) It may be the time to forget things, but it's also a time to develop skills not enforced by schools and expand your social environment. There's a balance in everything.
Doesn't this suggest the opposite? You only have 9,10,11,12 grades to learn algebra instead of 6-12?
The earlier you start the slower you can go, starting in grade 5-6 is spaced out.
The earlier you start the slower you can go, starting in grade 5-6 is spaced out.
We moved on from algebra as a focus quickly. In Central Europe, my high school math courses in grades 11 and 12 were about equivalent to math in a CS BSc in uni in the UK. Formal languages, computing, matrices, and other such things. But you could also finish your high school after grade 10 where I was and not learn any advanced math, or simply choose a lower intensity math course.
Regardless, education was rushed in my childhood (90s and 00s) and it was the norm in Europe. I don’t think that was good, it was very stressful and if a kid had to miss school for a few weeks because of a life event, it was very difficult to catch up.
Regardless, education was rushed in my childhood (90s and 00s) and it was the norm in Europe. I don’t think that was good, it was very stressful and if a kid had to miss school for a few weeks because of a life event, it was very difficult to catch up.
The issue is preventing kids from taking advanced classes.
I wonder how much of this is a byproduct of school administrators themselves not understanding algebra.
Hey, if they could become successful school administrators without algebra, why would anyone need to learn algebra?
One major issue is that SF doesn’t have many kids.
So “school issues” easily end up being implementations of ideologies, rather than of services provided.
People aren’t asking “are my kids learning” because they don’t have kids. And neither do their friends and coworkers.
So “school issues” easily end up being implementations of ideologies, rather than of services provided.
People aren’t asking “are my kids learning” because they don’t have kids. And neither do their friends and coworkers.
Good point. Some more info:
>Persons under 18 years, San Francisco County, California percent 14.0[0]
Meanwhile US total is %22[1]
This[2] article claims SF has the least amount of kids in the US, although it does not share an exact source.
[0]https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/sanfranciscocou...
[1]https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US
[2]https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/fewest-kids-maps-1719...
>Persons under 18 years, San Francisco County, California percent 14.0[0]
Meanwhile US total is %22[1]
This[2] article claims SF has the least amount of kids in the US, although it does not share an exact source.
[0]https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/sanfranciscocou...
[1]https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US
[2]https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/fewest-kids-maps-1719...
SF School district has 55,000 kids in public schools. It is the 6th largest school district in the state of California. They sit behind Los Angeles, San Diego, Fresno etc. In addition to 55k kids in public schools, they have another 22,000 kids in private schools. SF has a low number of kids per household, but it's still an enormous school district.
Yeah, but how many of those 55K public school kids are from affluent families?
California schools didn’t go from top ten to the 43’rd in the US by gutting the wealthy districts.
California schools didn’t go from top ten to the 43’rd in the US by gutting the wealthy districts.
The prompt was speculating that there aren't enough parents in the SF school district to enact change, my response is not addressing California schools in relation to other states.
If you go to public school in SF, you are probably poor. Well, the powers that be have decided that you’re too poor to be taught algebra so early. Probably because they don’t expect you to go to university. We need tradespeople and you have been selected for the role.
Then those who are willing and motivated to self-learn will get even further ahead... which causes exactly the opposite of the "equity" they're trying to create.
Wow. We did algebra in
.. 5th grade?
Seems like standardized testing and goals is killing things about as predicted.
Seems like standardized testing and goals is killing things about as predicted.
As a kid from eastern europe, my first algebra lessons were in 1st grade. I was always baffled by algebra being introduced in grade 5 or 6 here in the US; grade 8 would be ridiculous. Kids my age in my hometown would be taking early calculus at that grade level.
At my daughters school they had algebra in 6th and 7th grade, and it was only about an hour south of San Francisco. San Francisco is outlier bad in education in the US, and it is surrounded by a dozen communities with outlier-good schools. It is a double outlier.
https://schools.latimes.com/sat-scores/ranking/page/1/
https://schools.latimes.com/sat-scores/ranking/page/1/
South Bay public schools are leagues better than SFUSD, less politics and a lot more competitive
SF is actually contorting itself (ie, blatantly lying) to avoid showing the standardized test results which show how badly this policy has performed.
What? 8th grade and students won't take calculus?
