This is the way. Teach kids more, not less. Ask more of them, not less. If you need to lengthen the school day and school year to do so, do it. Do it now.
"So what should we do instead? Dallas came up with an answer: Teach kids more math instead of teaching them less. In 2019, Dallas Independent School District implemented a new equity policy that encouraged many more people to take honors math classes:
Many capable Hispanic, Black and English learner students did not elect to join these classes on their own or were passed over by their instructors. And their parents were often unaware they could make the request.
Dallas ISD, which serves some 142,000 children, took note of the disparity and in 2017 formed a racial equity advisory council — some of whose members had children in the district — with the goal of improving opportunity for all…It decided to move from an opt-in model to an opt-out policy in the 2019-20 school year. Since then…students cannot opt out [of advances classes] without written parent permission. The move has dramatically increased participation among traditionally marginalized children."
I'm chatting with some friends who are parents in the Bay Area. Their admittedly very Californian response is that at least this should reduce competition for college spots. (Their kids are obviously going to get tutoring.)
Lengthen the school _year_ sure, but I'm skeptical that lengthening the school _day_ won't have, at best, mixed effects, especially given all the studies on sleep etc.
> The move has dramatically increased participation among traditionally marginalized children
This program may or may not be a fantastic idea, but "participation" is about the worst possible metric for measuring the overall impact of a mandatory program.
Are these children having better overall life and educational outcomes from this? Are they taking time and energy away from classes they want to pursue to struggle in math courses they might not be truly passionate about?
And what about its impact on the non-marginalized kids? Because "everybody" is now participating, are honors courses now slowed and dumbed down so actual high-achievers will be less prepared for their future?
It's an odd combination of teaching kids too much in elementary school and too little in high. The children are exposed to a far more comprehensive curriculum at the expense of never practicing the skills enough to master them. As soon as summer resets their brains, they suddenly have large gaps in knowledge that slow next year's learning.
I'm fine with expecting more, but for those kids who just don't handle it well, it's not right to make them pariahs, just take the math down a notch. I saw kids treated as “less than” because they weren't making it in a certain level of math, and that always pissed me off. Likewise, I even had to report a calculus teacher once anonymously, I recorded the class with a mini-cassette (in the late 90s) recorder and slid it under the principal's door with a note. No the kid wasn't me, but he was a decent guy who I knew a little bit and knew he was trying hard but just couldn't get it.
STEM minded folks need to eat their own dog food; your sensibilities are not divine mandate.
The other billions don’t owe deference to scientists any more than they do priests.
No scientist is a divine being. Their attitudes can be very human; they think their knowledge and skills is irreplaceable and the social system while trying to pretend that’s objective and could never be leveraged in typically corrupt human ways given their very human being.
In the end you’re one of billions bleating for others to follow the path you lay out. Where is the real or imagine social obligation to specifically serve you or any of the rest of the people here who make up a tiny fraction of the species?
Others think you should learn to grow your own food and kill your steaks rather than exploit the labor of others.
The free market of ideas is not just for selling widgets but tent pole social movements.
A common phrase of the "soft bigotry of low expectations" is at work here. Those held to lower standards will fall to lower standards, deprived of the resources and support to achieve. The article attached provides a fantastic explanation.
- Most people don't need to learn calculus at all, and it's fine if the few weird students who do start when they get to college (maybe the advanced students can learn single-variable calculus in high school).
- For pure signaling reasons, taking calculus in high school has become very important for college admissions.
- In order to take calculus in high school, you need to at least take algebra I (and hopefully geometry) in middle school. Wealthier parents understand they are playing the college admissions game early on, so they make sure in elementary school that their kids will be able to get on the algebra track in middle school.
- Getting on the algebra track is thus the first really consequential part of the college admissions game, it happens much earlier than the rest, and takes real scheming by parents to make sure their young kids are prepared. [actually true]
- If you could just make this impossible, it will even the playing field in a huge way and knock down one of the biggest hurdles in college admissions for people from lower-SES backgrounds. [also probably true]
- The only downside is that students will no longer have time to cover calculus in high school, which doesn't matter anyway because it's only a small number of unusual people who need to learn calculus (very advanced math!), and they can just learn it in college.
This is my best guess about the line of thinking that motivates these "no advanced math" policies. It has elements of truth to it which are worth paying attention to. The problem is just that actually, it's really useful and important to learn calculus in high school, and more people need this opportunity.
edit: I thought it was clear that I think a lot more high school students should be learning calculus as early as possible, and that "no advanced math" is a terrible policy, but I guess not...
When the means to achieve equality is to handicap the strong, we're going the wrong way.
It would be more expensive and harder to try instead to invest in and help those with additional needs. But nobody is interested in spending more to help others.
This seems such an obvious thing to me, and I'm not even in the field of Education. I agree with everything the writer wrote and found myself nodding repeatedly, thinking, it's obvious.
So why can't our so-called professionals see this too? Taking away learning opportunities from kids does them no good!
I remember once when I was in 9th grade and my elder brother was a sophomore in college. I found a textbook of his titled "Matrices and Determinants" (or something to that effect), for one of his courses. I picked it up and started reading it. After a few pages I had some questions, asked my dad. He didn't blink and just helped me out. Soon I had finished a couple of chapters and had learned more about matrices, determinants, etc. than I would ever learn in High School. Nobody told me not to read it; they just helped me along whenever I needed the help.
