This article is a good platform for a series of solid specific observations. I particularly liked this one toward the end:
“ It could mean compressing the time teenagers have to sort out their hierarchies and pillory outsiders, by turning schools into minimalist places in which people only study and learn. All the elaborate rites of dances and games could take place under other auspices. (Many Europeans and Asians I’ve spoken to went to classes each day and then left school to do other things with other people, forgoing the elaborate excess of extracurricular activities that is found at American schools.)”
Hallelujah. End the role of high school as a monolith for teen life.
I also liked the call for more fluid stratification of students:
“ It could mean schools in which age segregation is not so strict, where a twelve-year-old might mentor a seven-year-old and be mentored by a seventeen-year-old; schools in which internships, apprenticeships, and other programs would let older students transition into the adult world before senior year. ”
This all essentially boils down to “freedom.” Meaning also flexibility and choice. For all the expectations piled on high school students they are given very little agency.
> (Many Europeans and Asians I’ve spoken to went to classes each day and then left school to do other things with other people, forgoing the elaborate excess of extracurricular activities that is found at American schools.)
Those extracurricular activities are opt-in activities to be done with other people.
The more kids are surrounded by technology, the more I appreciate structured social activities. Some kids are definitely motivated to get up and out of the house and do things in the real world day after day, but now that everyone is surrounded by endless digital entertainment it's tempting to just stay home and do... nothing.
I have great memories of school-centric extracurricular activities. All of my friends at the activities enjoyed them too. With few exceptions, we weren't forced to be there. We actually enjoyed it and had fun.
I understand that some people had negative high school experiences, but I'm always stunned to read HN comments insisting that everyone must have had a miserable time in high school.
That said, there were a few families who opted out of our high school and decided to home school. The few kids I knew who were forced into home school by their parents were not happy about it. I don't exactly see how forcing everyone out of the high school structure would somehow improve that situation.
> Many Europeans and Asians I’ve spoken to went to classes each day and then left school to do other things with other people, forgoing the elaborate excess of extracurricular activities that is found at American schools.
This doesn't ring true to me. Unless you played sports there was really no reason to hang around after school. Contrast this to many Japanese schools where being part of a school club is more or less expected.
> Many Europeans and Asians I’ve spoken to went to classes each day and then left school to do other things with other people
In China those things would often be cram schools. In Korea that’s even more common, practically universal. If you think the college rat race and obsession with prestige in the US is bad it’s nothing like as bad as in developed East Asia. (Japan may be slightly less awful but still much worse than anywhere in the cultural as opposed to political West.)
One of my fondest memories of my childhood in Germany was trying out all the different sports clubs in my home town during summer break. All the sports clubs organized events where they showed their sport, with the hope of recruiting new members, and there was a "vacation-pass" which listed all these events along with other stuff like free entry to museums and the like. It was a great way to spend the vacations at home, being entertained at very little cost, especially for less affluent families who didn't go on vacation abroad.
voluntary extracurriculars outside school are the privilege of affluent families. extracurriculars at school help kids from less educated background to do choir, theatre, arts and team sports, ...
Whenever a teacher got stuck trying to explain something I always jumped the opportunity to do it for them. Since I just learned the subject myself I understood how one could fail to understand it.
edit: of course there is also something to be said for surrounding yourself with knowledgeable people if one wants to learn something. (as opposed to oblivious teens)
I suppose it depends on whether it is important to build long-lasting relationships in early life. A lot of people I knew ended up back together in their later life despite living hundreds of miles apart for over a decade. I’m not sure there is any better opportunity for this. No other time in life comes even close to the bond permanence of high school.
But school is about creating obedient subjects so that the government can maintain status quo. I don't see them promoting anything that is radically different which has the potential to undermine the thought processes that support out institutions.
This really resonates for me. High school was a colossal waste of time, and a very unhealthy environment, that I think made me a worse person for a time.
I’ve been thinking a lot about how to help my kids skip high school, but I don’t quite know how to do it.
As the author, I don’t think that it should be banned, but I agree that kids should not be forced to attend. If anything, merely removing the mandate might make the experience of those who stay a lot better. For me a lot of the stress came from the hostility and bullying that the kids who did not want to be there inflicted on anyone who dared to show interest in class, ask questions, or, gasp, pass classes.
Has anyone found an alternative path for their kids to avoid high school, and if so how did it go?
I got out of my junior and senior years by taking the GED and going straight to college. I think that benefitted me a lot more than just graduating college a couple years early.
The environment was radically different and freeing. Teachers weren't babysitters. They wanted us to do well, but they weren't going to coddle us. I noticed that immediately, and it really changed how I approached my classes. I didn't have to be there if I didn't want to, so I really invested myself in a way that I don't think would be possible if I were being forced.
In Oregon at least, colleges must consider a GED score over 600 equivalent to a high school diploma. I went to the local college (SOU) for one year to get a solid transcript, then used that to transfer to a state college (U of O). I'm really glad that I did
> As the author, I don’t think that it should be banned, but I agree that kids should not be forced to attend.
Here is the problem: high school is mostly not meant for those of us who wound up on HN.
My father taught English for almost 4 decades in a US rural school district. His comments were:
"I'm not really here for the good students. They'll do fine no matter what I do, so my job for them is to keep them engaged and moving forward. All I have to do is not kill their motivation."