In Singapore, the default stream sees students taking basic algebra at age 11 (5th grade), simultaneous and quadratic equations at age 14 (8th grade), and single-variable calculus at age 16 (10th grade). By 17-18 (11-12th grades), students have done first-order ordinary differential equations, volumes of revolution, functions, vectors, and students have the option to take college-level linear algebra or discrete mathematics.
What is wrong with the US?
In Singapore, the default stream sees students taking basic algebra at age 11 (5th grade), simultaneous and quadratic equations at age 14 (8th grade), and single-variable calculus at age 16 (10th grade). By 17-18 (11-12th grades), students have done first-order ordinary differential equations, volumes of revolution, functions, vectors, and students have the option to take college-level linear algebra or discrete mathematics.
What is wrong with the US?
The US is the same it’s just spread out and named differently.
“Basic Algebra” is what we call 7th-8th grade (age 11-13) math.
“Simultaneous and quadratic equations” is what we call Algebra which is 9th grade (age 14-15) with logs and exponentials thrown in.
Most places do a split year of Geometry and Trig in 10th grade.
Single variable calculus and first order blah blah is Calc 1 for 11th graders.
Volumes, vectors, integrals, infinite series, taylor expansions is Calc 2 for 12th graders.
“Basic Algebra” is what we call 7th-8th grade (age 11-13) math.
“Simultaneous and quadratic equations” is what we call Algebra which is 9th grade (age 14-15) with logs and exponentials thrown in.
Most places do a split year of Geometry and Trig in 10th grade.
Single variable calculus and first order blah blah is Calc 1 for 11th graders.
Volumes, vectors, integrals, infinite series, taylor expansions is Calc 2 for 12th graders.
Nothing? I took all those classes around the same age in a public school in the midwestern United States. I didn't turn 16 until my 11th year of school so maybe there's just a difference in the way grades are numbered. (I was a little young for my grade.)
My friend moved from Taiwan to the US in 7th grade, and she felt the same way. She was totally bored, but enjoyed suddenly becoming the smartest kid in her math class. She was, at best, an average student in Taiwan.
It's the same with the standard school syllabus in my corner of dusty Africa.
> What is wrong with the US?
For a developed country, they can be frustratingly archaic.
> What is wrong with the US?
For a developed country, they can be frustratingly archaic.
We don’t have a homogenous population of Asians, that’s why. I was an Asian in American public school and was 2 years behind what you described, and that was going as fast as possible within the system.
I don't think being 'Asian' has anything to do with it (for the record, 'Asia' is a continent stretching from Yemen to Japan). In this very thread there are people talking about professors of German and Eastern European origin complaining about the standards of their students.
[deleted]
Having no previous knowledge about this situation in SF, I found this article from last year was an interesting read: https://fordhaminstitute.org/national/commentary/san-francis...
"With both gaps, SFUSD evidenced greater inequities than state averages in 2015, and that relative underperformance worsened by 2019. The district’s anti-tracking public relations campaign, by focusing on metrics such as grades and course enrollments, diverts attention from the harsh reality that SFUSD is headed in the wrong direction on equity."
"With both gaps, SFUSD evidenced greater inequities than state averages in 2015, and that relative underperformance worsened by 2019. The district’s anti-tracking public relations campaign, by focusing on metrics such as grades and course enrollments, diverts attention from the harsh reality that SFUSD is headed in the wrong direction on equity."
At this point - perhaps just to be the glass half full guy - its best to see math in the public school system as the equivalent to PE (physical education).
The kids (and parents) who really want to excel in STEM will just be doing after school competitive math anyway and probably are already so just like they don't provide competitive soccer/football/baseball/fencing/piano coaching (which also could be used to get into elite schools); the school district maybe doesn't need to provide anything beyond the equivalent to getting some fresh air. Perhaps even the lack of rigor, might increase the market size/volume for rigorous after-school offerings.
The kids (and parents) who really want to excel in STEM will just be doing after school competitive math anyway and probably are already so just like they don't provide competitive soccer/football/baseball/fencing/piano coaching (which also could be used to get into elite schools); the school district maybe doesn't need to provide anything beyond the equivalent to getting some fresh air. Perhaps even the lack of rigor, might increase the market size/volume for rigorous after-school offerings.
Really doesn't do anything except fuck over smart kids whose unlucky parents can't afford private school. I don't think that's equity by any definition.