I can't even imagine how toxic this discouragement would be to a curious mind!
The effect is even greater on younger students. My kid went into elementary school loving math and wanting to learn more. They refused to accelerate or even test her to see what she knew. She had to do endless busywork and sit through lessons on topics she'd mastered years earlier. She learned no math for years on end. The only lesson she learned is that "school doesn't care whether I learn".
> I remember once when I was in 9th grade and my elder brother was a sophomore in college. I found a textbook of his...
I'm curious if/how your teachers reacted?
I wrote a book Freshmen year of high school and started programming on my own. When I presented a physical copy of my self-published book and my computer programs to my teachers they gave me a metaphorical pat on the head, but not one point of extra credit or a special tutor. In computer class I was still expected to learn about Microsoft Excel and in English class I was still required to write two page stories. In my experience, the education system did not empower my curious mind. It felt like I was assigned busy work because the other students lacked motivation otherwise. I can only hope that one day the education system will tailor to the individual.
Is it not strange how in an article arguing from otherwise a very egalitarian, leftist viewpoint, when it discusses how students perform given more or less difficult classes, it somehow thinks the most relevant statistic is the race of the students? (Approximately, even, because American race designation is kinda weird anyway.)
Sure, socio-economic circumstances are correlated with race. (Unfortunately still in this day and age.) Not perfectly, but there is a correlation, so absent other data, it can be used as a proxy for the socio-economic circumstances in which the student grows up. But there are multiple problems with this:
1. If we are to lessen discrimination, the very first thing we should do is stop discriminating. Is this considered normal in the USA? Stop tracking race! And even if you do track it (or an approximation of it) to double-check you're not inadvertently disadvantaging certain minority groups, certainly (1.) there are better measures to designate minority groups, and (2.) one can do this without telling all the world about it and giving society even more fuel for discrimination. If people see other people treat people equally, and see that as normal, they will tend to do the same. We should lead by example, not start a discussion on equality with the worst kind of discrimination.
2. Surely there are better indicators for socio-economic circumstances than race? What about the salary of their parents? This is a typical measure in The Netherlands (where I live). Or even where they live. And if you say that we cannot track those things because that would be an infringement on privacy: how on Earth is tracking parents' salary an infringement on privacy but not tracking race?
Like, I agree that teaching less math is bollocks. But that's not the thing that surprises me most when reading OP.
This is why my kids are in private school now. The public school system here in NJ has been dumbing down its curriculum for years. And while I thought “social promotion” was only a thing in horrible inner city schools, we have it here out in the suburbs, too.
The first six months was very rough as they caught up from being so far behind, but they are being well positioned to the rest of their school careers compared to where they would have ended up academically in the public schools.
To me, it seems like the people who are pushing these policies are doing so to "juke the stats" and make it look like certain demographics aren't as behind academically as they actually are. Statistically, bipoc kids don't do as well in school as white/asian kids, right? I am not trying to make this about race, and I am not suggesting anything other than that statistical reality. But that sentiment seems pretty common when I read about these "equity" programs. "We are doing this to reduce the inequalities between groups X and Y".
One way to fix the statistical aspect of that problem is to reduce the possibility for such disparities to exist, which could be accomplished by removing "higher level" classes, such as algebra in middle school. If the upper limit of what a student can learn is lowered, then the students below that limit are "closer" to the students who are are at or above it.
Can anyone convince me this isn't what's happening? It just seems like a entirely ineffectual political move with the singular goal of making the people behind it look good, so that they can retain power. I cannot provide evidence, because part of my theory is that everyone involved in enacting these policies is either lying, or they incorrectly think that these policies help. I just can't see how anyone can think this is a good idea, or that it will help anything other than the stats. But why shouldn't I think this?
Yeah—but part of the reason for this is because we aren't capable of addressing the actual causes of educational inequality (among other forms...) which have very little to do with schools. Instead we focus on schools and ask them to do the impossible. The results are, predictably, absurd, and harmful to other worthy goals schools ought to have, because the only way to make serious progress is by faking it one way or another, or just getting lucky.
But this is far cheaper than actually fixing our entrenched poverty problems, screwed-up justice system, and terrible social safety net, and school reform programs are easy and often fairly popular (as opposed to what we actually need to do, which is guaranteed to be controversial and probably end up sabotaged no matter which plausible set of solutions one proposes) plus the real solutions would take many years to yield results, which is far too long for our political cycle—so we keep trying, then act surprised and/or outraged when the results are very stupid, when we've set things up such that we're basically asking for stupid results.
> To me, it seems like the people who are pushing these policies are doing so to "juke the stats" and make it look like certain demographics aren't as behind academically as they actually are. Statistically, bipoc kids don't do as well in school as white/asian kids, right? I am not trying to make this about race, and I am not suggesting anything other than that statistical reality. But that sentiment seems pretty common when I read about these "equity" programs. "We are doing this to reduce the inequalities between groups X and Y".
They're trying to make the schools fix poverty (whether caused by racism or anything else), in order to avoid directly fixing poverty. It's an endeavor doomed from the start because it rests on the religious belief that success is directly proportional to merit, and merit is best shown by achievement in school.