"I'm not really here for the worst students. I can't fix simply not doing the work or reveling in being stupid. I can't do much to fix a student's terrible home life other than providing a sympathetic ear and space for a little while."
"I'm mostly here for the average students. They don't want to be here, would rather be doing anything else and will do as little as possible to skate through. If I can push a few of those to care just a little more and have just a bit of internal motivation, I've done a good job. For the rest, I set the average bar to the point that they have to learn what I want them to to get the grade they need to."
"And I'm really here for a few of the below-average students. This is probably the last chance before they slide into being useless. Most of them have a bit of smarts, or they'd have slipped into the worst category long ago. They probably hang out with the wrong people. They get harassed if they accomplish something. Their home life is deteriorating. If I can reverse any of these, I've done a really good thing."
I had finished standard high school course work by around sixteen, so my parents had me start taking CLEP tests.
At seventeen, in what would have been my senior year of high school, I took a few classes at our local community college.
Basically, even in the strictest states (I grew up in one of them), homeschooling is a good mechanism for opting out of the stupid parts of high school.
We are homeschooling my son and he’s be a senior this next term. It’s gone very well for us, academically and socially and the like, but now we have to make him a transcript for college applications and he followed a job-standard curriculum. We were counting on the SAT scores being an important part of his transcript, we’ll see how changes in that vein work out.
Every year we ask him if he’d like to return to conventional schooling, he’s not tempted at all. His not-school devotions are numerous, so it’s also been rewarding from a family perspective.
I hated school too, and I sympathise with your quest to "save" your kids from it.
At the risk of presumption, I'd advise to be wary of overprojecting though. Different people have very different experiences, and your kids' may not be the same as your experience. Observe and react.
No sure about your state but I’ve known people in Canada who avoided it by doing core subjects via correspondence programs. It freed up time for them to pursue other interests or work. It didn’t seem to be a barrier to them getting into any public universities, but I don’t know how that works in the US where elite education seems to matter a lot more.
A couple of years ago I got an honourable mention in an essay competition on school shootings and in it I discussed how schools are the one place in most people's lives that they have no power to escape. [0]
You can quit a crappy job. You can transfer to a different university. You can ghost your friends. In nearly every social system after high school, there is some measure of self selection. But you have no power to extract yourself from that environment unless your parents are willing to send you to private school or move.
I am not sure there is a need to abolish high school, but rather just provide additional resolutions for those for whom it is a very poor fit and better clamp down on those who want to harm others in the ecosystem. Schools handle edge cases very poorly and they do an even worse job of managing those who wish to do harm.
I imagine this varies significantly from place to place but when I was in high school you could pretty easily switch to other public high schools in the area and there were several charter schools and alternative schools available for students not well served by the public schools. Since this was a fairly rural area in a fairly average state, I have always thought that this type of school choice was fairly common but I could be wrong.
I had a choice of over 20 high schools in my area, some within 5 minutes from my home, some 45 minutes. This upper limit was imposed by my parents, who weren't comfortable having me travelling for longer at that age. I had a shortlist of four, and was able to pre-attend classes at three of them. I ended up choosing one at 35 minutes from my home. I think the classmate with the highest commute time had to travel a little over an hour.
Most years, I think our class had one or two additions that did their previous year (or the same year) at a different school, and I remember two or three classmates changing to another school. I'm not sure how universal your observation is, but then again, I've never lived in the US.
> But you have no power to extract yourself from that environment unless your parents are willing to send you to private school or move.
Most states in the US allow students to drop out of high school without parental consent at the age of 16.
It's also not uncommon for parents to home school their children through high school.
The alternatives exist. People do choose the alternatives. They're just not as glamorous as they sound once you consider the consequences. I recall the home schooled kids I knew to be deeply unhappy about being separated from the structure and social circles that the rest of us enjoyed.
I've wondered about how well something like this would work:
1. Schools open early and accept students as early as they do now, but classes start around noon and extend to 4-6 PM. Students are not required to arrive early; the school opens early to provide a safe place and schedule flexibility for parents and buses.
2. Breakfast and lunch are offered to ensure food security.
3. Every student has 5+ hours of 1:1 or small group tutoring weekly. This is where the bulk of educator funding would likely end up.
4. Open format "study hall" periods with staff available to assist.
5. No homework; personal exercises are handled in study hall.
6. For any lecture format material, provide high quality centrally produced media. On premise educators focus most of their time on interaction and adapting to where the students are.
7. Much less age stratification; progress through class content would be heavily individualized by the 1:1 and small group interaction.
8. Unprison the experience- you can go to the bathroom or eat a snack, or even leave.
This reuses of all existing infrastructure, reorganizes educator hours into what is (as far as I know) a more effective structure, reduces required student time, and seems like this should fit in the current budgets (which are around the $12000/year/pupil averaged over the US).
And, critically, this doesn't force teenagers with delayed circadian rhythms to wake up at 5:45 AM to catch the bus. I'm pretty sure if you changed nothing else and just had high school run from noon to 4PM, you'd have a transformative improvement in outcomes even though the total number of hours would be significantly reduced.
You vastly underestimate how much money it would take to do (3) alone, let alone anything else on here. Your assumption around the usage of educator hours is incorrect. I suppose it's worth seeing how you believe educator hours are currently used?