What effect will this have on the economy longterm? Most software jobs for instance don't require much beyond simple arithmetic, but you need people with a mathematical bent to do the groundbreaking stuff. If this kind of BS is allowed to fester in the education system where do you find those people 10-20 years from now? You can't do it all with foreign workers, especially with engineer salaries becoming increasingly competitive outside of the US.
This is why parents move out of San Francisco when they have children. There are more dogs than kids in the city. The city government is actively hostile to children.
Education is general has gotten dumbed down with time. I dropped out of college almost 20 years ago and am almost finished with my degree after returning.
The difference between then and now is staggering. The mentality is if you can't make people smarter just lower the standards.
The reality is perhaps the top 15% of the US population by IQ should be receiving a college education. The rest is just credentialism and a waste of societal resources.
The difference between then and now is staggering. The mentality is if you can't make people smarter just lower the standards.
The reality is perhaps the top 15% of the US population by IQ should be receiving a college education. The rest is just credentialism and a waste of societal resources.
I honestly assumed this was about SF forcing all students to have taken algebra in 7th grade. What are they wasting their time doing in middle school?
[deleted]
I did algebra in 6th grade when I was 11 as IB curriculum (MYP 1).
WTF is the point of waiting until 9th grade? That's disgusting.
WTF is the point of waiting until 9th grade? That's disgusting.
One thing to note is that in the US education system they name classes/courses with the names of fields in mathematics. This is quite confusing and annoying. So "Algebra" actually means "The course we called Algebra 1" (there's an Algebra 2 that comes later, also not really about Algebra). The course called Algebra 1 is basically the material the education system has decided to teach at 9th grade.
That material comprises various topics, only some of which are Algebraic.
Students are typically (at least in my experience) exposed to "Algebra" (symbols, equations) much earlier. Memory is fading but for my kids something like 5th grade. I still have some of their scrawled equations on a white board in my office from back in those days...
Edit: they continue this confusion (at least consistently confusing) by calling the 10th grade class "Geometry" even though it's only somewhat about Geometry, and students will have met triangles and obtuse angles and whatnot years earlier. And so on through to "Pre-Calculus" which...you can guess is not much about Calculus, but the stuff they think should be taught before teaching Calculus (very scary).
Students are typically (at least in my experience) exposed to "Algebra" (symbols, equations) much earlier. Memory is fading but for my kids something like 5th grade. I still have some of their scrawled equations on a white board in my office from back in those days...
Edit: they continue this confusion (at least consistently confusing) by calling the 10th grade class "Geometry" even though it's only somewhat about Geometry, and students will have met triangles and obtuse angles and whatnot years earlier. And so on through to "Pre-Calculus" which...you can guess is not much about Calculus, but the stuff they think should be taught before teaching Calculus (very scary).
Thank you for the info. I actually really like features of the USA system, especially AP classes. The flexibility of AP is great. International baccalaureate actually places a limit on how many advanced subjects you can do and is completely inflexible to anyone trying to do more work or graduate early.
We had "pre-algebra" in 6th grade (optional) which was more or less foundational algebra, otherwise you took, whatever was the next step. Then in 7th grade you could take "algebra" and 8th was "algebra 2" if you wanted. Graduation from 8th grade required passing "algebra".
Then in 9th or 10th grade you took "high school algebra" which was a big step up from 7th grade Algebra. From there you either took geometry + trig, or geometry + algebra 2 + precalc, or had the option to do all four years geometry + algebra 2 + precalc + calc. Most of these had honors and AP variations that were opt-in.
Then in 9th or 10th grade you took "high school algebra" which was a big step up from 7th grade Algebra. From there you either took geometry + trig, or geometry + algebra 2 + precalc, or had the option to do all four years geometry + algebra 2 + precalc + calc. Most of these had honors and AP variations that were opt-in.
[deleted]
Looks like Seattle is ahead of the curve, here, as they already banned all gifted programs.
Good overview here. The TLDR is that some parents are giving their kids an edge by paying for private classes in Algebra I and/or Geometry in eight grade (this hasn't been banned, it seems) which means they're in better position to finish high school with an AP Calculus class, which tends to greatly improve their chances of getting into a UC/Cal State school:
https://calmatters.org/education/k-12-education/2021/12/san-...
Incidentally, this system has also created a big need for remedial high-school-level math courses at community colleges and even at the four-year universities, where students essentially have to relearn all the material again at an acceptable standard to continue in science/engineering upper education, which is just a huge waste of resources.