But we can't have a society of middle-class strivers, because no ditches will be dug, so all you end up with in the fantasy case is a bunch of well-educated ditch diggers who now have massive student loan debts. What you get in the real case is a bunch of people who realize that they can either A) be depressed baristas lamenting their failure to do better with the expensive degree that has given them a lifetime of debt, B) be depressed baristas who don't owe $100K for a useless degree.
It's not compulsory and free primary education that will fix poverty, and it's not the job of teachers to repair all inequity in society (although to the most egomaniacal, it's all they think their duty is.) Just like it isn't college's duty to fix racism. The way you fix these things is by directly addressing them, not explaining to children how to use a bootstrap.
> The idea that offering children fewer educational resources through the public school system will help the poor kids catch up with rich ones, or help the Black kids catch up with the White and Asian ones, is unsupported by any available evidence of which I am aware.
I was wondering if some people are aware of studies supporting this strategy.
I could try to dig them up, but I remember few studies demonstrating that school success is more correlated to the socio-economical situation of the parent than to the child intrinsic capacities (I think one usual method is to compare success of twins adopted in different families to remove the naive argument "higher socio-economical situation means that these people are intrinsically smarter").
If it is the case, while avoiding the privileged ones to run ahead is not ideal, the alternative of doing nothing is even worse (which is in practice what a lot of people criticizing this measure prone: they did not have any plan to change anything before the subject was introduced).
I think that the idea is not to "dumb down" the kids, but to have a goal that everyone can achieve instead of a goal that is impossible to achieve for some of the poor kids anyway. See under this lens, the proposal makes more sense: the lectures are given at the NORMAL pace, without assuming that extra learning is made at home while it is known that this extra learning is impossible to do for some. A bit like if your professor was saying "we have an exam on chapters 1, 2, 3 and 4, I will tell you the chapters 1 and 3, the chapters 2 and 4 are in the books but I'm going to give this book only to some students and not other". If a professor does that, people will obviously say that it is stupid, that the professor should teach chapters 1 and 2 to everyone and then do a test on chapters 1 and 2, and nobody will pretend that this is "dumbying down" the students.
> If it is the case, while avoiding the privileged ones to run ahead is not ideal, the alternative of doing nothing is even worse (which is in practice what a lot of people criticizing this measure prone: they did not have any plan to change anything before the subject was introduced).
> I think that the idea is not to "dumb down" the kids, but to have a goal that everyone can achieve instead of a goal that is impossible to achieve for some of the poor kids anyway. See under this lens, the proposal makes more sense: the lectures are given at the NORMAL pace, without assuming that extra learning is made at home while it is known that this extra learning is impossible to do for some.
The NORMAL pace is too slow for some kids who aren't even doing any math at home. The solution to kids learn at different paces and some kids can learn at a faster pace if they have resources at home, but not all kids have resources at home isn't force everyone onto the normal pace. It's to make sure all kids have access to resources.
If it's hard to get resources, then maybe you can free up some by adjusting class sizes. Instead of 60 kids, and 20 kids / class room all at the same pace; you can take the 30 kids capable of doing a faster pace and put them in the fast paced room, then have two classes of 15 kids at a slower pace and now they've got more time for individual instruction, and you didn't have to hire anyone.
No-one does real intelligence studies in humans because it's such a third-rail in academia. Think "The Bell Curve". Some scientists seem to believe that intelligence is intrinsic. The analogy with dog breeds, with their different temperaments and capabilities, with individual variation, applies to humans as well.
But then engaged parents will take their kids to Kumon, and rich parents will take their kids to private school.
Their kids will then mop the floor against all other kids, including engaged kids without engaged parents, that would have benefited from more advanced classes. Is that equality?
They address that in the article: tutoring. One on one tutoring works amazingly well. I used to volunteer as a tutor. The students I worked with accelerated drastically. It's simply a matter of money.
They do leave out some things: food + shelter. Many poor students have problems with nutrition and safe shelter, both of which make learning near impossible.
The metro area I'm in is a perfect example of this. We have two small cities side by side. Pretty much the same socioeconomic makeup in both. One invests massively into education, tutoring, summer programs, etc. In the other the schools are literally crumbling, but hey, the police budget is at an all time high! The city investing into education ranks 9/10-10/10 on state tests, the city that allows its buildings to literally crumble (the library was off limits for a while because the ceiling tiles were falling so often they were injuring the children), ranks 2/10.
We don't need to dumb down anything. We need to raise everyone up by investing in education.
You are on to something here. The thing I'd contribute is that then we need teacher training to improve math teaching in the US. Math teaching in the US is often of poor quality, as teachers may not be trained well and are often not confident in their own mathematical ability. Curricula are often haphazard.
The US generally takes the approach that changing the curriculum or changing standards will change outcomes, but rarely invests in teacher quality, which would have very high impact (compare to Korea, Finland, etc.).
I don't follow this debate closely. In the late 1970s, I had the option to take algebra in 8th grade. I was stunned that I was selected, because I was terrible at arithmetic, and honestly I still am. I got Cs, maybe a B every now and then, in math up through 7th grade. My parents didn't apply any pressure (that I know of) to get me in. I remember taking the assessment test for algebra and I didn't even finish it. It was very stressful. But somehow I got in. And starting with algebra, something clicked. I could actually see how math could be used to solve practical problems. I got mostly As in math after that.