Finland is currently in the process of trying something similar. The main criticism has been that it puts too much pressure on people too early. It works for some people but there are plenty of those who simply won't assign any homework to themselves or do any of the exercises. It's easy to get into the HN bubble and think almost everyone has above-average smarts and would've benefited from more, not less freedom in their formative years. But the fact is that huge swaths of population only go to school and do their school work because they have to.
The approach has also been criticized for exacerbating the already-poor performance of boys in educational results, and I assume the same approach in the US would exacerbate the educational gap between racial groups.
This probably would work as a one off. It would be very hard to do at school with >1000 students.
Also... beware of first principles, back-of-envelope calculations. They can be useful if you are creating something from the ground up, less so for reform.
I've had to change school a few times due to bullying. Thus my experience was the opposite: the worst bullying I endured was when I was between 9 and 12 years old. High school was mostly fine, and most of the people that I met were fine, although I had to deal with a bit of homophobia.
It's impressive how adults reject the fault of bullying on the victim. I had to not react, to learn to ignore the bullies, as if they were some hurricane and had no control over their own actions.
Compared to this, university was a breath of fresh air. I could mostly choose to not go to class, the site was completely open to the exterior, teachers were ready to help people in need and left alone people that wanted to be left alone.
I've preferred talking to older people most of my life, so I find the idea of the author of multi-generational groups appealing. Maybe don't remove high school, but at least leave the option for people that don't work like most other people that seem to enjoy high school. Also, have zero tolerance for bullying. When the thing you learn in school is that there's no justice and you can't count on people supposed to protect you, it's a bit hard to be mentally healthy after.
Yeah, it's interesting that the author DIDN'T go to high school, but talks about how bad bullying is in high school.
I was fortunate to not really be bullied much ever, but my anecdata from myself and asking friends is that bullying was MUCH worse in Middle School.
From some Googling, I couldn't find any studies, but everything I saw seemed to say the same.
My only major bullying was by a kid who got bullied a lot - randomly just kicked me down a flight of stairs one day. I'm not sure if that even counts as bullying, and it's hard to blame him too much as a major victim of bullying himself...
But getting kicked down a flight of stairs sucks! I don't recommend it.
It really is interesting how bullying as a thing seems much less prominent in College. You still have things like hazing in frats and such but the frats are optional, of course. It's easier to dismiss it as a maturity thing but it might have a little to do with how kids are crammed into the same spaces with the same people, good and toxic while in college somehow it seems less so.
yeah, middle school sucks way more. It wasn't that bad for me, but looking back some people were just treated awfully by everyone.
Bullying can really mess with your head at that age, people with self-esteem issues are really badly affected by it, and I've seen those effects last well into high school too.
Growing up in Minnesota in the late 1990s, we had Post-Secondary Enrollment Option (PSEO), where public high school students could go part or fill-time to college or university in-state for their jr. and/or sr. year of high school. As long as the college or university accepted the high school student, the student would get both college and high school credit for the courses. The course balance needed to meet high school requirements (English, History, Math, etc.), and the state wouldn't pay for more than a full-time course load. As I remember, at that time running a high school actually cost more per student than either public or private full-time tuition, so the school district actually saved money.
As I remember, some of my friends went to private institutions (Carlton and University of St. Thomas, IIRC).
I went to the University of Minnesota my sr. year of high school. I wish I also would have gone my jr. year. One of my buddies was also going to a local community college full-time while HS-aged through PSEA, and I remember one day that there was a snow storm and both of us only had 9 a.m. classes. I swung by his school right after my class ended, and we went skiing for the rest of the day while many of our friends were stuck in high school. Schedule flexibility was really nice.
My younger cousin attended a small, alternative, mixed age high school. It seemed quite pleasant. Students interacted with teachers like they would with parents' friends. They'd make themselves a cuppa and chat like regular people during breaks. The social dynamic of mixed age groups was notably unschoolish too. I had hated school, so I was quite impressed.
I'm inclined to think that a lot what we think of as how schools are, socially is a product of age segregation. Narcissism of Small Differences comes to mind.
That said, I don't think there is a single solution for all. The reality is that a lot of kids have a very rough time at schools for a lot of reasons, and we consistently underestimate how bad that can be.
Another point stood out to me here: "High school is often considered a definitive American experience...."
Besides high school, this could be college relationships, marriage, motherhood, sex life, career, etc. Our idealisations often seem to oppress us. When life doesn't live up to 90210, or Hackers and Painters, or Sex in The City... its an unbearable failure.
IDK what the solutions are. Ideals are inspiring as well as oppressive. I think with "psychology" broadly, it isn't always necessary to deal with every problem head on. Healthier relationships, decrease the risk of drug addiction, for example. We need healthier schools, broadly.
I think having alternatives to high school is good.
That said, I’ve experienced what happens when high schoolers infiltrate the community colleges - it feels like high school all over again. A bit better, sure. But the level of immaturity and the disruptions are very similar. God help you if you get a group project with 15 year olds.
Ultimately, there are many people at a young age who have no interests in being a part of the type of society that has been around for the last 30-40 years. And they are a sizable portion of youths. Nihilism (in many forms...) is strong at that age and so is the lack of interest in hard work. Ultimately, what do you do for those kids for them to be happy? UBI would really be the only thing... That’s the only way you could get these counter-culture kids who are more focused on disruption out.
Also, most kids who are problematic in school tend to have problematic parents. Trickles down real well that stuff.