I'm pretty sure that more math, taught earlier, in smaller-sized classes, by better teachers, is always going to be better for long-term outcomes. This 'equity' business seems like a race-to-the-bottom which is bad for everyone.
https://calmatters.org/education/k-12-education/2021/12/san-...
Incidentally, this system has also created a big need for remedial high-school-level math courses at community colleges and even at the four-year universities, where students essentially have to relearn all the material again at an acceptable standard to continue in science/engineering upper education, which is just a huge waste of resources.
I'm pretty sure that more math, taught earlier, in smaller-sized classes, by better teachers, is always going to be better for long-term outcomes. This 'equity' business seems like a race-to-the-bottom which is bad for everyone.
[deleted]
The short-sightedness is Remarkable.
Unless the entire world and every classroom hold to such a standard, than this simply widens an already uncomfortably wide Multi-Modal Distribution.
We live in a global economy and compete in one. Artificially holding your community back just takes away opportunities from them and gives them to another group.
Do you think the affluent families of the world are gonna stop teaching their kids math from a young age?
Equity at any cost is a remarkably dumb idea. And it has an obvious trivial solution. All people live in abject poverty, despair, disease.. equally. Only a sociopath would consider that a viable solution.
This reminds me of “There are some ideas so absurd that only an intellectual could believe them”
Unless the entire world and every classroom hold to such a standard, than this simply widens an already uncomfortably wide Multi-Modal Distribution.
We live in a global economy and compete in one. Artificially holding your community back just takes away opportunities from them and gives them to another group.
Do you think the affluent families of the world are gonna stop teaching their kids math from a young age?
Equity at any cost is a remarkably dumb idea. And it has an obvious trivial solution. All people live in abject poverty, despair, disease.. equally. Only a sociopath would consider that a viable solution.
This reminds me of “There are some ideas so absurd that only an intellectual could believe them”
The problem is that we’re not funding prisons to adequately to accept the apparently desired public school outcomes. /s
Well, there go their chances of solving the "X" factor in the Golden Gate Bridge equation.
Well minister you asked for equality so we gave them equal marks! One is not a mind reader!
I miss you Sir Humphrey.
I miss you Sir Humphrey.
In America, we have a war on merit.
What do they call themselves in cali these days? Progressives I guess, good job.
A lot of this is the result of efforts by Stanford faculty and (Stanford-owned) Youcubed.
If you are a Stanford alum or a parent in San Francisco, please reach out to Stanford leadership to let them know about your concern. You can send an email similar the one below, to any/all of these folks:
[email protected] (Dean of the Graduate School of Education https://ed.stanford.edu/faculty/danls)
[email protected] (Persis Drell)
[email protected] (Marc Tessier-Lavigne)
[email protected] (Deputy General Counsel)
Subject: Concerns Regarding Stanford's Involvement in CMF and YouCubed
Dear [Recipient's Name],
My name is [Your Name], and I am a concerned parent of a school-age child living in San Francisco. I am writing to express my deep concern about Stanford's connection to the California Mathematics Framework (CMF) and YouCubed. As a prestigious institution, Stanford's involvement in the promotion of these policies and practices has a significant impact on the quality of education our children receive. I am hoping to hear from you regarding the university's stance on this matter and the actions being taken to address the concerns of parents and faculty alike.
Recently, I came across a list of Stanford faculty who have signed a statement expressing their concerns about the CMF (https://sites.google.com/view/mathindatamatters/home). The signatories come from a diverse range of STEM fields, including the medical school, business school, and political science. This demonstrates a clear disagreement among the university's own quantitative faculty about the direction of math education proposed by YouCubed and the CMF.
As a concerned parent, I would like to know who at Stanford bears responsibility and liability for the educational effects of what YouCubed is advocating for math education. Given that YouCubed is owned by Stanford and not by an individual faculty member, I believe that the university should be held accountable for the potential negative consequences of these policies on our children's education.
I would like to draw an analogy with the case of Dr. Scott Atlas, a former Stanford faculty member whose controversial views on COVID-19 led to public outcry and concern. Just as the university had to address and clarify its stance on Dr. Atlas's views, I believe it is essential for Stanford to publicly address the concerns raised by its own faculty regarding the CMF and YouCubed.
I kindly request a detailed response on this matter, as it is of utmost importance to the future of our children's education. As a leading institution in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, Stanford has a responsibility to ensure that the educational policies it supports and promotes are in the best interests of our students.