More recently, my kids had the option to take algebra in the 8th grade. I don't see any good reason to not keep it available. Sometimes kids need a challenge (or at least need to see a point to it) to engage in a subject.
My guess is that the districts that want to eliminate it are looking at poor math achievement and thinking that applying more resources to getting all the kids up to some minimal level of math literacy is better than diverting some of those resources to a smaller number of kids who are ready for more advanced topics. And yeah, sad to say but there are some teachers who are not themselves capable of teaching algebra or anything more advanced. So teaching it in junior high leaves a smaller pool of qualified teachers for high school math.
So the problems they are trying to solve are really a scarce resource problem. They need more resources to try get the low performers up to some satisfactory level. The real answer of course is always the same whenever you have a supply problem: you need to pay more. Wealthy families will do this. They will hire tutors, either personal or virtual. For the rest of the kids who only have public education available, we've shown a consistent unwillingness to properly fund it. And I don't necessarily mean in terms of total dollars. We spend a lot of money on public education, but we spend it poorly.
> I think that the idea is not to "dumb down" the kids, but to have a goal that everyone can achieve instead of a goal that is impossible to achieve for some [...]
You don't need to have a unified "goal". Just let the faster students learn more. Note California public schools started *removing* optional classes for faster students.
The Dallas experiment is interesting, and it’s not surprising at all that the students actually learned more than if they had been in less-advanced classes.
The question I have is what the grades look like for the kids who were somewhat involuntarily included in the class. In junior high, grades don’t matter all that much, but come high school it could be worse to have lower grades in more challenging courses, depending on how hard the GPA hit is.
In the age of Zoom, won't even slightly well to do parents get tutors from a remote country for a reasonable price for their kids if the school stops teaching math. The only kids who will suffer are the kids where parents are not so much focused on education, thus increasing the disparity.
You can get remote tutors to teach your kid skills, yes. However, if your goal is to have your kid advance to higher math classes, it isn't enough to just know the skills. Schools erect extreme barriers to advancement (Palo Alto USD has been successfully sued on this point [1]), so what students really need is to enroll in outside courses that are certified replacements in order to get credit. Finding out about which courses these are, getting your kid physically to the courses, etc., will always be easier for parents with more means.
I don't think you need to get a tutor from a remote country. I would just enroll them in an after-school math program like Kumon. But yes, enhancing the education after school in general is likely what motivated parents with means would do.
> The only kids who will suffer are the kids where parents are not so much focused on education, thus increasing the disparity.
It’s almost like whenever the government tries to “fix” as issue and put its thumb on the scale it backfires. The results end up being the exact opposite of the government’s stated goal, unless that was the plan all along.
It probably needs to be said because of situations like that in Baltimore, Maryland. The city spends more than 97% of what other major school districts spend, and yet it's students are on average some of the worst performers: https://foxbaltimore.com/news/project-baltimore/baltimore-ci...
Some kids are educatable. Some are not. (and this also depends on subject and other factors)
That's true across all races, classes etc.
I say this because I actually think the biggest issue in education is that we waste resources on kids who are not educable and hold back whole classes for the one kid who refuses. This, and 101 other issues stem from that policy. A big part of what parents get at private schools or schools in nicer neighbourhoods is fewer kids holding the class up.
We should be assessing schools on how many kids get As and go to college. Instead we assess schools on how many kids pass or attend. So schools spend their time and energy dragging truants into classes and turning Ds into Cs. Anyone trying hard is just ignored, there is no news story, reward etc for getting a B kid to get an A etc...
It's not exactly like that. Average IQ is very different between races. That explains many discrepancies. And it also explains these policies that revolve around cutting down the tall poppies.
In most of Europe we have gymnasiums (advanced secondary) and lyceums (advanced high) schools, while primary is "just school" and the same for everyone. After primary education, usually 4 years, entry exams are held at gymnasiums, which have a lot of profiles (PhysMath, ChemBio, Philology etc, mine was Informatics), and those talented enough to pass them are transferred there, while the majority is filtered out and stays in "just schools". After secondary education (4 more years) people could get their high school level education at their "just school" or gymnasium, or either go to lyceum (requires exams) or college (as well). Lyceums are usually for those who aim at doing science at universities, and colleges for those for whom associate's degree is good enough (like me). What is really useful is that with associate's degree people could admit to the 3rd year of university of related profile to get their bachelor's in usually 2 more years. The profitable outcome of such a system is that everybody gets treated depending on their ability, resources are spent effectively and least common denominator doesn't sinks talents. Btw all of those are totally free, so no "social class" advantages are held by anyone. Maybe it's time for US to have gymnasiums and lyceums as well?
Does anyone have a less biased article about this to tell if this is actually a thing?
I remember the controversy over Common Core Math and I realized a lot of people complaining about it weren't very good at math and their criticism was more a reflection of that than valid criticism.
Now it's hard to believe when people complain about something when education is involved.
In the name of progressivism, epistemology in humanities has been dismantled, and business schools soon after were captured by the DIE (diversity, inclusion, equity) religion.