The older I get, the more I realise "high school" wasn't really the problem at all. High school, like any other government institution, is ultimately a reflection of the values of the people who run them. And in some places - those values aren't necessarily the best.
I grew up in a poor country with a lot of problems, however it gave me an extremely decent education up to the high school. My parents wouldn't have been able to do it alone.
So no, for me and my peers abolishing the high school wouldn't have been an option.
I went into high school as a curious kid who loved reading and enjoyed opportunities to be creative. I left high school as a nervous wreck who was terrified to apply myself in any academic situation because I'd been mocked so much - by teachers and students alike - for various failures.
It took me eight years to break out of that mindset, but I'm now doing well. In fact, my job makes heavy use of the subject that I was most afraid of due to my high school experience: mathematics. The process of becoming confident in mathematical problem solving and working through my considerable personal mental hangups was a dreadful experience. Many or even most people do not break out from the hang-ups they learn during high school, especially with mathematics.
EI have nothing but animosity for the high school system and would welcome any change that makes it less prominent in the lives of teens and young adults. I'd say that a college module system like that which the OP describes is a vastly superior alternative. I think that intellectual life and social life should be separated as much as possible, which I believe is for the most part the default setting in most universities.
I don’t agree with everything in the article but I really liked the age segregation point. It’s incredible how much we drill into people’s heads that students need to be the same age. Why? We’ve all known 9th graders more mature, whether academically or personally, than 12th graders. And there’s so many students shunted off to college way before they’re ready out of fear of “falling behind”. I’ve taken two gap years at this point, one after high school and one this past year due to covid. So yes, I’ve “fallen behind” my classmates. I’ve also gotten work experience, significantly improved my mental health and traveled. And oh no, I’m so late for what? Joining the workforce? Who cares? I’m probably gonna be working for 40 years. Two years isn't going to make a difference.
In Norway you get to choose your high school after middle school, all the pupils in a region is ranked solely based on their grades from middle school and for the ones who are sick of books they can go to a more trade-oriented high school (training to become a mechanic, electrician, etc). Obviously it is not perfect and in the district the choices can be quite limited, but it definitely prevents the stereotypical American high school.
Taking my school as an example it was pretty much filled with nerds, many being active in politics, math competitions, etc. I remember very well it being the first time no-one in the class wanted to do football in PE.
Some people criticize it for being worse for the students who don't do well in middle school and end up with very little choices and also separating stronger students. But for the stronger students it so nice with everybody being at least somewhat interested in learning and the teachers being very relaxed.
I recently found out about Summit Public Schools. By the sounds of it, this model aims to provide students with more autonomy than they would in a normal school. There is an emphasis on self-directed learning and teachers act more as mentors than lecturers. If your metric to measure success is admission to unviersity, it works! They claim 98% of their students are accepted onto 4-year courses and have twice the graduation rate relative to the US average. [1] Even if that isn't your metric for success (there are good reasons why it shouldn't be) it at least demonstrates ability.
Perhaps this is a good bridge between school and homeschooling as we know it. I'm sure you can tell from reading this that I only have surface-level understanding, so I'd be interested to hear from anybody who knows more about these schools or other schools that do similar things. Or indeed anybody who wants to shake up education/has some good ideas!
I have previously read up on that and her original exemplar story and I don't think she was as insightful about herself and her own role in that moment as she was about the guy mansplaining to her, but still, she definitely had her finger on the pulse of a cultural phenomenon.
High school seems like a highly personalized experience. Reading most of these comments, one would expect that high school is a form of punishment. For me, and most people I know however, high school was a deeply positive experience. I don't know how/if schooling needs to be fixed, but one thing that strikes me is the range in experiences.
I guess one part of it is that people who have had an overall good experience (or even a mediocre one) are less likely to talk about it. I wonder what percentage of people truly hated high school.
I have been saying since I was in high school in the late-90s/early-2000s that there’s isn’t enough being said and done about actually figuring out what about modern high school incites so much violence, and not just the deadly kind. All the energy goes into locking kids down more, controlling their lives, and doesn’t actually cure the disease.
In my fifteen years of office work, the worst I have encountered is a single shouting match between a developer and his boss. The developer started it, and ended up finding a new job within the week. Contrast that with my four years of high school where I was physically assaulted at least twice, and encountered fights almost weekly.
I didn’t have the luxury of consensual association with that institution. I couldn’t just leave if things took a turn. I think imposing so much inescapable structure can cause certain types of kids to lash-out like a trapped animal, because in an entirely literal sense they are. I certainly felt very trapped myself in a very real sense.
Having talked with teachers and administrators about this, they can’t seem to fathom what I am saying. I think it comes down to educational work having a self selection for people who thrive in such a structured environment. Many of them having never experienced anything else, going straight from college into teaching.
I went to a school with no letter grades, and skipped a year. Our school used to copy the nyt crossword puzzle, and it was considered ok to work on it in lieu of paying attention. Some teachers would simply tell me not to bother showing up, and I managed to get credit for a number of classes without going by simply convincing my teachers that I'd read the book and understood the material.
For autodidactic people such as the myself and presumably the author, this was great. Many of my classmates required more structured experiences, and I don't think this model works for most people. Abolishing high school is nice for the people who read hacker news, but probably wouldn't work for the vast majority of students
This is a poorly researched article. I won't bother critiquing every part, but I'll get to the meat:
> Abolishing high school could mean many things. It could mean compressing the time teenagers have to sort out their hierarchies and pillory outsiders, by turning schools into minimalist places in which people only study and learn.