Thank you for your attention to this matter. I look forward to your response.
Sincerely,
[Your Name] [Your Contact Information]
If you are a Stanford alum or a parent in San Francisco, please reach out to Stanford leadership to let them know about your concern. You can send an email similar the one below, to any/all of these folks:
[email protected] (Dean of the Graduate School of Education https://ed.stanford.edu/faculty/danls)
[email protected] (Persis Drell)
[email protected] (Marc Tessier-Lavigne)
[email protected] (Deputy General Counsel)
Subject: Concerns Regarding Stanford's Involvement in CMF and YouCubed
Dear [Recipient's Name],
My name is [Your Name], and I am a concerned parent of a school-age child living in San Francisco. I am writing to express my deep concern about Stanford's connection to the California Mathematics Framework (CMF) and YouCubed. As a prestigious institution, Stanford's involvement in the promotion of these policies and practices has a significant impact on the quality of education our children receive. I am hoping to hear from you regarding the university's stance on this matter and the actions being taken to address the concerns of parents and faculty alike.
Recently, I came across a list of Stanford faculty who have signed a statement expressing their concerns about the CMF (https://sites.google.com/view/mathindatamatters/home). The signatories come from a diverse range of STEM fields, including the medical school, business school, and political science. This demonstrates a clear disagreement among the university's own quantitative faculty about the direction of math education proposed by YouCubed and the CMF.
As a concerned parent, I would like to know who at Stanford bears responsibility and liability for the educational effects of what YouCubed is advocating for math education. Given that YouCubed is owned by Stanford and not by an individual faculty member, I believe that the university should be held accountable for the potential negative consequences of these policies on our children's education.
I would like to draw an analogy with the case of Dr. Scott Atlas, a former Stanford faculty member whose controversial views on COVID-19 led to public outcry and concern. Just as the university had to address and clarify its stance on Dr. Atlas's views, I believe it is essential for Stanford to publicly address the concerns raised by its own faculty regarding the CMF and YouCubed.
I kindly request a detailed response on this matter, as it is of utmost importance to the future of our children's education. As a leading institution in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, Stanford has a responsibility to ensure that the educational policies it supports and promotes are in the best interests of our students.
Thank you for your attention to this matter. I look forward to your response.
Sincerely,
[Your Name] [Your Contact Information]
This is evil. It's like that administration in that one sci-fi dystopia that tried to force everyone to be equal by making everyone wear masks and making the stronger wear weighted clothing and the smarter wear thought-jamming devices.
Increase standards, but also streamline processes. Leverage ChatGPT so students learn by repetition in innovative games with cool interfaces, virtual and 3d and sound/motion interfaces, with lots of gym time. No more identity bullshit besides what is basic to become a good person like it was common to be taught throughout the world like 10 years ago. You know what, fuck this. Pause everything. REWIND.
HARD FUCKING FORK on this reality. This is bullshit, I'm rewinding the time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pRpeEdMmmQ0
Increase standards, but also streamline processes. Leverage ChatGPT so students learn by repetition in innovative games with cool interfaces, virtual and 3d and sound/motion interfaces, with lots of gym time. No more identity bullshit besides what is basic to become a good person like it was common to be taught throughout the world like 10 years ago. You know what, fuck this. Pause everything. REWIND.
HARD FUCKING FORK on this reality. This is bullshit, I'm rewinding the time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pRpeEdMmmQ0
> Leverage ChatGPT so students learn by repetition in innovative games with cool interfaces
You mean shitty, derivative games that haven't been tested at all?
There's no good reason to use ChatGPT in education like that, and doing so is pure technology fetishism.
You mean shitty, derivative games that haven't been tested at all?
There's no good reason to use ChatGPT in education like that, and doing so is pure technology fetishism.
I think you might not have used chatgpt much. In the last year it's gotten much much better, it can do lots of useful things and with 1/1000th the effort of alternative ways of performing the same task. Assuming they can continue to improve it at even a fraction of it's current rate of improvement, even a small fraction, technology like this will be in everything we do and constantly in our ear. It's astoundingly useful and you are wrong here.
>> Leverage ChatGPT so students learn by repetition in innovative games with cool interfaces
> It's astoundingly useful and you are wrong here.
It may be useful, but I'm not wrong here.
Software engineers and the like are too-frequently technology fetishists that are like the proverbial guy who has a hammer and thinks everything is a nail.