Finally the demented Paulo Freire idolaters are coming for stem fields. Let's see if the push back is too little, too late, or if there's hope. Otherwise, do tutoring or homeschool your children.
Edit: and of course, the result of those last 2 proposed actions will be that the gap between social economically well off kids with good structured families and those in difficulty will soar sky high. And progressives will use that increased gap to double down on asinine policies.
Has anyone tried giving kids a vote in school-board elections?
Teachers' unions are increasingly compromised. Electeds use kids as pawns to appeal to radicals to promote random social causes. And parents seem to focus on grades going up at the expense of an actual education.
Maybe they'll just vote themselves candy. But in my experience, kids understand--at least as well as the median adult voter--what they need to succeed. Enfranchising them in their own educations seems worth exploring.
California, in particular, has high-school only school districts. We don't have to start with whether the kindergarten block is aligned with less nap time.
Asians outscore all other ethnic groups in school.
The schools are under government order to equalize educational outcomes, but because Asians dominate in educational performance the only feasible way to get outcomes is to crush the top, i.e. it's easier to make everyone dumber than make everyone smarter.
It's not OK to harm Asians to elevate other groups when Asians have been victims of racism in America for hundreds of years.
Goodhart's Law: when a measure becomes a target it ceases to be a good measure.
We have a generation if activists and policy makers that have grown up seeing measurements as the ground truth, that they have list sight of what they were trying to accomplish.
I went to public school in the 2000s in South Florida and there were after school programs hosted at the schools to help with all sorts of subjects. Do these school districts not provide these services anymore?
Also, in high school & college I tutored people in mathematics (algebra and pre-calc usually). What I found is that everybody can learn anything (I truly believe this), they just need help and for people to be patient with them. What saddens me about this policy is that:
1. It feels like its giving up on students. Instead of trying to help them they're just throwing their hands up.
2. It also feels like a very lazy and uncreative solution. let's assume there are people who just can't do math. Why not create tracks for them to succeed in topics they are good at and create separate tracks for people good at math? It feels like the school districts are trying to fit everybody into the same bucket when maybe people should be put into different buckets. This is how it was in my public school system (gifted vs. honors vs. regular track) and nobody complained. Regardless of the political association (progressive or not) it feels very very lazy.
[+] [-] pwthornton|2 years ago|reply
"So what should we do instead? Dallas came up with an answer: Teach kids more math instead of teaching them less. In 2019, Dallas Independent School District implemented a new equity policy that encouraged many more people to take honors math classes:
Many capable Hispanic, Black and English learner students did not elect to join these classes on their own or were passed over by their instructors. And their parents were often unaware they could make the request.
Dallas ISD, which serves some 142,000 children, took note of the disparity and in 2017 formed a racial equity advisory council — some of whose members had children in the district — with the goal of improving opportunity for all…It decided to move from an opt-in model to an opt-out policy in the 2019-20 school year. Since then…students cannot opt out [of advances classes] without written parent permission. The move has dramatically increased participation among traditionally marginalized children."
[+] [-] JumpCrisscross|2 years ago|reply
I'm chatting with some friends who are parents in the Bay Area. Their admittedly very Californian response is that at least this should reduce competition for college spots. (Their kids are obviously going to get tutoring.)
[+] [-] MostlyStable|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] logicalmonster|2 years ago|reply
This program may or may not be a fantastic idea, but "participation" is about the worst possible metric for measuring the overall impact of a mandatory program.
Are these children having better overall life and educational outcomes from this? Are they taking time and energy away from classes they want to pursue to struggle in math courses they might not be truly passionate about?
And what about its impact on the non-marginalized kids? Because "everybody" is now participating, are honors courses now slowed and dumbed down so actual high-achievers will be less prepared for their future?
[+] [-] BeFlatXIII|2 years ago|reply
It's an odd combination of teaching kids too much in elementary school and too little in high. The children are exposed to a far more comprehensive curriculum at the expense of never practicing the skills enough to master them. As soon as summer resets their brains, they suddenly have large gaps in knowledge that slow next year's learning.
[+] [-] achates|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lost_tourist|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hdior|2 years ago|reply
STEM minded folks need to eat their own dog food; your sensibilities are not divine mandate.
The other billions don’t owe deference to scientists any more than they do priests.
No scientist is a divine being. Their attitudes can be very human; they think their knowledge and skills is irreplaceable and the social system while trying to pretend that’s objective and could never be leveraged in typically corrupt human ways given their very human being.
In the end you’re one of billions bleating for others to follow the path you lay out. Where is the real or imagine social obligation to specifically serve you or any of the rest of the people here who make up a tiny fraction of the species?
Others think you should learn to grow your own food and kill your steaks rather than exploit the labor of others.
The free market of ideas is not just for selling widgets but tent pole social movements.
[+] [-] wnc3141|2 years ago|reply
https://www.educationnext.org/teachers-should-replace-the-so...
[+] [-] currymj|2 years ago|reply
- Most people don't need to learn calculus at all, and it's fine if the few weird students who do start when they get to college (maybe the advanced students can learn single-variable calculus in high school).
- For pure signaling reasons, taking calculus in high school has become very important for college admissions.
- In order to take calculus in high school, you need to at least take algebra I (and hopefully geometry) in middle school. Wealthier parents understand they are playing the college admissions game early on, so they make sure in elementary school that their kids will be able to get on the algebra track in middle school.