This is impossible to begin with. Any institution that has more than a single individual will naturally result in stratification and hierarchies. Any student who doesn't want to go to high school can already do so by opting into home schooling if their parents agree and support that (and can provide resources).
Furthermore, how exactly would you only "study and learn?" the author hardly gives proper examples of any of their ambitious ideas.
> All the elaborate rites of dances and games could take place under other auspices. (Many Europeans and Asians I’ve spoken to went to classes each day and then left school to do other things with other people, forgoing the elaborate excess of extracurricular activities that is found at American schools.)
The article handwaves how exactly you would replace all of the non academic portions of high school by vaguely mentioning anecdotes.
> It could mean schools in which age segregation is not so strict, where a twelve-year-old might mentor a seven-year-old and be mentored by a seventeen-year-old; schools in which internships, apprenticeships, and other programs would let older students transition into the adult world before senior year. (Again, there are plenty of precedents from around the world.)
The author doesn't bother to even explain why this would be beneficial, and what the potential downsides could be. Though I am personally a supporter of mixed-age classrooms, some research has shown it's not good (https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.3102/003465430660033...).
Interestingly many people who have poor social skills wish to avoid people, but in reality that just delays the inevitable poor encounters you will have with others. What's better is to teach people to have good social skills. It's a shame that schools don't explicitly do this. The author also seems to conveniently ignore the extreme differences between people during high school age.
Per the authors own definition high school has already been "abolished" as all of the things they speak of are already possible.
I was an undiagnosed autistic growing up and I begged my parents to homeschool me. Thankfully my two best friends were already doing so and we were in a liberal area where we could make this happen and my parents (less so my dad) were reasonably open to it. His main objection, "You'll never get into college" was put to rest when I found data showing that being a homeschooler puts you in a smaller pool than "Random highschool grad" and college admissions people are smart enough to keep an eye out for home schoolers, so in all my chances actually went up. I don't have my GED but I do have a BA which broke German bureaucracy when I went over there to continue studies.
Anyway grade school was tough enough for me and I very much believe that I would have ended up hospitalized or suicidal/dead had I gone through highschool. Giving options to children who are non neurotypical (I don't envy ADHD kids) and suffer from behavioral issues is crucial. A lot of people without these problems have very serious psychological scarring from high school so put a kid suffering more challenges in the mix and it becomes clear what you're dealing with.
I was able to study what I wanted, at the level that was appropriate for me, on my own time. I ended up taking a number of distance learning classes as well as community college classes and got college credits for them. I was really held back in middle school with this. A lot of people ask "weren't you lonely" but I didn't have anything in common with most other kids and the school environment was toxic and overstimulating to me. I hate that people's knee jerk reaction is "You must have been soo lonely" and it really shows you the truth about high school honestly..it's NOT about learning..it's almost some hazing ritual that people are stockholm syndrome'd into.
I don't have the link now but I saw some surveys and it's something like 99% of home schooled students wouldn't take it back for the world.
[+] [-] mapgrep|4 years ago|reply
“ It could mean compressing the time teenagers have to sort out their hierarchies and pillory outsiders, by turning schools into minimalist places in which people only study and learn. All the elaborate rites of dances and games could take place under other auspices. (Many Europeans and Asians I’ve spoken to went to classes each day and then left school to do other things with other people, forgoing the elaborate excess of extracurricular activities that is found at American schools.)”
Hallelujah. End the role of high school as a monolith for teen life.
I also liked the call for more fluid stratification of students:
“ It could mean schools in which age segregation is not so strict, where a twelve-year-old might mentor a seven-year-old and be mentored by a seventeen-year-old; schools in which internships, apprenticeships, and other programs would let older students transition into the adult world before senior year. ”
This all essentially boils down to “freedom.” Meaning also flexibility and choice. For all the expectations piled on high school students they are given very little agency.
[+] [-] PragmaticPulp|4 years ago|reply
Those extracurricular activities are opt-in activities to be done with other people.
The more kids are surrounded by technology, the more I appreciate structured social activities. Some kids are definitely motivated to get up and out of the house and do things in the real world day after day, but now that everyone is surrounded by endless digital entertainment it's tempting to just stay home and do... nothing.
I have great memories of school-centric extracurricular activities. All of my friends at the activities enjoyed them too. With few exceptions, we weren't forced to be there. We actually enjoyed it and had fun.
I understand that some people had negative high school experiences, but I'm always stunned to read HN comments insisting that everyone must have had a miserable time in high school.
That said, there were a few families who opted out of our high school and decided to home school. The few kids I knew who were forced into home school by their parents were not happy about it. I don't exactly see how forcing everyone out of the high school structure would somehow improve that situation.
[+] [-] ng12|4 years ago|reply
This doesn't ring true to me. Unless you played sports there was really no reason to hang around after school. Contrast this to many Japanese schools where being part of a school club is more or less expected.
[+] [-] barry-cotter|4 years ago|reply
In China those things would often be cram schools. In Korea that’s even more common, practically universal. If you think the college rat race and obsession with prestige in the US is bad it’s nothing like as bad as in developed East Asia. (Japan may be slightly less awful but still much worse than anywhere in the cultural as opposed to political West.)