Even if "innovative games with cool interfaces" is the right way to educate kids, which is very unlikely to be true, those games aren't going to be spat out by ChatGPT.
And if they can be spat out by ChatGPT, why even bother educating most of those kids at all?
> It's astoundingly useful and you are wrong here.
It may be useful, but I'm not wrong here.
Software engineers and the like are too-frequently technology fetishists that are like the proverbial guy who has a hammer and thinks everything is a nail.
Even if "innovative games with cool interfaces" is the right way to educate kids, which is very unlikely to be true, those games aren't going to be spat out by ChatGPT.
And if they can be spat out by ChatGPT, why even bother educating most of those kids at all?
> Software engineers and the like are too-frequently technology fetishists that are like the proverbial guy who has a hammer and thinks everything is a nail.
Irrelevant even if true.
> Even if "innovative games with cool interfaces" is the right way to educate kids, which is very unlikely to be true,
Presumably baseless personal opinion offered without even attempting to provide support.
> those games aren't going to be spat out by ChatGPT.
This is just easily demonstrated to be false already.
> And if they can be spat out by ChatGPT, why even bother educating most of those kids at all?
Dramatic Irony
Irrelevant even if true.
> Even if "innovative games with cool interfaces" is the right way to educate kids, which is very unlikely to be true,
Presumably baseless personal opinion offered without even attempting to provide support.
> those games aren't going to be spat out by ChatGPT.
This is just easily demonstrated to be false already.
> And if they can be spat out by ChatGPT, why even bother educating most of those kids at all?
Dramatic Irony
[deleted]
education is a lot more than the pipeline for getting skills built up.
ChatGPT is a massive pipe that will allow for increase in throughput of information into curious brains for almost no cost. With increasingly more valuable answers over time. And it can already quiz you on math and teach you math.
It's amazing. I love it.
ChatGPT is a massive pipe that will allow for increase in throughput of information into curious brains for almost no cost. With increasingly more valuable answers over time. And it can already quiz you on math and teach you math.
It's amazing. I love it.
Those pipes already exist without the risk of errors and other strange stuff ChatGPT produces.
Sites like
https://www.khanacademy.org/
are way better than the shiny new toy ChatGPT. ChatGPT will confidently tell you nonsense if it's given the wrong prompt and you have no chance to know in advance.
Sites like
https://www.khanacademy.org/
are way better than the shiny new toy ChatGPT. ChatGPT will confidently tell you nonsense if it's given the wrong prompt and you have no chance to know in advance.
ChatGPT is a massive pipe... of bullshit.
Unless your goal is to turn humans into mindless drones which are easily persuaded and uncritical, it's possibly the worst thing to learn from.
Unless your goal is to turn humans into mindless drones which are easily persuaded and uncritical, it's possibly the worst thing to learn from.
Incorrect assesment. That's what people said about Wikipedia when I was in elementary school. The internet and Wikipedia are amazing. ChatGPT is amazing if you use it properly - if you prompt in ways that exercise understanding of the math itself, it boosts knowledge of math. I filled in gaps in my comp sci math fundamentals lazily over a weekend just in case. It's an amazing tool for learning measurable skills and improving in measurable skills, but admittedly only in limited workflows still. I love ChatGPT so far for my workflow.
It's amazing for learning. ChatGPT is information learning superpowers. Give me more power please. More power please.
It's amazing for learning. ChatGPT is information learning superpowers. Give me more power please. More power please.
> ChatGPT is a massive pipe that will allow for increase in throughput of information into curious brains for almost no cost. With increasingly more valuable answers over time. And it can already quiz you on math and teach you math.
> It's amazing. I love it.
It's pretty clear you're a true believer, who takes the marketing fantasy at face value.
But it's still a fantasy. They said the same thing about the web in 1995.
> It's amazing. I love it.
It's pretty clear you're a true believer, who takes the marketing fantasy at face value.
But it's still a fantasy. They said the same thing about the web in 1995.
The web succeeded in its initial mission and is an amazing innovation. I love the Internet. ChatGPT is a massive innovation. Check again in a year lol.
The people thought the web would do what you now think ChatGPT will do.
Now the web is a big source of misinformation, spam and ads.
ChatGPT is new and that's why it's results are impressive at the moment but people are already exploiting it's flaws.
What a year and ads and spam will lower it's usefulness.
Now the web is a big source of misinformation, spam and ads.