- Getting on the algebra track is thus the first really consequential part of the college admissions game, it happens much earlier than the rest, and takes real scheming by parents to make sure their young kids are prepared. [actually true]
- If you could just make this impossible, it will even the playing field in a huge way and knock down one of the biggest hurdles in college admissions for people from lower-SES backgrounds. [also probably true]
- The only downside is that students will no longer have time to cover calculus in high school, which doesn't matter anyway because it's only a small number of unusual people who need to learn calculus (very advanced math!), and they can just learn it in college.
This is my best guess about the line of thinking that motivates these "no advanced math" policies. It has elements of truth to it which are worth paying attention to. The problem is just that actually, it's really useful and important to learn calculus in high school, and more people need this opportunity.
edit: I thought it was clear that I think a lot more high school students should be learning calculus as early as possible, and that "no advanced math" is a terrible policy, but I guess not...
[+] [-] mabbo|2 years ago|reply
https://archive.org/stream/HarrisonBergeron/Harrison%20Berge...
When the means to achieve equality is to handicap the strong, we're going the wrong way.
It would be more expensive and harder to try instead to invest in and help those with additional needs. But nobody is interested in spending more to help others.
[+] [-] 1024core|2 years ago|reply
So why can't our so-called professionals see this too? Taking away learning opportunities from kids does them no good!
I remember once when I was in 9th grade and my elder brother was a sophomore in college. I found a textbook of his titled "Matrices and Determinants" (or something to that effect), for one of his courses. I picked it up and started reading it. After a few pages I had some questions, asked my dad. He didn't blink and just helped me out. Soon I had finished a couple of chapters and had learned more about matrices, determinants, etc. than I would ever learn in High School. Nobody told me not to read it; they just helped me along whenever I needed the help.
I can't even imagine how toxic this discouragement would be to a curious mind!
[+] [-] gnicholas|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hgs3|2 years ago|reply
I'm curious if/how your teachers reacted?
I wrote a book Freshmen year of high school and started programming on my own. When I presented a physical copy of my self-published book and my computer programs to my teachers they gave me a metaphorical pat on the head, but not one point of extra credit or a special tutor. In computer class I was still expected to learn about Microsoft Excel and in English class I was still required to write two page stories. In my experience, the education system did not empower my curious mind. It felt like I was assigned busy work because the other students lacked motivation otherwise. I can only hope that one day the education system will tailor to the individual.
[+] [-] tomsmeding|2 years ago|reply
Is it not strange how in an article arguing from otherwise a very egalitarian, leftist viewpoint, when it discusses how students perform given more or less difficult classes, it somehow thinks the most relevant statistic is the race of the students? (Approximately, even, because American race designation is kinda weird anyway.)
Sure, socio-economic circumstances are correlated with race. (Unfortunately still in this day and age.) Not perfectly, but there is a correlation, so absent other data, it can be used as a proxy for the socio-economic circumstances in which the student grows up. But there are multiple problems with this:
1. If we are to lessen discrimination, the very first thing we should do is stop discriminating. Is this considered normal in the USA? Stop tracking race! And even if you do track it (or an approximation of it) to double-check you're not inadvertently disadvantaging certain minority groups, certainly (1.) there are better measures to designate minority groups, and (2.) one can do this without telling all the world about it and giving society even more fuel for discrimination. If people see other people treat people equally, and see that as normal, they will tend to do the same. We should lead by example, not start a discussion on equality with the worst kind of discrimination.
2. Surely there are better indicators for socio-economic circumstances than race? What about the salary of their parents? This is a typical measure in The Netherlands (where I live). Or even where they live. And if you say that we cannot track those things because that would be an infringement on privacy: how on Earth is tracking parents' salary an infringement on privacy but not tracking race?
Like, I agree that teaching less math is bollocks. But that's not the thing that surprises me most when reading OP.
[+] [-] Scubabear68|2 years ago|reply
The first six months was very rough as they caught up from being so far behind, but they are being well positioned to the rest of their school careers compared to where they would have ended up academically in the public schools.
[+] [-] colpabar|2 years ago|reply
One way to fix the statistical aspect of that problem is to reduce the possibility for such disparities to exist, which could be accomplished by removing "higher level" classes, such as algebra in middle school. If the upper limit of what a student can learn is lowered, then the students below that limit are "closer" to the students who are are at or above it.
Can anyone convince me this isn't what's happening? It just seems like a entirely ineffectual political move with the singular goal of making the people behind it look good, so that they can retain power. I cannot provide evidence, because part of my theory is that everyone involved in enacting these policies is either lying, or they incorrectly think that these policies help. I just can't see how anyone can think this is a good idea, or that it will help anything other than the stats. But why shouldn't I think this?
[+] [-] bamfly|2 years ago|reply
But this is far cheaper than actually fixing our entrenched poverty problems, screwed-up justice system, and terrible social safety net, and school reform programs are easy and often fairly popular (as opposed to what we actually need to do, which is guaranteed to be controversial and probably end up sabotaged no matter which plausible set of solutions one proposes) plus the real solutions would take many years to yield results, which is far too long for our political cycle—so we keep trying, then act surprised and/or outraged when the results are very stupid, when we've set things up such that we're basically asking for stupid results.