[+] [-] phreeza|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] froh|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 6510|4 years ago|reply
edit: of course there is also something to be said for surrounding yourself with knowledgeable people if one wants to learn something. (as opposed to oblivious teens)
[+] [-] jl2718|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] giantg2|4 years ago|reply
But school is about creating obedient subjects so that the government can maintain status quo. I don't see them promoting anything that is radically different which has the potential to undermine the thought processes that support out institutions.
[+] [-] hyperpallium2|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] burlesona|4 years ago|reply
I’ve been thinking a lot about how to help my kids skip high school, but I don’t quite know how to do it.
As the author, I don’t think that it should be banned, but I agree that kids should not be forced to attend. If anything, merely removing the mandate might make the experience of those who stay a lot better. For me a lot of the stress came from the hostility and bullying that the kids who did not want to be there inflicted on anyone who dared to show interest in class, ask questions, or, gasp, pass classes.
Has anyone found an alternative path for their kids to avoid high school, and if so how did it go?
[+] [-] mind-blight|4 years ago|reply
The environment was radically different and freeing. Teachers weren't babysitters. They wanted us to do well, but they weren't going to coddle us. I noticed that immediately, and it really changed how I approached my classes. I didn't have to be there if I didn't want to, so I really invested myself in a way that I don't think would be possible if I were being forced.
In Oregon at least, colleges must consider a GED score over 600 equivalent to a high school diploma. I went to the local college (SOU) for one year to get a solid transcript, then used that to transfer to a state college (U of O). I'm really glad that I did
[+] [-] bsder|4 years ago|reply
Here is the problem: high school is mostly not meant for those of us who wound up on HN.
My father taught English for almost 4 decades in a US rural school district. His comments were:
"I'm not really here for the good students. They'll do fine no matter what I do, so my job for them is to keep them engaged and moving forward. All I have to do is not kill their motivation."
"I'm not really here for the worst students. I can't fix simply not doing the work or reveling in being stupid. I can't do much to fix a student's terrible home life other than providing a sympathetic ear and space for a little while."
"I'm mostly here for the average students. They don't want to be here, would rather be doing anything else and will do as little as possible to skate through. If I can push a few of those to care just a little more and have just a bit of internal motivation, I've done a good job. For the rest, I set the average bar to the point that they have to learn what I want them to to get the grade they need to."
"And I'm really here for a few of the below-average students. This is probably the last chance before they slide into being useless. Most of them have a bit of smarts, or they'd have slipped into the worst category long ago. They probably hang out with the wrong people. They get harassed if they accomplish something. Their home life is deteriorating. If I can reverse any of these, I've done a really good thing."
"In the meantime, I teach English."
[+] [-] NateEag|4 years ago|reply
I had finished standard high school course work by around sixteen, so my parents had me start taking CLEP tests.
At seventeen, in what would have been my senior year of high school, I took a few classes at our local community college.
Basically, even in the strictest states (I grew up in one of them), homeschooling is a good mechanism for opting out of the stupid parts of high school.
[+] [-] browningstreet|4 years ago|reply
Every year we ask him if he’d like to return to conventional schooling, he’s not tempted at all. His not-school devotions are numerous, so it’s also been rewarding from a family perspective.
[+] [-] dalbasal|4 years ago|reply
At the risk of presumption, I'd advise to be wary of overprojecting though. Different people have very different experiences, and your kids' may not be the same as your experience. Observe and react.
[+] [-] krrrh|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] MattGaiser|4 years ago|reply
You can quit a crappy job. You can transfer to a different university. You can ghost your friends. In nearly every social system after high school, there is some measure of self selection. But you have no power to extract yourself from that environment unless your parents are willing to send you to private school or move.
I am not sure there is a need to abolish high school, but rather just provide additional resolutions for those for whom it is a very poor fit and better clamp down on those who want to harm others in the ecosystem. Schools handle edge cases very poorly and they do an even worse job of managing those who wish to do harm.
[0] http://www.psychological-observations.com/918-jmh-internatio...
[+] [-] mulderc|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tremon|4 years ago|reply
Most years, I think our class had one or two additions that did their previous year (or the same year) at a different school, and I remember two or three classmates changing to another school. I'm not sure how universal your observation is, but then again, I've never lived in the US.
[+] [-] PragmaticPulp|4 years ago|reply
Most states in the US allow students to drop out of high school without parental consent at the age of 16.
It's also not uncommon for parents to home school their children through high school.
The alternatives exist. People do choose the alternatives. They're just not as glamorous as they sound once you consider the consequences. I recall the home schooled kids I knew to be deeply unhappy about being separated from the structure and social circles that the rest of us enjoyed.
[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] rossnordby|4 years ago|reply
1. Schools open early and accept students as early as they do now, but classes start around noon and extend to 4-6 PM. Students are not required to arrive early; the school opens early to provide a safe place and schedule flexibility for parents and buses.
2. Breakfast and lunch are offered to ensure food security.
3. Every student has 5+ hours of 1:1 or small group tutoring weekly. This is where the bulk of educator funding would likely end up.
4. Open format "study hall" periods with staff available to assist.
5. No homework; personal exercises are handled in study hall.
6. For any lecture format material, provide high quality centrally produced media. On premise educators focus most of their time on interaction and adapting to where the students are.
7. Much less age stratification; progress through class content would be heavily individualized by the 1:1 and small group interaction.