ChatGPT is new and that's why it's results are impressive at the moment but people are already exploiting it's flaws.
What a year and ads and spam will lower it's usefulness.
[deleted]
[deleted]
Students need to learn before being given a tool like that. You have to teach kids math before giving them a calculator. Otherwise, all they know is how to ask for information.
Most people learn by doing stuff with their hands, not by reading a paragraph.
Most people learn by doing stuff with their hands, not by reading a paragraph.
well said. chatgpt is awesome. it will free everyone.
Related news from earlier: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35364985
More family time! And higher quality of education outcomes for very cheap! It's truly the iphone moment for AI including the increasingly cheaper pipelines to train it. I remember how just a couple months ago it was still costing $50k+ to realistically get something resembling GPT-3+ performance. Now that's way less.
Wohoo!!! Innovation abounds!!! <3
Related news from earlier: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35364985
More family time! And higher quality of education outcomes for very cheap! It's truly the iphone moment for AI including the increasingly cheaper pipelines to train it. I remember how just a couple months ago it was still costing $50k+ to realistically get something resembling GPT-3+ performance. Now that's way less.
Wohoo!!! Innovation abounds!!! <3
The internet is awesome. it will free everyone.
Didn't work out.
Technology can't correct human flaws.
It's always the same error to think it will work, but in the end it's just a reason to reduce funds for education.
Didn't work out.
Technology can't correct human flaws.
It's always the same error to think it will work, but in the end it's just a reason to reduce funds for education.
[deleted]
You want to increase standards and make all dependent on a new and not battle tested service of one company?
This is still the same dystopia and still tries to cover up the underlying problem.
You need teachers, lots of of them and well payed.
This is still the same dystopia and still tries to cover up the underlying problem.
You need teachers, lots of of them and well payed.
The story you are referring to is Harrison Bergeron by Vonnegut.
My friend, the only thing I can say to that is:
Fuck that shit.
We're going back to 2011, I have unfinished business back there.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tg00YEETFzg
Everyone back to 2011 hardcore startup mindset with all the tech conferences w/ free food and great shows and demos, but this time code is still king, none of this talking only bullshit
same at every level of compensation in any kind of org. time to earn your keep or be replaced by chatgpt since that'll be the tyranny you fall under if you wanna front tyranny yourself like in Harrison Bergeron like my friend and I are familiar with, you see.
Fuck that shit.
We're going back to 2011, I have unfinished business back there.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tg00YEETFzg
Everyone back to 2011 hardcore startup mindset with all the tech conferences w/ free food and great shows and demos, but this time code is still king, none of this talking only bullshit
same at every level of compensation in any kind of org. time to earn your keep or be replaced by chatgpt since that'll be the tyranny you fall under if you wanna front tyranny yourself like in Harrison Bergeron like my friend and I are familiar with, you see.
dwg(1)
I’m really put off by both sides.
If my daughters school didn’t offer algebra in eight grade, she just wouldn’t take algebra.
I wouldn’t spent thousands of dollars so she can be a year ahead.
It seems you have a bunch of parents who view their children’s education as a carefully calibrated laboratory process, and bunch of activists who care more about groups than individuals.
If my daughters school didn’t offer algebra in eight grade, she just wouldn’t take algebra.
I wouldn’t spent thousands of dollars so she can be a year ahead.
It seems you have a bunch of parents who view their children’s education as a carefully calibrated laboratory process, and bunch of activists who care more about groups than individuals.
This is a message board mostly full of people who can send their children to private school for a trivial portion of their savings. If I had "hella cash" and was already sending my child to prison every day and the prison decided to waste their time for years because algebra is racist, it seems like I would be a bit heartless not to lift a finger to correct the issue.
Related, from just about a year ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30952821
And from a few months before that: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29324551
And from a few months before that: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29324551
See also this article from 4 days ago on Jo Boaler who uses San Francisco as a model for the rest of California https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35319345 https://twitter.com/stephaniemlee/status/1640765521946902529
On an anecdotal basis, I went to an elite university in the US (mostly based on luck I think because I was a mediocre student) and there was an implicit expectation was that students seriously pursuing STEM would be starting their curriculum with multivariable calc or linear algebra as a freshmen since the single variable calc requirement would have been knocked out AP/IB credits. I've seen many of my international cohorts going even beyond. I genuinely worry that school systems such as SFUSD is doing a great disservice to its students and the society.