[+] [-] pessimizer|2 years ago|reply
They're trying to make the schools fix poverty (whether caused by racism or anything else), in order to avoid directly fixing poverty. It's an endeavor doomed from the start because it rests on the religious belief that success is directly proportional to merit, and merit is best shown by achievement in school.
But we can't have a society of middle-class strivers, because no ditches will be dug, so all you end up with in the fantasy case is a bunch of well-educated ditch diggers who now have massive student loan debts. What you get in the real case is a bunch of people who realize that they can either A) be depressed baristas lamenting their failure to do better with the expensive degree that has given them a lifetime of debt, B) be depressed baristas who don't owe $100K for a useless degree.
It's not compulsory and free primary education that will fix poverty, and it's not the job of teachers to repair all inequity in society (although to the most egomaniacal, it's all they think their duty is.) Just like it isn't college's duty to fix racism. The way you fix these things is by directly addressing them, not explaining to children how to use a bootstrap.
[+] [-] vuln|2 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] cauch|2 years ago|reply
> The idea that offering children fewer educational resources through the public school system will help the poor kids catch up with rich ones, or help the Black kids catch up with the White and Asian ones, is unsupported by any available evidence of which I am aware.
I was wondering if some people are aware of studies supporting this strategy.
I could try to dig them up, but I remember few studies demonstrating that school success is more correlated to the socio-economical situation of the parent than to the child intrinsic capacities (I think one usual method is to compare success of twins adopted in different families to remove the naive argument "higher socio-economical situation means that these people are intrinsically smarter").
If it is the case, while avoiding the privileged ones to run ahead is not ideal, the alternative of doing nothing is even worse (which is in practice what a lot of people criticizing this measure prone: they did not have any plan to change anything before the subject was introduced).
I think that the idea is not to "dumb down" the kids, but to have a goal that everyone can achieve instead of a goal that is impossible to achieve for some of the poor kids anyway. See under this lens, the proposal makes more sense: the lectures are given at the NORMAL pace, without assuming that extra learning is made at home while it is known that this extra learning is impossible to do for some. A bit like if your professor was saying "we have an exam on chapters 1, 2, 3 and 4, I will tell you the chapters 1 and 3, the chapters 2 and 4 are in the books but I'm going to give this book only to some students and not other". If a professor does that, people will obviously say that it is stupid, that the professor should teach chapters 1 and 2 to everyone and then do a test on chapters 1 and 2, and nobody will pretend that this is "dumbying down" the students.
[+] [-] toast0|2 years ago|reply
> I think that the idea is not to "dumb down" the kids, but to have a goal that everyone can achieve instead of a goal that is impossible to achieve for some of the poor kids anyway. See under this lens, the proposal makes more sense: the lectures are given at the NORMAL pace, without assuming that extra learning is made at home while it is known that this extra learning is impossible to do for some.
The NORMAL pace is too slow for some kids who aren't even doing any math at home. The solution to kids learn at different paces and some kids can learn at a faster pace if they have resources at home, but not all kids have resources at home isn't force everyone onto the normal pace. It's to make sure all kids have access to resources.
If it's hard to get resources, then maybe you can free up some by adjusting class sizes. Instead of 60 kids, and 20 kids / class room all at the same pace; you can take the 30 kids capable of doing a faster pace and put them in the fast paced room, then have two classes of 15 kids at a slower pace and now they've got more time for individual instruction, and you didn't have to hire anyone.
[+] [-] javajosh|2 years ago|reply
See Richard Haier: IQ Tests, Human Intelligence, and Group Differences | Lex Fridman Podcast https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hppbxV9C63g
[+] [-] zzleeper|2 years ago|reply
Their kids will then mop the floor against all other kids, including engaged kids without engaged parents, that would have benefited from more advanced classes. Is that equality?
[+] [-] light_hue_1|2 years ago|reply
They do leave out some things: food + shelter. Many poor students have problems with nutrition and safe shelter, both of which make learning near impossible.
The metro area I'm in is a perfect example of this. We have two small cities side by side. Pretty much the same socioeconomic makeup in both. One invests massively into education, tutoring, summer programs, etc. In the other the schools are literally crumbling, but hey, the police budget is at an all time high! The city investing into education ranks 9/10-10/10 on state tests, the city that allows its buildings to literally crumble (the library was off limits for a while because the ceiling tiles were falling so often they were injuring the children), ranks 2/10.
We don't need to dumb down anything. We need to raise everyone up by investing in education.
[+] [-] kaitai|2 years ago|reply
The US generally takes the approach that changing the curriculum or changing standards will change outcomes, but rarely invests in teacher quality, which would have very high impact (compare to Korea, Finland, etc.).
[+] [-] stale2002|2 years ago|reply
Nobody has a problem with there being options for students to learn at their own pace.
The problem is not allowing people to take more advanced classes, if they so choose.
> nobody will pretend that this is "dumbying down" the students.
If you prevent students from taking more advanced classes, if those students choose it, then yes it would be dumbing down their education.
Just let them take the more advanced classes. Stop removing their options.
[+] [-] SoftTalker|2 years ago|reply
More recently, my kids had the option to take algebra in the 8th grade. I don't see any good reason to not keep it available. Sometimes kids need a challenge (or at least need to see a point to it) to engage in a subject.