8. Unprison the experience- you can go to the bathroom or eat a snack, or even leave.
This reuses of all existing infrastructure, reorganizes educator hours into what is (as far as I know) a more effective structure, reduces required student time, and seems like this should fit in the current budgets (which are around the $12000/year/pupil averaged over the US).
And, critically, this doesn't force teenagers with delayed circadian rhythms to wake up at 5:45 AM to catch the bus. I'm pretty sure if you changed nothing else and just had high school run from noon to 4PM, you'd have a transformative improvement in outcomes even though the total number of hours would be significantly reduced.
[+] [-] endisneigh|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tziki|4 years ago|reply
The approach has also been criticized for exacerbating the already-poor performance of boys in educational results, and I assume the same approach in the US would exacerbate the educational gap between racial groups.
[+] [-] dalbasal|4 years ago|reply
Also... beware of first principles, back-of-envelope calculations. They can be useful if you are creating something from the ground up, less so for reform.
[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] Zababa|4 years ago|reply
You'll have a hard time finding staff without the promise that you can humiliate younger people /s
[+] [-] Zababa|4 years ago|reply
It's impressive how adults reject the fault of bullying on the victim. I had to not react, to learn to ignore the bullies, as if they were some hurricane and had no control over their own actions.
Compared to this, university was a breath of fresh air. I could mostly choose to not go to class, the site was completely open to the exterior, teachers were ready to help people in need and left alone people that wanted to be left alone.
I've preferred talking to older people most of my life, so I find the idea of the author of multi-generational groups appealing. Maybe don't remove high school, but at least leave the option for people that don't work like most other people that seem to enjoy high school. Also, have zero tolerance for bullying. When the thing you learn in school is that there's no justice and you can't count on people supposed to protect you, it's a bit hard to be mentally healthy after.
[+] [-] onlyrealcuzzo|4 years ago|reply
I was fortunate to not really be bullied much ever, but my anecdata from myself and asking friends is that bullying was MUCH worse in Middle School.
From some Googling, I couldn't find any studies, but everything I saw seemed to say the same.
My only major bullying was by a kid who got bullied a lot - randomly just kicked me down a flight of stairs one day. I'm not sure if that even counts as bullying, and it's hard to blame him too much as a major victim of bullying himself...
But getting kicked down a flight of stairs sucks! I don't recommend it.
[+] [-] noobermin|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kart23|4 years ago|reply
Bullying can really mess with your head at that age, people with self-esteem issues are really badly affected by it, and I've seen those effects last well into high school too.
[+] [-] KMag|4 years ago|reply
As I remember, some of my friends went to private institutions (Carlton and University of St. Thomas, IIRC).
I went to the University of Minnesota my sr. year of high school. I wish I also would have gone my jr. year. One of my buddies was also going to a local community college full-time while HS-aged through PSEA, and I remember one day that there was a snow storm and both of us only had 9 a.m. classes. I swung by his school right after my class ended, and we went skiing for the rest of the day while many of our friends were stuck in high school. Schedule flexibility was really nice.
[+] [-] dalbasal|4 years ago|reply
I'm inclined to think that a lot what we think of as how schools are, socially is a product of age segregation. Narcissism of Small Differences comes to mind.
That said, I don't think there is a single solution for all. The reality is that a lot of kids have a very rough time at schools for a lot of reasons, and we consistently underestimate how bad that can be.
Another point stood out to me here: "High school is often considered a definitive American experience...."
Besides high school, this could be college relationships, marriage, motherhood, sex life, career, etc. Our idealisations often seem to oppress us. When life doesn't live up to 90210, or Hackers and Painters, or Sex in The City... its an unbearable failure.
IDK what the solutions are. Ideals are inspiring as well as oppressive. I think with "psychology" broadly, it isn't always necessary to deal with every problem head on. Healthier relationships, decrease the risk of drug addiction, for example. We need healthier schools, broadly.
[+] [-] JJMcJ|4 years ago|reply
Not always in a positive way, it should be emphasized.
[+] [-] bradlys|4 years ago|reply
That said, I’ve experienced what happens when high schoolers infiltrate the community colleges - it feels like high school all over again. A bit better, sure. But the level of immaturity and the disruptions are very similar. God help you if you get a group project with 15 year olds.
Ultimately, there are many people at a young age who have no interests in being a part of the type of society that has been around for the last 30-40 years. And they are a sizable portion of youths. Nihilism (in many forms...) is strong at that age and so is the lack of interest in hard work. Ultimately, what do you do for those kids for them to be happy? UBI would really be the only thing... That’s the only way you could get these counter-culture kids who are more focused on disruption out.
Also, most kids who are problematic in school tend to have problematic parents. Trickles down real well that stuff.
[+] [-] ashleyn|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] notdang|4 years ago|reply
So no, for me and my peers abolishing the high school wouldn't have been an option.
[+] [-] akuro|4 years ago|reply
It took me eight years to break out of that mindset, but I'm now doing well. In fact, my job makes heavy use of the subject that I was most afraid of due to my high school experience: mathematics. The process of becoming confident in mathematical problem solving and working through my considerable personal mental hangups was a dreadful experience. Many or even most people do not break out from the hang-ups they learn during high school, especially with mathematics.
EI have nothing but animosity for the high school system and would welcome any change that makes it less prominent in the lives of teens and young adults. I'd say that a college module system like that which the OP describes is a vastly superior alternative. I think that intellectual life and social life should be separated as much as possible, which I believe is for the most part the default setting in most universities.
[+] [-] hardwaregeek|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] birktj|4 years ago|reply
Taking my school as an example it was pretty much filled with nerds, many being active in politics, math competitions, etc. I remember very well it being the first time no-one in the class wanted to do football in PE.
Some people criticize it for being worse for the students who don't do well in middle school and end up with very little choices and also separating stronger students. But for the stronger students it so nice with everybody being at least somewhat interested in learning and the teachers being very relaxed.
[+] [-] BlackVanilla|4 years ago|reply
Perhaps this is a good bridge between school and homeschooling as we know it. I'm sure you can tell from reading this that I only have surface-level understanding, so I'd be interested to hear from anybody who knows more about these schools or other schools that do similar things. Or indeed anybody who wants to shake up education/has some good ideas!
You can read more here: https://summitps.org/
[1] https://summitps.org/the-summit-model/our-results/
[+] [-] fsckboy|4 years ago|reply
I have previously read up on that and her original exemplar story and I don't think she was as insightful about herself and her own role in that moment as she was about the guy mansplaining to her, but still, she definitely had her finger on the pulse of a cultural phenomenon.
[+] [-] HDMI_Cable|4 years ago|reply
I guess one part of it is that people who have had an overall good experience (or even a mediocre one) are less likely to talk about it. I wonder what percentage of people truly hated high school.
[+] [-] donatj|4 years ago|reply
In my fifteen years of office work, the worst I have encountered is a single shouting match between a developer and his boss. The developer started it, and ended up finding a new job within the week. Contrast that with my four years of high school where I was physically assaulted at least twice, and encountered fights almost weekly.
I didn’t have the luxury of consensual association with that institution. I couldn’t just leave if things took a turn. I think imposing so much inescapable structure can cause certain types of kids to lash-out like a trapped animal, because in an entirely literal sense they are. I certainly felt very trapped myself in a very real sense.
Having talked with teachers and administrators about this, they can’t seem to fathom what I am saying. I think it comes down to educational work having a self selection for people who thrive in such a structured environment. Many of them having never experienced anything else, going straight from college into teaching.
[+] [-] gbronner|4 years ago|reply
For autodidactic people such as the myself and presumably the author, this was great. Many of my classmates required more structured experiences, and I don't think this model works for most people. Abolishing high school is nice for the people who read hacker news, but probably wouldn't work for the vast majority of students
[+] [-] endisneigh|4 years ago|reply
> Abolishing high school could mean many things. It could mean compressing the time teenagers have to sort out their hierarchies and pillory outsiders, by turning schools into minimalist places in which people only study and learn.
This is impossible to begin with. Any institution that has more than a single individual will naturally result in stratification and hierarchies. Any student who doesn't want to go to high school can already do so by opting into home schooling if their parents agree and support that (and can provide resources).
Furthermore, how exactly would you only "study and learn?" the author hardly gives proper examples of any of their ambitious ideas.
> All the elaborate rites of dances and games could take place under other auspices. (Many Europeans and Asians I’ve spoken to went to classes each day and then left school to do other things with other people, forgoing the elaborate excess of extracurricular activities that is found at American schools.)
The article handwaves how exactly you would replace all of the non academic portions of high school by vaguely mentioning anecdotes.
> It could mean schools in which age segregation is not so strict, where a twelve-year-old might mentor a seven-year-old and be mentored by a seventeen-year-old; schools in which internships, apprenticeships, and other programs would let older students transition into the adult world before senior year. (Again, there are plenty of precedents from around the world.)
The author doesn't bother to even explain why this would be beneficial, and what the potential downsides could be. Though I am personally a supporter of mixed-age classrooms, some research has shown it's not good (https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.3102/003465430660033...).
Interestingly many people who have poor social skills wish to avoid people, but in reality that just delays the inevitable poor encounters you will have with others. What's better is to teach people to have good social skills. It's a shame that schools don't explicitly do this. The author also seems to conveniently ignore the extreme differences between people during high school age.
Per the authors own definition high school has already been "abolished" as all of the things they speak of are already possible.
[+] [-] mixmastamyk|4 years ago|reply
I personally learned a lot in high school, though I took the harder AP classes.
[+] [-] cupcake-unicorn|4 years ago|reply
Anyway grade school was tough enough for me and I very much believe that I would have ended up hospitalized or suicidal/dead had I gone through highschool. Giving options to children who are non neurotypical (I don't envy ADHD kids) and suffer from behavioral issues is crucial. A lot of people without these problems have very serious psychological scarring from high school so put a kid suffering more challenges in the mix and it becomes clear what you're dealing with.
I was able to study what I wanted, at the level that was appropriate for me, on my own time. I ended up taking a number of distance learning classes as well as community college classes and got college credits for them. I was really held back in middle school with this. A lot of people ask "weren't you lonely" but I didn't have anything in common with most other kids and the school environment was toxic and overstimulating to me. I hate that people's knee jerk reaction is "You must have been soo lonely" and it really shows you the truth about high school honestly..it's NOT about learning..it's almost some hazing ritual that people are stockholm syndrome'd into.
I don't have the link now but I saw some surveys and it's something like 99% of home schooled students wouldn't take it back for the world.