My guess is that the districts that want to eliminate it are looking at poor math achievement and thinking that applying more resources to getting all the kids up to some minimal level of math literacy is better than diverting some of those resources to a smaller number of kids who are ready for more advanced topics. And yeah, sad to say but there are some teachers who are not themselves capable of teaching algebra or anything more advanced. So teaching it in junior high leaves a smaller pool of qualified teachers for high school math.
So the problems they are trying to solve are really a scarce resource problem. They need more resources to try get the low performers up to some satisfactory level. The real answer of course is always the same whenever you have a supply problem: you need to pay more. Wealthy families will do this. They will hire tutors, either personal or virtual. For the rest of the kids who only have public education available, we've shown a consistent unwillingness to properly fund it. And I don't necessarily mean in terms of total dollars. We spend a lot of money on public education, but we spend it poorly.
[+] [-] yes_really|2 years ago|reply
You don't need to have a unified "goal". Just let the faster students learn more. Note California public schools started *removing* optional classes for faster students.
[+] [-] CrimsonRain|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gnicholas|2 years ago|reply
The question I have is what the grades look like for the kids who were somewhat involuntarily included in the class. In junior high, grades don’t matter all that much, but come high school it could be worse to have lower grades in more challenging courses, depending on how hard the GPA hit is.
[+] [-] crop_rotation|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gnicholas|2 years ago|reply
1: https://thecampanile.org/27999/news/the-verdict-is-in-pausds...
[+] [-] thatfrenchguy|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] headcanon|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vuln|2 years ago|reply
It’s almost like whenever the government tries to “fix” as issue and put its thumb on the scale it backfires. The results end up being the exact opposite of the government’s stated goal, unless that was the plan all along.
[+] [-] mydriasis|2 years ago|reply
It is shocking to me that this has to be said. What in the world...
[+] [-] 1MachineElf|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] LatteLazy|2 years ago|reply
Some kids are educatable. Some are not. (and this also depends on subject and other factors)
That's true across all races, classes etc.
I say this because I actually think the biggest issue in education is that we waste resources on kids who are not educable and hold back whole classes for the one kid who refuses. This, and 101 other issues stem from that policy. A big part of what parents get at private schools or schools in nicer neighbourhoods is fewer kids holding the class up.
We should be assessing schools on how many kids get As and go to college. Instead we assess schools on how many kids pass or attend. So schools spend their time and energy dragging truants into classes and turning Ds into Cs. Anyone trying hard is just ignored, there is no news story, reward etc for getting a B kid to get an A etc...
[+] [-] avisser|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] goodpoint|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] veave|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] x3qt|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thrashh|2 years ago|reply
I remember the controversy over Common Core Math and I realized a lot of people complaining about it weren't very good at math and their criticism was more a reflection of that than valid criticism.
Now it's hard to believe when people complain about something when education is involved.
[+] [-] sergiogjr|2 years ago|reply
Finally the demented Paulo Freire idolaters are coming for stem fields. Let's see if the push back is too little, too late, or if there's hope. Otherwise, do tutoring or homeschool your children.
Edit: and of course, the result of those last 2 proposed actions will be that the gap between social economically well off kids with good structured families and those in difficulty will soar sky high. And progressives will use that increased gap to double down on asinine policies.
[+] [-] JumpCrisscross|2 years ago|reply
Teachers' unions are increasingly compromised. Electeds use kids as pawns to appeal to radicals to promote random social causes. And parents seem to focus on grades going up at the expense of an actual education.
Maybe they'll just vote themselves candy. But in my experience, kids understand--at least as well as the median adult voter--what they need to succeed. Enfranchising them in their own educations seems worth exploring.
California, in particular, has high-school only school districts. We don't have to start with whether the kindergarten block is aligned with less nap time.
[+] [-] fwungy|2 years ago|reply
The schools are under government order to equalize educational outcomes, but because Asians dominate in educational performance the only feasible way to get outcomes is to crush the top, i.e. it's easier to make everyone dumber than make everyone smarter.
It's not OK to harm Asians to elevate other groups when Asians have been victims of racism in America for hundreds of years.
[+] [-] declan_roberts|2 years ago|reply
It's like a super power to be able to tailor education for your own children. You know their strengths and weaknesses better than anybody.
[+] [-] gizmo686|2 years ago|reply
We have a generation if activists and policy makers that have grown up seeing measurements as the ground truth, that they have list sight of what they were trying to accomplish.
[+] [-] ironman1478|2 years ago|reply
Also, in high school & college I tutored people in mathematics (algebra and pre-calc usually). What I found is that everybody can learn anything (I truly believe this), they just need help and for people to be patient with them. What saddens me about this policy is that:
1. It feels like its giving up on students. Instead of trying to help them they're just throwing their hands up.
2. It also feels like a very lazy and uncreative solution. let's assume there are people who just can't do math. Why not create tracks for them to succeed in topics they are good at and create separate tracks for people good at math? It feels like the school districts are trying to fit everybody into the same bucket when maybe people should be put into different buckets. This is how it was in my public school system (gifted vs. honors vs. regular track) and nobody complained. Regardless of the political association (progressive or not) it feels very very lazy.